William A. Alcott

Letter from Dr. H. A. Barrows.—Dr. J. M. B. Harden.—Dr. J. Porter.—Dr. N. J. Knight.—Dr. Lester Keep.—Second letter from Dr. Keep.—Dr. Henry H. Brown.—Dr. Franklin Knox.—From a Physician.—Additional statements by the Author.

During the years 1837 and 1838 I wrote to several of the physicians whose names, experiments, and facts appear in Chapter II. Their answers, so far as received, are now to be presented.

I have also received interesting letters from several other physicians in New England and elsewhere—but particularly in New England—on the same general subject, which, with an additional statement of my own case, I have added to the foregoing. I might have added a hundred authentic cases, of similar import. I might also have obtained an additional amount of the same sort of intelligence, had it not been for the want of time, amid numerous other pressing avocations, for correspondence of this kind. Besides, if what I have obtained is not satisfactory, I have many doubts whether more would be so.

The first letter I shall insert is from Dr. H. A. Barrows, of Phillips, in Maine. It is dated October 10, 1837, and may be considered as a sequel to that written by him to Dr. North, though it is addressed to the author of this volume.

LETTER I.—FROM DR. H. A. BARROWS.

Dear Sir,—As to food, my course of living has been quite uniform for the last two or three years—principally as follows. Wheat meal bread, potatoes, butter, and baked sweet apples for breakfast and dinners; for suppers, old dry flour bread, which, eaten very leisurely without butter, sauce, or drink, sits the lightest and best of any thing I eat. But I cannot make this my principal diet, because the bowels will not act (without physic) unless they have the spur of wheat bran two thirds of the time. I have at times practiced going to bed without any third meal; and have found myself amply rewarded for this kind of fasting, and the consequent respite thereby afforded the stomach, in quiet sleep and improved condition the next day. And as to drink, I still use cold water, which I take with as great a zest, and as keen a relish, as the inebriate does his stimulus. I seldom drink any thing with my meals; and if I could live without drinking any thing between meals, I think I should be rid of the principal "thorn in my side," the acetous fermentation so constantly going on in my epigastric storehouse.

As to exercise, I take abundance; perform all my practice (except in the winter) on horseback, and find this the very best kind of exercise for me. I seldom eat oftener than at intervals of six hours, and am apt to eat too much—have at various times attempted Don Cornaro's method of weighing food, but have found it rather dry business, probably on account of its conflicting with my appetite; but I actually find that my stomach does not bear watching at all well.

My brother continues to practice nearly total abstinence from animal food. I have seen him but once in two and a half years, but learn his health has greatly improved, so that he was able to take charge of a high school in the fall of 1836, of an academy in the spring of the present year, and also again this fall. During his vacation last July, he took a tour into the interior of Worcester county, Mass., and came home entirely on foot by way of the Notch of the White Hills, traveling nearly three hundred miles. This speaks something in favor of rigid abstinence—as when he commenced this regimen he was extremely low.

Yours sincerely,

H. A. Barrows.

LETTER II.—FROM DR. JOHN M. B. HARDEN.

Georgia, Liberty Co., Oct. 19, 1837.

Dear Sir,—I stated in my letter to Dr. North, if I recollect correctly, that the use of animal food was resumed in consequence of a protracted indisposition brought on, as was supposed, by the inhalation of arseniuretted hydrogen gas. The gentleman had begun to recover some time previously; and in a short time after he commenced the use of the animal food, he was restored to his usual health. He has continued the use of it ever since to the same extent as in the former part of his life. He has lately passed his fifty-fifth year, and is now in the enjoyment of as good health as he has ever known.

I know of a gentleman in an adjoining county, who with his lady has been living for some time past on a purely vegetable diet. They have not continued it long enough, however, to make the experiment a fair one.

