As it was based on the results of chemical and physiological investigations, let us go back of the opinion expressed by the Medical Congress, and examine these results, in order that the ground of its opinion may become apparent.
There was presented to this Congress, by a distinguished physician of New Jersey, Dr.Ezra M.Hunt, a paper on "Alcohol as a Food and Medicine," in which the whole subject is examined in the light of the most recent and carefully-conducted experiments of English, French, German and American chemists and physiologists, and their conclusions, as well as those of the author of the paper, set forth in the plainest manner.

This has since been published by the National Temperance Society, and should be read and carefully studied by every one who is seeking for accurate information on the important subject we are now considering.

It is impossible for us to more than glance at the evidence brought forward in proof of the assertion that ALCOHOL HAS NO FOOD VALUE, and is exceedingly limited in its action as a remedial agent; and we, therefore, urge upon all who are interested in this subject, to possess themselves of Dr.Hunt's exhaustive treatise, and to study it carefully.
If the reader will refer to the quotation made by us in the second chapter from Dr.Henry Monroe, where the food value of any article is treated of, he will see it stated that "every kind of substance employed by man as food consists of sugar, starch, oil and glutinous matter, mingled together in various proportions; these are designed for the support of the animal frame.

The glutinous principles of food--fibrine, albumen and casein--are employed to build up the structure; while the oil, starch and sugar are chiefly used to generate heat in the body." Now, it is clear, that if alcohol is a food, it will be found to contain one or more of these substances.

There must be in it either the nitrogenous elements found chiefly in meats, eggs, milk, vegetables and seeds, out of which animal tissue is built and waste repaired; or the carbonaceous elements found in fat, starch and sugar, in the consumption of which heat and force are evolved.
"The distinctness of these groups of foods," says Dr.Hunt, "and their relations to the tissue-producing and heat-evolving capacities of man, are so definite and so confirmed by experiments on animals and by manifold tests of scientific, physiological and clinical experience, that no attempt to discard the classification has prevailed.