The Sense of Taste has a value in relation to nutrition that has not fully been appreciated.

Taste has been considered the lowest, in usefulness, of all the senses.

On the contrary, if properly understood, taste is one of the most important of all the faculties man possesses.

Taste has lacked appreciation, for the reason that it has been supposed that it catered to sensuality, in the vulgar sense, and performed the function of devilish temptation rather than that of natural invitation and protection.

Upon an examination, that any one can make for himself, however, it is revealed that taste is the faithful servant of appetite; the sentinel of the stomach, of the intestines, of the tissues and of the brain, whose guidance and warning, if heeded, will give heretofore unknown enjoyment of eating, and at the same time insure perfect health and the maximum of strength.

TASTE IS THE GUIDE AND GUARD OF NUTRITION

The more we learn, the more evident it is that there is a Perfect Way locked, or, rather, enfolded, in all of Nature's secrets, and that it is intended that man shall sometime discover them.

Taste, in its normal condition, when allowed to direct or advise, serves several important functions, not the least of which is as first-assistant to Appetite. Appetite craves the kind of nourishment the body needs, invites to eating, gives enjoyment during the whole time needed for the fluids of the mouth and the stomach to do their part of the digestive process. Taste ceases when the food is ready for the stomach and thereafter fails to recognise the indigestible sediment which remains in the mouth after nutriment has been extracted; and, in these discriminations, if consulted and obeyed, Taste and Appetite prevent indigestible matter from entering the system to burden and clog the lower intestines, form deposits in bone, cartilage and kidneys, inflame the tissues, and otherwise create conditions favourable to the propagation of the microbes of disease.

The normal sensitiveness of taste can be recovered, if already lost, in the course of a week, or two weeks at most, by means of the stimulating and regenerating influence of natural body-repair, if the method of taste and appetite cultivation recommended in this book is followed.

Those who now enjoy good health will find a new joy in living when they have discovered the intelligent use of taste and submit the fuel of their Mind Power-Plant and strength to the analysis and selection of Nature's instinctive agents.

LATEST DEFINITION

Dr. William T. Harris, in his latest contribution to the "International Education Series," Psychologic Foundations of Education, defines the presently appreciated value of the sense of taste, as follows: "The lowest form of special sense is taste, which is closely allied to nutrition. Taste perceives the phase of assimilation of the object, which is commencing with the mouth. The individuality of the object is attacked and it gives way, its organic product or inorganic aggregate suffering dissolution—taste perceives the dissolution. Substances that do not yield to the attack of the juices of the mouth have no taste. Glass and gold have little taste as compared with salt or sugar. The sense of taste differs from the process of nutrition in the fact that it does not assimilate the body tasted, but reproduces ideally the energy that makes the impression on the sense organ of taste. Even taste, therefore, is an ideal activity, although it is present only when the nutritive energy is assimilating—it perceives the object in a process of dissolution.

"Smell is another specialisation which perceives dissolution of objects in a more general form than taste. Both smell and taste perceive chemical changes that involve dissolution of the object."

If this is the recognised estimate of taste, which is true as widely as I have been able to inquire, both among physicians and among the latest books on health, it is certainly a case of neglected appreciation such as the world has not witnessed up to the present time.

PRESUMED CAUSES OF DISEASES

On the undisputed authority of physiologists it is known that all diseases are made possible by derangement which is favourable to the propagation of the microbes of disease, or by deposits of inharmonious matter which are not thrown off.

Derangement of all the substance of the internal body is effected mainly, and probably entirely, by deposit of indigestible food or of tissue which is broken down and is not thereafter expelled from the system by the ordinary means provided for the discharge of waste.

These inharmonious deposits which cause so much direct and indirect trouble are mainly, and probably entirely, the result of excess of eating, or of wrong eating, so that the digestive organs of the body cannot take care of what is forced on them; or, of admitting substances which they are powerless to make into good blood or discharge by the regular means provided by nature.

Right eating and right food are, then, the all-important considerations of health, as far as the tissues are concerned; and, as the tissues are themselves the stored food or fuel of the brain and the nerve centres, the importance of perfect nutrition extends to the most vital functions and interests of life.

TARDY APPRECIATION

All experience warns against overeating and improper eating as the most common causes of disease; and troubles of the stomach and intestines are known to be the parents of all other bodily ills; yet no fixed guide has been set to determine what is "overeating" and what is "improper food." The reason for this is probably because no two bodies require the same quantity or kind of nourishment, and, "What is one man's food is another man's poison."