No case of injury from the inhalation of arseniuretted hydrogen has come under my own personal observation, if we except the one above alluded to. I find, however, that Gehlen, a celebrated French chemist, fell a victim to it in the year 1815. His death is thus announced in the "Philosophical Magazine" for that year. "We lament to have to announce the death of Gehlen, many years the editor of an excellent Journal on Chemistry and other sciences, and a profound chemist. He fell a victim to his ardent desire to promote the advancement of chemical knowledge. He was preparing, in company with Mr. Rehland, his colleague, some arsenated hydrogen gas, and while watching for the full development of this air from its acid solution, trying every moment to judge from its particular smell when that operation would be completed, he inhaled the fatal poison which has robbed science of his valuable services." Vide Tillock's Phil. Mag., vol. 46, p. 316. Some further notice is taken of his death in a paper extracted from the "Annales de Chimie et de Physique," and published in a subsequent volume of the same Magazine. Vide vol. 49, p. 280, in which are given his last experiments on that subject, by M. Gay Lussac. I regret that no account is given in the same work of the symptoms arising from the poison in his case. I presume, however, they are on record.

In the subject of the case I mention, the general and prominent symptoms were an immediate and great diminution of muscular strength, with pallor of countenance and constant febricula, the arteries of the head beating with violence, particularly when lying down at night, the pulse always moderately increased in frequency, and full, but not tense; and digestion for the most part good. This state continued for about three months, during which time he was attending to his usual business, although not able to take as much exercise as before. At the end of this time he began to recover slowly, but it was six months before he was restored entirely.

Yours, etc.,

John M. B. Harden.

LETTER III.—FROM DR. JOSHUA PORTER.

North Brookfield, Oct. 26, 1827.

Though I would by no means favor the propensity for book-making, so prevalent in our day, yet I have been long of the opinion that a work on vegetable diet for general readers was greatly needed. I need it in my family; and there are many others in this vicinity who would be materially benefited by such a work.

I have had no means of ascertaining the good or bad effects of a "diet exclusively vegetable in cases of phthisis, scrofula, and dyspepsia," for I have had none of the above diseases to contend with. But, since your letter was received, I have been called to prescribe for a man who has been a flesh eater for more than half a century. He was confined to his house, had been losing strength for several months, still keeping up his old habits. The disease which was preying upon him was chronic inflammation of the right leg; the flesh had been so long swollen and inflamed that it had become hard to the touch. There were ulcers on his thigh, and some had made their appearance on the hip. This disease had been of seven months' standing, though not in so aggravated a form as it now appeared. During this time, all the local applications had been made that could be thought of by the good ladies in the neighborhood; and after every thing of the kind had failed, they concluded to send for "the doctor."

After examining the patient attentively, I became convinced that the disease, which developed itself locally, was of a constitutional origin, and of course could not be cured by local remedies. All local applications were discontinued; the patient was put on a vegetable diet after the alimentary canal was freely evacuated. I saw this man three days afterward. The dark purple appearance of the leg had somewhat subsided; the red and angry appearance about the base of the ulcers was gone, his strength improved, etc. Three days after I called, I found him in his garden at work.

He is now—two weeks since my first prescription—almost well. All the ulcers have healed, with the exception of one or two. This man, who thinks it wicked not to use the good things God has given us—such as meat, cider, tobacco, etc.—is very willing to subsist, for the present, on vegetable food, because he finds it the only remedy for his disease.

Early in the spring of 1830, while a student at Amherst College, I was attacked with dyspepsia, which rendered my life wretched for more than a year, and finally drove me from college; but it had now so completely gained the mastery, that no means I resorted to for relief afforded even a palliation of my sufferings. After I had suffered nearly two years in this way, I was made more wretched, if possible, by frequent attacks of colic, with pains and cramps extending to my back; and so severe had these pains become, that the prescriptions of the most eminent physicians afforded only partial relief.

On the 13th of February, 1833, after suffering from the most violent paroxysm I had ever endured, I left my home for Brunswick, Maine, to attend a course of medical lectures. For several days I boarded at a public house, and ate freely of several substantial dishes that were before me. The consequence was a fresh attack of colic. From some circumstances that came up at this time, I was convinced that flesh meats had much to do with my sufferings, and the resolution was formed at once to change my diet and "starve" out dyspepsia.

