Encyclopedia of Diet: a Treatise on the Food Question, Vol. 5

Part 1

ENCYCLOPEDIA OF DIET

A Treatise on the Food Question

IN FIVE VOLUMES

EXPLAINING, IN PLAIN LANGUAGE, THE CHEMISTRY OF FOOD AND THE CHEMISTRY OF THE HUMAN BODY, TOGETHER WITH THE ART OF UNITING THESE TWO BRANCHES OF SCIENCE IN THE PROCESS OF EATING SO AS TO ESTABLISH NORMAL DIGESTION AND ASSIMILATION OF FOOD AND NORMAL ELIMINATION OF WASTE, THEREBY REMOVING THE CAUSES OF STOMACH, INTESTINAL, AND ALL OTHER DIGESTIVE DISORDERS

EUGENE CHRISTIAN, F. S. D.

VOLUME V

NEW YORK CITY CORRECTIVE EATING SOCIETY, INC. 1917 COPYRIGHT 1914 BY EUGENE CHRISTIAN ENTERED AT STATIONERS HALL, LONDON SEPTEMBER, 1914 BY EUGENE CHRISTIAN, F. S. D. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

PUBLISHED AUGUST, 1914

CONTENTS

VOLUME V

Lesson XVI Page

ADAPTING FOOD TO SPECIAL CONDITIONS 1145

Infant, Old Age, and Athletic Feeding; Sedentary Occupations, Climatic Extremes 1147

Normal Diet 1152

Infant Feeding 1154

General Rules for the Prospective Mother 1157

Special Rules for the Prospective Mother 1159

The Nursing Mother 1162

Care of the Child 1164

Constipation 1169

Exercise 1171

Clothing 1171

Temperature of Baby's Food 1173

Bandage 1173

Emaciation 1173

General Instructions for Children after One Year 1174

General Diet from Ages One to Two 1174

Simplicity in Feeding 1175

Part 2

Old Age 1178

Three Periods of Old Age 1181

Athletics 1188

Sedentary Occupations 1194

General Directions for Sedentary Worker 1198

Climatic Extremes 1199

Lesson XVII

NERVOUSNESS--ITS CAUSE AND CURE 1209

Causes 1213

The Remedy 1217

Suggestions for Spring 1220

Suggestions for Summer 1222

Suggestions for Fall 1223

Suggestions for Winter 1224

Lesson XVIII

POINTS ON PRACTISE 1231

Introduction to Points on Practise 1233

Suggestions for the Practitioner 1236

Value of Experience 1239

Value of Diagnosis 1241

Educate Your Patient 1242

Effect of Mental Conditions 1245

Publicity 1247

Be Courteous and Tolerant 1250

Lesson XIX

EVOLUTION OF MAN 1253

What is Evolution? 1255

The Three Great Proofs of the Evolution of Animal Life 1261

Part 3

Man's Animal Kinship 1265

Lesson XX

SEX AND HEREDITY 1277

The Origin of Sex 1279

A Rational View of Sexual Health 1285

Embryological Growth--Prenatal Culture 1289

Heredity 1293

What Heredity Is 1295

Summary of Facts regarding Sex and Heredity 1297

Lesson XXI

REST AND SLEEP 1299

Rest 1301

The Old Physiology 1305

Rest and Recreation 1306

Sleep 1308

Some Reasons 1310

Oxidation and Air 1312

Lesson XXII

A LESSON FOR BUSINESS MEN 1315

A Good Business Man 1320

The Routine Life of the Average Business Man 1322

Some Suggestions for a Good Business Man 1324

Lesson XXIII

EXERCISE AND RE-CREATION 1327

Exercise 1329

Constructive Exercises 1330

Exercise for Repair 1331

Physiology of Exercise 1333

Part 4

Systems of Physical Culture 1338

Program for Daily Exercise 1343

Re-creation 1346

LESSON XVI

<sc>Adapting Food to Special Conditions</sc>

INFANT, OLD AGE, AND ATHLETIC FEEDING, SEDENTARY OCCUPATIONS, CLIMATIC EXTREMES

Diet may be divided into three distinct classes--normal, preventive, and curative. In order to understand the application of diet to these several conditions, it is necessary to observe the following rules:

1 Foods must be selected which contain all the desired nutritive elements.

2 They must be so combined as to produce chemical harmony, or should at least produce no undesirable chemical action.

3 They must be proportioned so as to level or balance their nutritive elements; that is, to prevent overfeeding on some elements of nourishment, and underfeeding on others.