Nature has not been so unkind, however, as to leave man without a means of knowing just how to gauge the quantity of food required for her best service, and probably, when we learn the secret, has equally well provided us with certain discrimination relative to the quality of food that is best for harmonic development.

Investigation never fails to find provision for both guard and guide in all of Nature's plans and man's nutrition is of such importance that she surely has not left it out of the list of the protected.

Of the power of taste to discriminate accurately in the matter of comparative value of foods I am not sure as yet, although I am confident the power rests somewhere within our reach if we can only discover it; but I have the best evidence possible that taste has the power to advise accurately in the matter of the kind of food and the quantity required; and, having selected what it wants or needs out of a morsel of food, rejects the rest by ceasing to taste.

The message or warning which taste gives in connection with eating is, "THAT WHILE ANY TASTE IS LEFT IN A MOUTHFUL OF FOOD IN PROCESS OF MASTICATION OR SUCKING, IT IS NOT YET IN CONDITION TO BE PASSED ON TO THE STOMACH; AND WHAT REMAINS AFTER TASTE HAS CEASED IS NOT FIT FOR THE STOMACH."

WHAT SENSE?

When one comes to think about it, what sense is there in throwing away a palatable morsel of food when the taste is at its best, or while taste lasts at all, even if the purpose of the meal is merely to contribute to the pleasure of eating?

"Some people live to eat and others eat to live" is a saying that is familiar to everyone, and yet how few appreciate that the perfection of living includes the perfection of both these desiderata!

Such is the impetuosity of uncultivated or perverted human tendencies that the desire for acquisition, sometimes called greed, impels one to swallow one mouthful of food to take in another, without ever dreaming that the very last contribution of taste to the last remnant of a delicious morsel is like the last flicker of a candle, more brilliant than any of the preceding ones. In eating, the last taste, when saliva, the medium of taste, is most perfectly in possession of the solution, is better than all the other stages of the process. It is the choicest and sweetest expression of the incident, as related to each mouthful. Then why not court it and obey, thereby, Nature's first law of health?

Before proceeding further with a description of its functions it may be well to state briefly the certain result of following the guidance and heeding the warnings of taste.

Taste determines the mastication of food so that the requisite quantity of saliva and other juices of the mouth are added in transit, so that the stomach and the intestines will have the least possible to do in the matter of conversion of the food to blood, and so that the brain and nerve centres will be taxed the least possible to assist the stomach and intestines in their work.

If Taste is heeded in its invitation and its warnings, that which passes into the stomach will be so suitable and ready for nourishment of the body that the smallest possible quantity will serve the purpose and almost no waste will be left to tax and disease the lower intestines, while the absence of fatally inharmonious deposits in the tissue and bone will cease to exist in proportion to the skill with which one interprets the warnings of Taste, and in response to the care taken in following them.

DISEASE PREVENTED

It is said that none of the microbes of disease can live an instant, and hence cannot propagate, in a perfectly healthy human tissue. It is possible to secure the perfectly healthy human tissue, to both the generally healthy and to those who are afflicted, unless too far gone to reform, by keen attention to the direction of Taste, and the reward of the attention is manifold. The actual pleasure derived from eating under the direction of the method suggested herein cannot be equalled by any other means.

While cheerfulness, hopefulness, good nature, charity and all the mental good qualities are splendid forced-draughts of oxygenised impulse that assist the stomach in consuming and otherwise in taking care of any erratic or excessive food supply, and are able to help take care of a moderate glut of material; Taste, if allowed to serve its full purpose, furnishes its own draught of cheerfulness by means of the very pleasure it distributes, and at the same time it prevents, instead of inducing, gluttony.

There are two ways of putting a limit to a meal—to eating. One—the wrong one—comes in the shape of a protest on the part of a too full stomach while the appetite is yet ravenous. The right one comes naturally from a perfectly satisfied feeling—a ceasing of desire for anything more, no matter how previously alluring to the palate, before the stomach is overburdened. The former is evidence of glut, or gluttony, and the latter is Nature's way, for which there is every desired reward.

SOME EASY EXPERIMENTS

It is a very easy matter to prove for one's self that ample saliva is essential to the most economic and perfect digestion; and also, that no two mouthfuls of food require the same quantity.

Experiment will be doubly interesting in that it reveals pleasure of taste in eating that has not before been enjoyed.