I took a room by myself, and made arrangements for receiving a pint of milk per day; this, with coarse rye and Indian bread, constituted my only food. After living in this way a week or two, I had a free and natural evacuation. Thus nature began to effect what medicine alone had done for nearly three years. The skin became moist, and my voracious appetite began to subside. I returned home to my friends at the close of the term well, and have been well ever since—have never had a colic pain or any costiveness since that time. My powers of digestion are good, and though I do not live so rigidly now as when at Brunswick, I always feel best when my food is vegetables and milk. I can endure fatigue and exposure as well as any man. On this mild diet, too, my muscular strength has considerably increased; and every day is adding new vigor to my constitution.

Having experienced so much benefit from a mild diet, and being rationally convinced that man was a fruit-eating animal naturally, I made my views public by a course of lectures on physiology, which I delivered in the Lyceum soon after I came to this place (three years ago). The consequence was, that quite a number of those who heard my lectures commenced training their families as well as themselves to the use of vegetables, etc., and I am happy to inform you that, at this day, many of our most active influential business-doing men are living in the plainest and most simple manner.

One of my neighbors has taken no flesh for more than three years. He is of the ordinary height, and sanguine temperament, and usually weighed, when he ate flesh, one hundred and eighty pounds. After he changed his diet, his countenance began to change, and his cheeks fell in; and his meat-eating friends had serious apprehensions that he would survive but a short time, unless he returned to his former habits. But he persevered, and is now more vigorous and more athletic than any man in the region, or than he himself has ever been before.

His muscular strength is very great. A few days since, a number of the most athletic young men in our village were trying their strength at lifting a cask of lime, weighing five hundred pounds. All failed to do it, with the exception of one, who partly raised it from the ground. After they were gone, this vegetable eater without any difficulty raised the cask four or five times. More than three years ago this man lost his daughter, who fell a prey to cholera infantum; he has now a daughter rather more than a year old, whom he has trained on strictly physiological principles; and though very feeble at birth, and for three months subsequently, she is now the most healthy child in the town. This child had some of the first symptoms of consumption last August, owing to the too free indulgence of the mother in improper articles of food; but being treated with demulcents, at the same time correcting the mother's system, she recovered, and is now the "picture of health."

I was conversing with this gentleman the other day respecting his health—says he is perfectly well, weighs one hundred and sixty-five pounds; and though he was called well when eating flesh, he was not so in reality; for every few weeks he was troubled with headache and a sense of fullness in the region of the stomach, for which he was obliged to take an active cathartic. For a few months before he adopted the vegetable system, he had decided symptoms of congestion in the head, such as precede apoplexy. I questioned him as to his appetite. He informed me, that when he ate meat he had such an unconquerable desire for food about eleven o'clock, that he could not wait till noon. This he calls "meat hunger," for it disappeared soon after he came to the present style of living. He has no craving now; but when he begins to eat, the zest is exquisite.

Yours,

Joshua Porter.

LETTER IV.—FROM DR. N. J. KNIGHT, OF TRURO.

Dated at Truro, October, 1837.

Dr. Alcott: Sir,—I hasten to comply so far with your request as to show my decided approbation of a fruit and farinaceous diet, both in health and sickness. The manner in which nutritious vegetables are presented to us for our consumption and support, evince to a demonstration the simplicity of our corporeal systems. Through every medium of correct information, we learn that the most distinguished men, both in ancient and modern times, were pre-eminently distinguished for their abstemiousness, and the simplicity of their diet.

It was not, however, a consideration of this kind that first induced me to relinquish flesh meat and fish. Some three years previous to my forming a determination to subsist upon farinacea, I had been laboring under an aggravated case of dyspepsia; and about six months previous, also, an attack of acute rheumatism.

I was harassed with constant constipation of the bowels, and ejection of food after eating, together with occasional pain in the head.

Under all these circumstances, I came to this determination, which I committed to paper: "November 9, 1831. This day ceased from strengthening this mortal body by any part of that which ever drew breath." To the above I rigidly adhered until last November, when my health had become so perfect that I thought myself invincible, so far as disease was concerned. All pains and aches had left me, and all the functions of the body seemed to be performed in a healthy manner.

