chagrin differs from Balzac in its capacity of being repaired, and brought back to its full size, after every exertion.
"'For example, this present lecture, whatever its intellectual worth to you, has a certain physical value to me, which is, conceivably, expressible by the number of grains of protoplasm and other bodily substance wasted in maintaining my vital processes during its delivery. My peau de chagrin will be distinctly smaller at the end of the discourse than it was at the beginning. By and by, I shall probably have recourse to the substance commonly called mutton, for the purpose of stretching it back to its original size. Now, this mutton was once the living protoplasm, more or less modified, of another animal,—a sheep. As I shall eat it, it is the same matter altered, not only by death, but by exposure to sundry artificial operations in the process of cooking.
"'But these changes, whatever be their extent, have not rendered it incompetent to resume its old functions as matter of life. A singular inward laboratory which I possess will dissolve a certain portion of the modified protoplasm; the solution so formed will pass into my veins; and the subtle influences to which it will then be subjected will convert the dead protoplasm, and transubstantiate sheep into man.
"'Nor is this all. If digestion were a thing to be trifled with, I might sup upon a lobster, and the matter of life of the crustacean would undergo the same wonderful metamorphosis into humanity. And, were I to return to my own place by sea, and undergo shipwreck, the Crustacean might, and probably would, return the compliment, and demonstrate our common nature by turning my protoplasm into living lobster. Or, if nothing better were to be had, I might supply my wants with mere bread, and I should find the protoplasm of the wheat-plant to be convertible into man, with no more trouble than that of the sheep, and with far less, I fancy, than that of the lobster.'"
I hold that every one of us is born with a certain amount of protoplasmal capital, both in fact and the power of gaining it. Nothing wastes so much as heat, hence the affections will not bear too much tampering with, for of all the earthly powers of life-destroying, none are so effectual as the passions, especially the amorous, for it destroys and saps the very citadel and capital of