The function of saliva in digestion has commonly been understood to be the lubrication of the food so as to enable it to be swallowed. The truth is that it is the first and most important solvent necessary to digestion, the good offices of which are to separate, make alkaline, neutralise, saponify, and otherwise render the succeeding processes within the delicate organs of the body as easy as their delicacy requires, and thus not to strain and inflame them into festering breeding grounds for the myriads of microbes of diseases which we are compelled to draw in with every breath of air we inhale.

Drawn into a perfectly clean and healthy organism, some microbes aid and are a part of life, but taken into a system clogged by dirt and strained by overwork, these same harmless creatures become agents of destruction. Bacilli may be either friends or enemies and we have the choice.

NATURAL LIFE LIMIT

It is said that the natural life of all animals, left to pursue a natural existence by being protected from the enemies of their species, and in reach of sufficient nourishment, is six times the growing period. If this is so no man need die or move his soul to another habitation until he has occupied the present one for from one hundred and ten to one hundred and forty years. If the proper use of the instincts and senses be conserved in children, the growing period may be prolonged to probably twenty-five years with a resultant tenure of life of one hundred and fifty years.

I have personally interviewed a patriarch, who, at sixty-five, was awaiting death with constant expectancy, and was helping to attain it by every sort of favourable suggestion. It happened that he had his portrait taken in a photograph gallery on his sixty-fifth birthday as a last souvenir to be distributed among his friends. Shortly after that, in the fruity and salubrious foothills of the Pacific Coast of California, he met with accidental suggestion which changed his habits of living, and, very soon, his attitude toward life and death.

I sat with the patriarch on his one hundredth birthday in the same photograph gallery, examined the portraits of sixty-five and one hundred years, conversed with the subject in a low tone of voice, looked upon a man who felt that he was yet in middle life, and in possession of an enjoyment of life that he said had never been equalled in the early years of his bondage to the ignorance and impatience of youth.[13]

STUDY NATURE

Watch good Nature, observe her methods, try to imitate them by way of experiment, and you will find that, as heretofore stated, there is a perfect way enfolded in all of Nature's problems and that man has only to discover the way to have it freely accessible to him.

Watch a child take its nourishment in natural manner. The sucking action is like the act of mastication in that it excites the glands which supply fluids to the mouth. Whatever number of these fluids there may be, I will class them all as saliva. Certainly in the case of milk being taken into the stomach, saliva is not needed to lubricate it. It is, therefore, reasonable to suppose that saliva is intended as a part of the mixture necessary to digestion; that is, to the conversion of the food into nutriment.

In the case of children nourished at the breast of the mother—the only natural way—the food is already alkaline and ready for digestion in the stomach and intestines as related previously.

Remember also that, in the case of invalids with very weak stomachs, physicians recommend taking milk and broth through a straw or through a glass tube. Taking fluid this way requires a sucking action of the mouth and thereby induces a flow of saliva. Of course, the fluid is better digested than when drunk because Nature's way has been followed, and it is no wonder that milk and often soups of different kinds are indigestible, if taken contrary to the natural way, except in digestive systems which have not yet exhausted their ten-horse-power resistance capacity.

I have tried milk and soups upon a stomach trained down so fine that it was like a pair of apothecary's balances, sensitive to the least inharmony, to find that if they are drunk there is a mild protest—a sort of a shrug of the shoulders, as it were—and that when the same liquids have been moved about in the mouth for the time necessary to naturally excite the Swallowing Impulse, they have passed into the stomach without the owner being conscious afterwards of their presence except by feeling of complete satisfaction.

It would seem, therefore, that the perfection of nutrition requires the proper mixture of saliva added to all food substances, and that mastication is not only a means of separation in order to give saliva a chance but a valve opener for salivary glands in order to make the proper solution for the stomach; and, that taste exists, in one of its important functions, to indicate how long the process should continue and when it has effected its healthful purpose.

Any one who tries it, no matter how perverted the taste has become by abuse, will find that Nature is not only kind but alluring. Meat or bread, without sauces or butter, are tasteless, in a degree, when first taken into the mouth dry. It is for this reason that butter, sauces, salt, sugar, etc., are used to make them what is called palatable. It is the salt or the sugar or other spices in these which excites the palate immediately when the dry morsel would not do so in such marked degree.