My diet had consisted of rye and Indian bread, stale flour bread, sweet bread without shortening, milk, some ripe fruit, and occasionally a little butter.

During this time, while I devoted myself to considerable laborious practice and hard study, there was no deficiency of muscular strength or mental energy. I am fully satisfied my mind was never so active and strong.

Since last November I have, at times, taken animal food, in order that I might be absolutely satisfied that my mode of living acted decidedly in favor of my perfect health, and that a different course would produce organic derangement.

I had only taken animal food about two months after the usual custom, before I had a severe attack, and only escaped an inflammatory fever by the most rigid antiphlogistic treatment.

I again lived as I ought, and felt well; and having continued so some time, I resorted the second time to an animal diet.

In two months' time, I was taken with the urticaria febrilis, of Bateman, which lasted me more than two weeks, and my suffering was sufficient to forever exclude from my stomach every kind of animal food.

I am now satisfied, to all intents and purposes, that mankind would live longer, and enjoy more perfectly the "sane mind in a sound body," should they never taste flesh meat or fish.

A simple farinaceous diet I have ever found more efficient in the cure of chronic complaints, where there was not much organic lesion, than every other medical agent.

Mrs. A., infected with scrofula of the left breast, and in a state of ulceration, applied to me two years since. The ulcer was then the size of a half-dollar, and discharged a considerable quantity of imperfect pus. The axillary glands were much enlarged, and, doubting the practicability of operating with the knife in such cases, I told her the danger of her disease, and ordered her to subsist upon bread and milk and some fruit, drink water, and keep the body of as uniform temperature as possible. I ordered the sore to be kept clean by ablutions of tepid water. In less than three months, the ulcer was all healed, and her general health much improved. The axillary glands are still enlarged, though less so than formerly.

She still lives simply, and enjoys good health; but she tells me if she tastes flesh meat, it produces a twinging in the breast.

Many cases, like the above, have come under my observation and immediate attention, and suffice it to say, I have never failed to ameliorate the condition of every individual that has applied to me, who was suffering under chronic affections, if they would follow my prescriptions—unless the system was incapable of reaction.

Yours, truly,

N. J. Knight.

LETTER V.—FROM DR. LESTER KEEP.

Fair Haven, Jan. 22, 1838.

Dear Sir,—Agreeably to your request, I will inform you that from September, 1834, to June, 1836, I used no meat at all, except occasionally in my intercourse with society, I used a little to avoid attracting notice.

When I commenced my studies, life was burdensome. I knew not, for months, and I may say years, what enjoyment comfortable health affords. In a great many ways I can now see that I very greatly erred in my course of living. I am surprised that the system will hold out in its powers during so long a process in the use of what I should now consider the means best calculated to break it down.

I cannot now particularize. But in college, and during my professional studies, and since, during six or eight years of practice in an arduous profession, I have been greatly guilty, and neglected those means best calculated to promote and preserve health; and used those means best fitted to destroy it. The summers of 1832, 1833, and 1834, were pretty much lost, from wretched health. I was growing worse every year, and no medicines that I could prepare for myself, or that were prescribed by various brother physicians, had any thing more than a temporary effect to relieve me. All of the year 1834, until September, I used opium for relief; and I used three and four grains of sulphate of morphine per day, equal to about sixteen grains of opium. Spirit, wine, and ale I had tried, and journeys through many portions of the State of Maine, with the hope that a more northern climate would invigorate and restore a system that I feared was broken down forever, and that at the age of thirty-seven. But, without further preamble, I will say, I omitted at once and entirely the use of tea, coffee, meat, butter, grease of all sorts, cakes, pies, etc., wine, cider, spirits, opium (which I feared I must use as long as I lived), and tobacco, the use of which I learned in college. Of course, from so sudden and so great a change, a most horrid condition must ensue for many days, for the relief of which I used the warm bath at first several times a day. I had set no time to omit these articles, and made no resolutions, except to give this course a trial, to find out whether I had many native powers of system left, and what was their character and condition when unaffected by the list of agents mentioned.

