h. The juice,[234] by which
we are nourished, being separated from the rest of the food, passes the
stomach and intestines to the liver, through open and direct passages,
which lead from the mesentery to the gates of the liver (for so they
call those vessels at the entrance of it). There are other passages
from thence, through which the food has its course when it has passed
the liver. When the bile, and those humors which proceed from the
kidneys, are separated from the food, the remaining part turns to
blood, and flows to those vessels at the entrance of the liver to which
all the passages adjoin. The chyle, being conveyed from this place
through them into the vessel called the hollow vein, is mixed together,
and, being already digested and distilled, passes into the heart; and
from the heart it is communicated through a great number of veins to
every part of the body.

It is not difficult to describe how the gross remains are detruded by
the motion of the intestines, which contract and dilate; but that must
be declined, as too indelicate for discourse. Let us rather explain
that other wonder of nature, the air, which is drawn into the lungs,
receives heat both by that already in and by the coagitation of the
lungs; one part is turned back by respiration, and the other is
received into a place called the ventricle of the heart.[235] There is
another ventricle like it annexed to the heart, into which the blood
flows from the liver through the hollow vein. Thus by one ventricle the
blood is diffused to the extremities through the veins, and by the
other the breath is communicated through the arteries; and there are
such numbers of both dispersed through the whole body that they
manifest a divine art.

Why need I speak of the bones, those supports of the body, whose joints
are so wonderfully contrived for stability, and to render the limbs
complete with regard to motion and to every action of the body? Or need
I mention the nerves, by which the limbs are governed--their many
interweavings, and their proceeding from the heart,[236] from whence,
like the veins and arteries, they have their origin, and are
distributed through the whole corporeal frame?

LVI. To this skill of nature, and this care of providence, so diligent
and so ingenious, many reflections may be added, which show what
valuable things the Deity has bestowed on man. He has made us of a
stature tall and upright, in order that we might behold the heavens,