If you take the meat or the dry bread and masticate sufficiently, allowing the nutriment to become thoroughly solved by the saliva and separated from the dirt,—the indigestible, tasteless remainder—the taste will become more and more delicious as the saliva gets possession of the solution, and will have a final delicacy which sauces cannot equal, as a reward for pursuing Nature's invitation and rendering her the appointed service.

An easy experiment that will prove the above statement to be correct is to take a variety of breads, white and brown, toasted and untoasted, crust and soft, and afterwards some of the same soaked in soup or milk, or, in the juice of whatever meat you happen to have at your meal.

Taken dry, toast will only reduce and disappear, without effort of swallowing, into the stomach, leaving no tasteless dregs behind, after about thirty actions of the jaw. This is probably the reason why toast is an invalid's best diet; because mastication is required to crush it, saliva is liberated by the acts of mastication, less saliva is required to prepare toast for the stomach than any other form of bread, and therefore, the proper conditions are attained perforce, and easy digestion is promoted. Crust of French bread will do the same by means of about forty jets let loose by mastication; the soft inside of French bread will require fifty, or more; crust and inside of biscuits and of "home-made" bread somewhat more than the French bread; while "Boston brown bread" requires as many as seventy to eighty jets turned on by action of mastication to dissolve it.

The above refers to moderate mouthfuls. The process is incomplete until all is dissolved, taste ceases, and natural swallowing occurs.

Will it not be observed that mastication, as far as crushing or mangling is concerned, has small part in the reduction of "Boston brown bread," and little seeming use except to turn on the jets of the solving saliva, for the material itself is soft, and sometimes "mushy"? Saliva has little use as a lubricant in this case, for the reason that the brown bread experimented with can be easily swallowed when first taken in the mouth. Abundant experiment has been made by those to whom "Boston brown bread" was formerly little less than a poison, to prove the assertion that, sufficiently mixed with saliva, it is perfectly digestible and that the delicious taste of the bread after forty or fifty bites (? to ½ minute) gets sweeter and sweeter, and attains its greatest sweetness and most delicate taste at the very last, when it has dissolved into liquid form and most of it has escaped into the stomach.

It will be noticed that the time, or attention, required to solve these different problems of nutrition as embodied in different sorts of breads is exactly proportionate to their recognised digestibility, and explains the reason why hot and "soggy" biscuits, after the American fashion, and "Boston brown bread" have been classed as not easily digestible.

Still further proof of my contention in favour of the importance of taste as a guide and guard in the process of nutrition is that, if you soak soft bread, or even toast, in the juice or gravy of any meat, the number of masticatory or tasting movements necessary to fit it for the stomach and satisfy the taste will be about the number required to masticate raw meat from which the juice has come and not such only as would seem requisite on account of the softness of the substance when made pulpy by soaking and which might be forcibly swallowed at once.

Tests like these alone are sufficient to prove my contention, but, when the result of the experiments is so immediate for good in every direction, as it has proved itself to be in all cases tried, there is no longer doubt but that Nature's most important secret relative to human alimentation has been heretofore practically undiscovered; that is, as far as any inquiry I have been able to make sheds light upon the subject.

The result, in all the cases of my observation, has been an immediate response of naturally increased energy; approach of weight toward the normal, whether the subject was over-weight or under-weight; a great falling off of the waste to be discharged by the avenue of the lower intestines and also through the kidneys; relief of bleeding hemorrhoids and catarrh—the diseases suffered by the patients; emancipation from headaches; clearing of the tongue of the yellow deposit—usually called fur—that is an indication of rotten conditions in the stomach; and return of the energy for work which all men and women should have, and which finds expression in healthy children in the form of great energy for play.

The tax upon the lower intestines has been, in my experiments, reduced so that there was no invitation to relief more frequently than once in four or five days, and the quantity of the deposit was less than half the quantity of a usual daily contribution to waste under former methods of taking in nourishment, thereby proving the fact that appetite and taste, when given full chance to serve, serve us well.

This feature (quantity of waste) differed in the cases of the different persons experimented with according to the carefulness with which they obeyed the test injunctions. In some, greed abnormality could not quickly be overcome, but, as the subjects were selected in part from the stratum of society where want is the constant dread, it is not to be wondered at that a lifetime habit of tremor and greed should resist even the dictates of their reason. But it was in these that the revelation excited the highest appreciation at last when they were put in possession of faculties and strength that they had supposed the Creator had denied them in a world of suffering.

There is no doubt but that it is possible to introduce nutrition into the system wherein, or rather wherewith, there is little or no waste material.