I pursued this plan of living faithfully for one year and a half, and with unspeakable joy I found a gradual return of original vigor and health. Now, I cannot say that the omission of meat of all kinds, for a year and a half, caused this improvement in health; it is possible that it had but little to do with it. I know I was guilty of many bad habits; and probably all combined caused my bad condition.

At the close of the year and a half, I married my present second wife, and then commenced living as do others, in most respects, and continued this course most of the time until I received your letter. I then again omitted the use of all animal food, tea, coffee, and tobacco; and for the last month, it is a clear case, my health is better; that is, more vigorous to bear cold. I also bear labor and care better.

I have not investigated the subject of dietetics very much, but I have no doubt that the inhabitants of our whole land make too much use of animal food. No doubt it obstructs the vital powers, and tends to unbalance the healthful play and harmony of the various organs and their functions. There is too much nutriment in a small space. An unexpected quantity is taken; for with most people a sense of fullness is the test of a sufficient quantity.

I am satisfied that I am better without animal food than with the quantity I ordinarily use. If I should use but a small quantity once or twice a day, it is possible it would not be injurious. This I have not tried; for I am so excessively fond of meat, that I always eat more than a small quantity, when I eat it at all. Healthy, vigorous men, day laborers in the field, or forest, may perhaps require some meat to sustain the system, during hard and exhausting labor. Of this I cannot say.

I am now pretty well convinced, from two or three years' observation, that a large portion of my business, as a physician, arises from intemperance in the use of food. Too much and too rich nutriment is used, and my constant business is, to counteract its bad effects.

Two cases are now in mind of the great benefit of dieting for the recovery of health, the particulars of which I cannot now give you. One of them I think would be willing to speak for himself on the subject.

I am, sir, yours, etc.,

Lester Keep.

LETTER VI.—SECOND LETTER FROM DR. KEEP.

Fair Haven, Ct., Jan. 26, 1838.

Sir,—Since I wrote you, a few days ago, I have learned of several individuals who have, for some length of time, used no flesh meat at all.

Amos Townsend, Cashier of the New Haven Bank, has, as I am told, lived almost entirely upon bread, crackers, or something of that kind, and but little of that. He can dictate a letter, count money, and hold conversation with an individual, all at the same time, with no embarrassment; and I know him to have firm health.

Our minister, Rev. B. L. Swan, during the whole of two years of his theological studies at Princeton, made crackers and water his only food, and was in good health.

Mr. Hanover Bradley, of this village, who has been several years a missionary among the Indians, has, for I think, eight or ten years, lived entirely on vegetable food. He had been long a dyspeptic.

There are some other cases of less importance, and probably very many in New Haven; but I am situated a mile from the city, and have never inquired for vegetable livers.

Yours, etc.,

Lester Keep.

LETTER VII.—FROM DR. HENRY H. BROWN

West Randolph, Vt., Feb. 3, 1838.

Dear Sir,—It has been about two years and a half since I adopted an exclusively vegetable diet, with no drink but water; and my food has been chiefly prepared by the most simple forms of cookery. Previously to this, I used a large proportion of flesh meat, and drank tea and coffee. I had much impaired my health by such indulgences. I hardly need to say that my health has greatly improved, and is now quite good and uniform.

I think that physicians, in prescribing for the removal of disease, should pay much more regard to the diet of their patients, and administer less of powerful medicine, than is customary with gentlemen of this profession at large.

Yours, etc.,

Henry H. Brown.

LETTER VIII.—FROM DR. FRANKLIN KNOX.

Kinston,[5] N. C., June 23, 1837.

Dear Sir,—Your letter of the 22d July has been hitherto unanswered, through press of business.

I consider an exclusive vegetable diet as of the utmost consequence in most diseases, especially in those chronic affections or morbid states of the system which are not commonly considered as diseases; and I think that, in these cases, such a diet is too often overlooked, even by physicians.

Yours, truly,

F. Knox.

LETTER IX.—FROM A HIGHLY RESPECTABLE PHYSICIAN.

