body; therefore alcohol is food. As logically we
might say: 'All birds are bilaterally symmetrical; the earthworm
is bilaterally symmetrical; therefore the earthworm is a bird.'
Oxidation within the body is simply one of several important
properties of food, as bilateral symmetry is one of several
important characteristics of a bird."

Schafer's Physiology says:--

"It cannot be doubted that any small production of energy
resulting from the oxidation of alcohol is more than
counterbalanced by its deleterious influences as a drug upon the
tissue elements, and especially upon those of the nervous
system."

The _Bulletin_ of the A. M. T. A. for July, 1899, contained an article
upon Prof. Atwater by Dr. J. H. Kellogg, from which the following is
taken:--

"Starch, sugar and fats become foods or fuels only through their
assimilation. Abundant physiological evidence attests that no
substance can act as a food, or as a true source of energy,
unless it has first entered into the composition of the body. It
must be assimilated. The forces manifested by the body, the
muscular forces, or nervous energy, are the result of the
breaking down of organized structure into simpler forms. For
example, in the case of nervous energy, material from which
nerve energy is derived is stored up in the nerve cell, and can
be seen with the microscope in the form of minute granules,
which disappear as the cell energy is expended, leaving the cell
blank and shriveled when in a state of extreme fatigue from
overwork. The same is essentially true of the muscle cell. The
source of muscular energy is glycogen, an organized substance
which becomes a part of the muscle tissue in a well-nourished
muscle in a state of rest.

"Experiments have clearly shown that fat, sugar and starch must
all alike be converted into the form of glycogen and enter into
the muscle structure before they can become a source of energy.

"Professor Atwater tells us that alcohol can not form tissue,
hence the query is pertinent, How can it be a source of vital
energy? The body does not burn food as a stove does fuel. Food
can be called fuel only in a highly figurative sense. The
oxidation of food in the body does not take place directly. Food
is assimilated, becoming a part of the tissue. Oxygen is also
assimilated, entering into t