One physician, to whom I applied for information, suggested that too fine an application of my method might finally do away with the lower intestines altogether from the same cause that any unused member of the body, and also unnourished members, shrivel and disappear in time.

While this is possible, the means taken towards it are productive of marvellous good results; and, if there were no further use, what purpose would they serve?[14]

Think of the number of separate complaints that are attributable to trouble of the lower intestines, and think of the relief coming with their return to normal conditions in performing infrequent service with the ease of rejuvenated strength! Such was the case with all of the subjects under test, and it was a revelation which was as the opening of a new life to even those who had suffered least, and had thought themselves fortunate as to health conditions.

I hope I will be excused for using the terms "dirt," "rotten," "glutton," etc. I know they will give a shock to sensitive conventionality, but is it not better to shock conventionality with a proscribed term, if it means just what it says, and nothing else, than to shock the delicate organism of our machinery of life by throwing dirt into its furnace with good fuel, and thereby allowing the glut of ashes therefrom to encumber the journals of our mechanism, to the waste of our power and to the wearing out of our machinery?

Disease is nothing but dirt in the system and the result of dirt. It is our own dirt at that, having been introduced by our own carelessness or as the result of combined ignorance and greed.

Ignorance has excused and does excuse the responsibility; but, when we have providentially been provided a way by Nature to select and sift and prepare perfect fuel for the furnace of our Life-Power-Plant, there can be no further excuse for not following the teaching to the extreme of the last possible refinement.

I will not presume to say what and whom good Doctor Appetite, with the assistance of Doctor Taste, can cure. They have both cured and greatly relieved rheumatism, gout, eczema, obesity, under-weight, bleeding-piles, blotches and pimples, catarrh, "that tired feeling," muddy complexion, indigestion, and yellow-tongue, within four months. It has been revealed that attention to their invitation and warning cures unnatural craving and beautifully appeases appetite desires with one-third the usual food; and, at the same time, they teach an appreciation and enjoyment of food quite new even to bon vivants.

Any person can employ Dr. Normal Appetite and consult Dr. Good Taste free of all charge, and make endless discoveries in the possibility of delightful and healthfully economic nutrition.

The suggestion was originally given by the author in crudest form with the assurance of physiologists that trial of it involved no risk, but, on the contrary, that it led in the right direction toward preventing disease. I felt that it was too important to be withheld from those who do not know the existence of Nature's perfect way provided by the Senses of Appetite and Taste.

Record of careful tests and results will probably follow in another volume. The author has entered the field of investigation to find deterrents to Nature's perfect development and will not rest while any remain.[15]

With even the crude hint, that health can be secured and maintained by consulting and respecting Appetite and Taste, each person having either can assist in the investigation.

SUGGESTION AND DIRECTIONS

For initial experiment, do not change any of your present habits of living as to time of meals, kind of food, etc.

Following the directions given hereafter will undoubtedly lead to just the right thing for you in these regards.

There is no doubt but that the early morning meal is not productive of the best results in nutrition and strength, but it is better to have Appetite suggest the necessary change in accustomed habits. Dr. Dewey's advice in the "No-Breakfast" regimen is excellent. The getting-up craving is not an earned appetite.

Forced abstinence from a heavy morning meal will surely bring about normal conditions of appetite which are best adapted to perfect nutrition, so that if the invitation to give up the morning gorge voluntarily does not overcome perverse habit, the heroic denial may be tried.

The value of the discovery lies in recognising the fact that Taste still has important work to do with passing food while yet there is taste, and that what remains after Taste ceases to express itself should not go into the stomach.

The ease with which one will learn to enjoy and "hang on" to food in the mouth, even milk and soup, after he has learned a good reason for doing so, will quickly create a counter habit which is in accordance with Nature's perfect way.

When one has discovered the delight of that last indescribably sweet flash of taste, which Taste offers as a pousse cafÉ to those who serve it with respect, he will find any food that Appetite selects is needed for his nutrition, and is good.

Remember this! Salt, sugar, some sauces and spices which are used to make food palatable may be in themselves nutritious, but do not let them mislead you. The tendency is to relish them and think that they represent the food they disguise, which, however, is often only an excuse for them, and has very little nutrition itself. In this case a morsel of food is taken into the mouth, the sauce or spice which it carries meets immediate response from Taste and disappears, whereupon the indigestible food morsel is swallowed in indigestible condition so as to admit another sauce-laden supply.