[The following letter, received last autumn, is from a medical gentleman, in a distant part of the country, whose name, for particular reasons, we stand pledged not to give to the world. The facts, however, may be relied on; and they are exceedingly important and interesting.]

Dear Sir,—Your letter was duly received. I proceed to say that, since I settled in this town, my attacks of epilepsy[6] have occurred in the following order:

Thus it appears that I have enjoyed a longer immunity since the last, than for some years prior. I have maintained total abstinence from flesh, fish, or fowl, for two and a half years, namely, from March 1835 to the present time. That this happy immunity from a most obstinate disease is to be attributed solely to my abstinence from animal food, I do not feel prepared to assert; but that my general health has been better, my attacks of disease far milder, my vigor of mind and body greater, my mental perceptions clearer and more acute, and my enjoyment of life, on the whole, very essentially increased, I am fully prepared to prove.

I have, however, found it nearly as essential for me to abstain from many kinds of vegetable food as from animal, namely, from all kinds of flatulent vegetables; from all kinds of fruits and berries, except the very mildest—as, perfectly ripe and well baked sweet apples—and from all kinds of pies, sauces, and preserves. Of these, however, I am not able to say, as I do of the animal varieties, that I have practiced total abstinence; by no means. I have often ventured to indulge, and generally suffer more or less for my temerity. My severest sufferings for the last two years have been in the form of colic, of which I have had frequent slight attacks; but none to confine me over twenty-four hours.

ADDITIONAL STATEMENTS.—BY THE AUTHOR.[7]

From the age of five or six months to that of two years, I was literally crammed with flesh meat; usually of the most gross kind. Such a course was believed, by the fond parents and others, as likely to be productive of the most healthful and happy consequences. The result was an accumulation of adipose substance, that rendered me one of the most unsightly, not to say monstrous productions of nature. I ought not to say nature, perhaps; for, if not perverted, she produces no such monsters. At the age of six months, my weight was twenty-five pounds; and it rose soon after to thirty or more.

When I was about two years of age, I had the whooping-cough, and, having been brought up to the height, and more than the height of my condition, by over-feeding with fat meat, I suffered exceedingly. I? recovered, at length, but I had lost my relish, as I am informed, for flesh meat; and from this time till the age of fourteen, I seldom ate any but the leanest muscle. I was tolerably healthy, but, from the age of two years, was slender; so much so that, at five or six, I only weighed fifty pounds; and was constantly either found fault with, or pitied, because I did not eat meat in quality and quantity like other people. Nor was it without much effort, even at the age of fourteen, that I could bring myself to be reconciled to it. I was also trained to the early use of much cider, and to the moderate use of tea and spirits. I have spoken of my slender constitution;—I believe this was in part the result of excessive early labor, and that it was not wholly owing to a premature use of flesh meat.

I had suffered so much, however, from the belief that I was feeble from the latter cause, that I had no sooner become reconciled to the use of flesh and fish—which was at the age of fourteen—than I indulged in it quite freely. About this time I had a severe attack of measles, which came very near carrying me off. I was left with anasarca, or general dropsy, and with weak eyes. To cure the former the physicians plied me, for a long time, with blue pill, and with mercurial medicine in other forms, and also with digitalis; and finally filled my stomach to overflowing with diuretic drinks. However, in spite of them all, I recovered during the next year; except that a foundation was laid for premature decay of the teeth, and for a severe eruptive disease. This last, and the weakness of the eyes, were, for some time, very troublesome.

The eruptive complaint was soon discovered to be less severe, even in hot weather, and while I was using a great deal of exercise, in proportion as I abstained from all drinks but water, and ate none but mild food. Owing to the discovery of this fact and to other causes, I chiefly discontinued the use of stimulating food and drink, during the hottest part of the season; though I committed much error in regard to the quantity of my food, and drank quite too freely of cold water. Still I always found my health best, and my body and mind most vigorous at the end of summer, or the beginning of autumn, notwithstanding the very hard labor to which I was subjected on the farm. This increase of vigor was, at that time, attributed chiefly to a free use of summer fruits; for, so deeply had the belief been infixed by early education, that highly stimulating food and drink were indispensable to the full health and strength of mankind, and especially to people who were laboring hard, that, though I sometimes suspected they were not true friends to the human system, my conscience always condemned the suspicion, and pronounced me guilty of a species of high treason for harboring it.