Many fine specimens of men and women have been produced without knowledge of these laws, but in nearly every case it may have been observed that the person was normal as to habits, and temperate in eating, therefore led aright by instinct.

If one lives an active life, spending from three to five hours a day in the open air, the body will cast off and burn with oxygen much excess nutrition, and will also convert or appropriate certain nutritive elements to one purpose, which, according to all known chemical laws, Nature intended for another. Much better results, however, will be obtained by giving Nature the right material with which to work, thus pursuing lines of least resistance.

What foods to select, how they should be combined and proportioned, is determined mainly by laws dependent upon the following conditions:

1 Age.

2 Temperature of environment--time of year or climate.

3 Work or activity.

(1) As to age:

If we wish the best results we must select and proportion our food according to age, because the growing child or youth needs much structural material--calcium phosphates--with which to build bone, teeth, and cartilage. This is found in cereals and in all grain foods. The middle-aged person needs but little of these--just enough for repair, and the aged person needs practically none.

While the growing child needs calcium phosphate, he also needs milk and natural sweets, which named in the order of their preference are honey, maple-sugar, dates, figs, and raisins. This does not mean that a generous quantity of vegetables and fruit cannot be taken, but that the articles first mentioned (cereals and starchy foods) should form a conspicuous part of the child's diet.

The adult needs a much less quantity of the heavier starchy foods, because the structural part of the body has been built up. The diet of the adult should consist of vegetables, nuts, and a normal quantity of sweets, a normal quantity of fruits, milk and eggs, with rather a limited amount of cereal or bread products, while the aged, or those having passed sixty, could subsist wholly upon a non-starch diet (non-cereal starch), such as vegetables, milk, nuts, eggs, salads, and fruits, including bananas, which is not a fruit, but a vegetable, and which contains a splendid form of readily soluble starch.

(2) As to time of year:

In selecting and proportioning our food we should observe the laws of temperature or time of the year. We should not eat foods of a high caloric or heating value at a time when the sun is giving us this heat direct, thus building a fire inside, while the sun is giving us the same heat outside. The violation of this simple law is the cause of all sunstroke and heat prostrations. On the contrary, if we are going to be exposed to zero weather, we should build a fire inside by eating foods of a high caloric value.

(3) As to work or activity:

We should select and proportion our food according to the work we do, because eating is a process of making energy, while work is a process of expending energy, and we should make these two accounts balance.

THE NORMAL DIET

While in some respects each body is a law unto itself, there are a few fundamental rules and laws that apply to all alike. For instance, overeating of starchy foods, in every case, will produce too much uric acid, and finally rheumatism. Also the overeating of sweets and starches will cause the stomach to secrete an over-supply of fermentative acids, the effects of which have been discussed in a previous lesson.

In laying out the diet, under all conditions, the practitioner must be governed by the above-named rules. He should exercise his judgment, however, in each case according to the prevailing conditions. In prescribing diet it is well to remember that Nature will not tolerate, without protest, any radical change. It often occurs, therefore, that the most correct and thoroughly balanced menu will cause violent physical disturbances which the inexperienced may consider as unfavorable symptoms, but in a majority of cases this is merely the adjusting process, similar to that which occurs when the body is suddenly deprived of narcotics and stimulants after their habitual use.

The practitioner should exercise much care in diagnosis. He should study all symptoms and lay out the diet so as to counteract prevailing conditions, and to produce normality.

Part 5

The tendency of the body, that has been incorrectly fed for many years, to protest against the right kind and the right combinations of food, is often very deceptive. It is not always correct to say that the food did not agree with the stomach, but more correct to say that the different foods did not agree with themselves. The patient should be thoroughly acquainted with these facts, and mentally prepared for some temporary discomforts or physical protest against the new system.

INFANT FEEDING

The tremendous mortality among infants and children is due to incorrect feeding more than to all other causes. In the process of reproducing animal life, nearly all abnormal conditions are eliminated. The best that is in the mother is given to the child. The trend of Nature is upward toward higher intelligence and more perfect physical development. For this reason infants are usually healthier than their parents, though millions of babies are rapidly broken in health by improper feeding.

The economy of Nature is perfect, therefore all natural forces conspire to preserve the life of the young. This is the natural law governing the preservation and the development of human life, and that this condition does not obtain is the most striking evidence of our lack of knowledge in feeding the young.

Infant feeding must be considered from two points of view: (1) Dealing with the child or infant as we find it, where the mother has so violated Nature's laws of nutrition and hygiene as to afford no breast-milk for her child; (2) where this condition does not prevail, and the child receives ample nourishment from the breast of the mother.

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