change in their dress, in consequence of adopting the change of diet; nor that they have discovered any thing like a decrease of heat, arising from that change, to induce them to think it necessary."

303. In conclusion, I can with truth affirm that, after nine years trial of an exclusively vegetable diet, I feel no inconvenience from the change of the seasons; though I am more thinly clad than formerly; and my present immunity from coughs and colds, to which I was very subject, may probably be attributed to the joint influence of a natural diet, and daily sponging or bathing with cold

water.

CHAPTER VI.

INFLUENCE OF AZOTIZED FOOD IN THE PRODUCTION OF CERTAIN DISEASES.

Si tibi deficiant medici, medici tibi fiant

Hæc tria; mens hilaris, requies, moderata diæta.-SCHOLA SALER.

304. As health depends (primarily) upon a sound constitution, or fitness of the bodily organs to perform the functions assigned to them, and (secondarily) upon a proper relation between those organs and external objects, so disease is the consequence of organic defects, or the want of relation between external matter and the organs, or of both;—so that the processes of decay and renewal are interrupted, or imperfectly performed. Functional disarrangement, therefore, affords the first indications of the commencement of disease; and although, in certain conditions of the atmosphere, the healthiest person may be subject to epidemic infection, yet were all the physiological laws of health strictly observed by persons of originally sound constitutions, they would seldom suffer from disease.

305. The principal avenues through which external agents influence organic life, for good or for ill, are the stomach, the lungs, and the skin or general surface:

the two latter require in this place no notice; our attention, therefore, will be confined to the former. It has already been shown, in part, (though the subject admits of much further elucidation,) that the teeth, salivary glands, stomach, liver, pancreas, spleen, the whole of the alimentary canal, and even the kidneys, lungs, and skin, as well as all the other organs of the body, bear a determinate relation to each other, and to the natural food of the animal. Various and wonderful are the contrivances and adaptations of nature, for removing from the system any foreign matter that may make its way into the blood, as well as any excess of such substances as are natural to it, which food improper as to quality or quantity, may be the means of introducing. Nay, even so provident is nature, that when men absurdly persist in supplying the stomach with food that is unnatural (whether solid or liquid), the increased action to which any organ is excited, in order to rid the system of what is injurious, gradually enlarges the organ itself; so that it may the more energetically and efficiently perform the additional duty imposed upon it. But this can take place only within certain limits; and, in a great many instances, functional and finally structural disarrangement, is the consequence of over stimulation.

306. Without entering further into the nature of disease or its causes, we may show-1. That too stimulating a diet, or one that is unnatural in quality or quantity, is a very general cause of functional disorder. 2. That an abstemious diet of fruit, grain, and other farinaceous vegetables is, in general, the surest means of restoration

:

to health. Let it however be clearly understood, that improper food is not considered the only means of introducing disease inattention to exercise, pure air, cleanliness, the cutaneous and other excretions, together with a number of acquired and unnatural habits, may be equally effective in destroying health; and a man who lives temperately upon a mixed diet of animal and vegetable food, and is at the same time regular in other sanitary habits, will enjoy a far greater share of health, and be less liable to epidemic diseases, than the man who adheres strictly to a vegetable diet, but neglects all other physiological laws.

307. If fruit, and other products of the vegetable kingdom, be the natural food of man, (of which much evidence has already been adduced,) it is reasonable to conclude, à priori, that all the functions of the human frame will be best maintained in healthy action upon this diet; and the most readily restored by it to a normal state, when functional power has been lost and many eminent medical practitioners entertain this opinion.

308. "The effects of animal food, and other noxious matter", observes Dr. Lambe, " of inducing and accelerating fatal disease, are not immediate, but ultimate effects. The immediate effect is to engender a diseased habit, or state of constitution: not enough to impede the ordinary occupations of life, but (in many) to render life itself a long continued sickness; and to make the great mass of society morbidly susceptible of many passing impressions, which would have no injurious influence upon healthy systems." (239.)

309. "Food in excess", says Dr. Clarke, "or of a kind too exciting for the digestive organs, may induce tubercular cachexia;- a circumstance which is not sufficiently attended to,-I may say not generally understood, even by medical men. Nevertheless I hold it to be a frequent cause of scrofula; and believe that it produces the same effect on the system, as a deficient supply." Dr. Buchan oberves-" Consumptions, so common in England, are in part owing to the great use of animal food"; and Dr. Lambe is of opinion, that scrofula and other diseases are frequently attributable to the same cause.

310. Abernethy says "Animal substances are changed into a putrid, abominable, and acrid stimulus"; which was verified by Sir Edwd. Berry, who prevailed upon a man to live on partridges without vegetables; but, after eight days' trial, he was obliged to desist; in consequence of strong symptoms then appearing of an incipient putrefaction. “Errors in diet are the great source of disease: amendment of diet is the basis of recovery. The majority of our maladies medicine may relieve or suspend; but, without the aid of regimen, can never cure.'

*

311. Many believe that the abuse of animal food, as an article of diet, is connected with the introduction of certain diseases; some of which appear to be of modern date, and are yet unknown in other parts of the globe. Dr. Sigmond, in his work on mercury, &c., says—“ It is stated, that our living on animal food is the cause of the greater number of diseases to which man is subject." Dr. Alphonsus Lercy, of Paris, has published an Essay on

*THACKRAH'S "LECTURES ON DIGESTION AND DIET." P. 108.

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