This brings up my dietetic history, to the period at which it commences, in the letter to Dr. North. The study of medicine, however, from the age of twenty-four to twenty-seven, and the subsequent study and practice of it for a few years, joined to the changes I made at the same time in my physical habits, and my observations on their effects, led me to reject, one after another, and one group after another, the whole tribe of extra stimulants—solid and fluid.

The sequel of my story remains to be told. It is now nearly fifteen years since I wrote the letter, which is found at page 23d, to Dr. North. During this long period, and for several years before, amounting, in all, to about nineteen years, I have not only abstained entirely from flesh, fish, and fowl—not having eaten a pound of any one of these during the whole time, except the very few pounds I used in the time of the first visitation of our country with cholera, as before mentioned—but I have almost entirely abstained from butter, cheese, eggs, and milk. Butter, especially, I never taste at all. The occasional use of milk, in very small quantities, once a day, has, however, been resorted to; not from necessity, indeed, or to gratify any strong desire or inclination for it, but from a conviction of its happy medicinal effects on my much-injured frame. Hot food of every kind, and liquids, with the exception just made, I rarely touch. Nearly every thing is taken in as solid a form and in as simple a state as possible; with no condiments, except a very little salt, and with no sweets, sauces, gravies, jellies, preserves, etc. I seldom use more than one sort of food at a time, unless it be to add fruit as a second article; and this is rarely done, except in the morning. I have for ten or twelve years used no drinks with my meals; and sometimes for months together have had very little thirst at all.[8]

And as to the effects, they are such, and have all along been such, as to make me wonder at myself, whenever I think of it. Instead of being constantly subject to cold, and nearly dying with consumption in the spring, I am almost free from any tendency to take cold at all. During the winter of 1837-8, by neglecting to keep the temperature of my room low enough, and by neglecting also to take sufficient exercise in the open air, I became unusually tender, and suffered to some extent from colds. But I was well again during the spring, and felt as if I had recovered or nearly recovered my former hardihood.

In regard to other complaints, I may say still more. Of rheumatism, I have scarcely had a twinge in twelve or fourteen years. My eruptive complaint is, I believe, entirely gone. The weakness of my eyes has been wholly gone for many years. Indeed, the strength and perfection of my sight and of all my senses, till nearly fifty years of age—hearing perhaps excepted, in which I perceive no alteration—appeared to be constantly improving. My stomach and intestines perform their respective duties in the most appropriate, correct, and healthful manner. My appetite is constantly good, and as constantly improving;—that is, going on toward perfection. I can detect, especially by taste, almost any thing which is in the least offensive or deleterious in food or drink; and yet I can receive, without immediate apparent disturbance, and readily digest, almost any thing which ever entered a human stomach—knives, pencils, clay, chalk, etc., perhaps excepted. I can eat a full meal of cabbage, or any other very objectionable crude aliment, or even cheese or pastry—a single meal, I mean—with apparent impunity; not when fatigued, of course, or in any way debilitated, but in the morning and when in full strength. It is true, I make no experiments of this sort, except occasionally as experiments.

In my former statements I gave it as my opinion that vegetable food was less aperient than animal. My opinion now is, that if we were trained on vegetable food, and had never received substances into the stomach which were unduly stimulating, we should find the intestinal or peristaltic action quite sufficient. The apparent sluggishness of the bowels, when we first exchange an animal diet for a vegetable one, is probably owing to our former abuses. At present, I find my plain vegetable food, in moderate and reasonable quantity, quite as aperient as it ought to be, and, if I exceed a proper quantity, too much so.

I have now no remaining doubts of the vast importance that would result to mankind, from an universal training from childhood, to the exclusive use of vegetable food. I believe such a course of training, along with a due attention to air, exercise, cleanliness, etc., would be the means of improving our race, physically, intellectually, and morally, beyond any thing of which the world has yet conceived. But my reasons for this belief will be seen more fully in another place. They are founded in science and the observation of facts around me, much more than on a narrow individual experience.

There is one circumstance which I must not omit, because it is full of admonition and instruction. I have elsewhere stated that, twenty-three years ago, I had incipient phthisis. Of this fact, and of the fact that there were considerable inroads made by disease on the upper lobe of the right lung, I have not the slightest doubt. The symptoms were such at the time, and subsequently, as could not have been mistaken. Besides, what was, as I conceive, pretty fully established by the symptoms which existed, is rendered still more certain by auscultation. The sounds which are heard during respiration, in the region to which I have alluded, leave no doubt on the minds of skillful medical men, of their origin. Still I doubt whether the disease has made any considerable progress for many years.

But, during the winter of 1837-8, my employments became excessively laborious; and, for the whole winter and spring, were sufficient for at least two healthy and strong men. They were also almost wholly sedentary. At the end of May, I took a long and rather fatiguing journey through a country by no means the most healthy, and came home somewhat depressed in mind and body, especially the former. I was also unusually emaciated, and I began to have fears of a decline. Still, however, my appetite was good, and I had a good share of bodily strength. The more I directed my attention to myself, the worse I became; and I actually soon began to experience darting pains in the chest, together with other symptoms of a renewal of pulmonary disease. Perceiving my danger, however, from the state of my mind, I at length made a powerful effort to shake off the mental disturbance—which succeeded. This, together with moderate labor and rather more exercise than before, seemed gradually to set me right.

Again, in the spring of 1848, after lecturing for weeks and months—often in bad and unventilated rooms and subjecting myself, unavoidably, to many of those abuses which exist every where in society, I was attacked with a cough, followed by great debility, from which it cost me some three months or more of labor with the spade and hoe, to recover. With this and the exceptions before named, I have now, for about twenty years, been as healthy as ever I was in my life, except the slight tendency to cold during the winter of which I have already taken notice. I never was more cheerful or more happy; never saw the world in a brighter aspect; never before was it more truly "morning all day" with me. I have paid, in part, the penalty of my transgressions; and may, perhaps, go on, in life, many years longer.

I now fear nothing in the future, so far as health and disease are concerned, so much as excessive alimentation. To this evil—and it is a most serious and common one in this land of abundance and busy activity—I am much exposed, both from the keenness of my appetite, and the exceeding richness of the simple vegetables and fruits of which I partake. But, within a few years past, I seem to have gotten the victory, in a good measure, even in this respect. By eating only a few simple dishes at a time, and by measuring or weighing them with the eye—for I weigh them in no other way—I am usually able to confine myself to nearly the proper limits.

This caution, and these efforts at self-government, are not needed because their neglect involves any immediate suffering; for, as I have already stated, there was never a period in my life before, when I was so completely independent—apparently so, I mean—of external circumstances. I can eat what I please, and as much or as little as I please. I can observe set hours, or be very irregular. I can use a pretty extensive variety at the same meal, and a still greater variety at different meals, or I can live perpetually on a single article—nay, on almost any thing which could be named in the animal or vegetable kingdom—and be perfectly contented and happy in the use of it. I could in short, eat, work, think, sleep, converse, or play almost all the while; or I could abstain from any or all of these, almost all the while. Let me be understood, however. I do not mean to say that either of these courses would be best for me, in the end; but only that I have so far attained to independence of external circumstances that, for a time, I believe I should be able to do or bear all I have mentioned.

One thing more, in this connection, and I shall have finished my remarks. I sleep too little; but it is because I allow my mind to run over the world so much, and lay so many schemes for human improvement or for human happiness; and because I allow my sympathies to become so deeply enlisted in human suffering and human woe. I should be most healthy, in the end, by spending six hours or more in sleep; whereas I do not probably exceed four or five. I have indeed obtained a respite from the grave of twenty-three years, through a partial repentance and amendment of life, and the mercy of God; but did I obey all his laws as well as I do a part of them, I know of no reason why my life might not be lengthened, not merely fifteen years, as was Hezekiah's, or twenty-three merely, but forty or fifty.