The most nutritious food does not require sauces. It may seem dry and tasteless to the first impression, but, as the juices of the mouth get possession of it, warm it up, solve its life-giving qualities out of it and coax it into usefulness, the delight of a new-found delicacy will greet the discoverer.

It may be difficult, at first, to avoid swallowing food before it is thoroughly separated, the nutriment dissolved and the dirt rejected, but after a little practice there will be no difficulty. On the contrary, there will be an involuntary habit of retention established that will be as tenacious of a morsel of food till that last and sweetest taste has been found, as a dog is tenacious of a savory bone.

Did it ever occur to gum chewers that the gum is simply an exciter of saliva, and that the sweet taste is the nutritious dextrin in the saliva and has nothing to do with the gum? In the ordinary "watering of the mouth" the same sweet taste is experienced.

Another important fact in this connection, and which belongs in the list of "directions" because it is a leader, is, that perfect nutrition is a source of ample saliva, the effect thereby reproducing the cause in friendly reciprocity.

It will be found that, when normal conditions have been attained through attention to the inspection, selection and rejection of Taste, when the tongue has lost its malarial yellow scum and when Hunger is represented by healthful Appetite and has dismissed bilious and insatiable Craving from its service, there will at all times be a delicately sweet taste in the mouth which will prevent craving for anything else. For instance, a person in possession of normal taste conditions may pass a confectionery shop or a fruit stand without temptation to eat of their wares, for they would spoil the taste already in possession of the mouth.

The expert wine tasters in Rhineland, where the full flavour of the luscious fruit is retained in the wine as Nature put it there, never drink wine. They breathe it into the mouth and atomise it on the tongue with utmost relish. To them the swallowing of the precious juice without dissipation by taste is an unpardonable sacrilege. The Bavarians also, whose beer is the best in the world, practically do not drink beer as Americans are accustomed to seeing it drunk. They sit over a stein of beer for an hour, reading or chatting with friends. The epicurean drinkers of what has been termed eau de vie in France sit and sip a "pony" of their beloved Cognac while they enjoy a view of pastoral loveliness or a throng of passers-by in a boulevard of Paris. None of these people drink anything but water and hence are not drunkards; and, at the same time, they have full enjoyment of Nature's most stimulating and delicious compounds in a form preserved by Nature for the use of man.

The taste of these students of nutrition becomes so discriminating that they can distinguish a wine or a beer or a cognac, as they would distinguish between intimate friends and strangers. The year, the vineyard, the state of the weather, or any accident that may have surrounded the development of the fruit are as distinguishable to these epicures in the essential juices as are the marks on men which indicate prosperity, happiness or any stamp of environment whatever.

An epicurean cannot be a glutton. There may be gluttons who are less gluttonous than other gluttons, but epicureanism is like politeness and cleanliness, and is the certain mark of gentility.

A physiological chemist, a friend of the author, who is responsible for the suggestion that the function of saliva in turning the starches of our food into nutritious glucose may never have been fully given a chance to act, thus accounts for the last delicate sweet taste which is attained by complete mastication. It is then a perfect solution, and hence the delicacy of the taste.

For illustration, try a ship's biscuit—commonly called hardtack—and keep it in the mouth, tasting it as you would a piece of sugar, till it has disappeared entirely, and note what a treasure of delight there is in it.

Taste will teach the experimenter more than I can even suggest. I simply offer an introduction to Doctor N. Appetite and to Doctor G. Taste and state some of their excellences that I have discovered through their attentions to myself and others under my direction.

I will, however, give a resumÉ of my own experience as a guide.

PERSONAL CASE, INITIAL CONDITION

Age, 49 years; height, 5 feet 7 inches. Extremes of weight for fifteen years (in ordinary clothing) minimum, 198 lbs.; maximum, 217 lbs. Chest measure, varying but little, if any, 42 inches; waist measure (tailor's) 43 to 44 inches. Usual weight during the time, about 205 lbs.

My experiments began near the middle of June, but with no systematic application until the middle of July, 1898; weight on June 1st, probably over 205 lbs., in summer clothing.

SPEEDY IMPROVEMENT

On October 10th, as a result of the experiments, weight 163 lbs., and stationary; chest measure same as before, but waist measure reduced to 37 inches, or one inch below the "tailor's ideal," and nearly down to the "athlete's ideal."

The energy and desire for activity with immunity from fatigue, which was the characteristic equipment of twenty years ago returned, but not, of course, the trained muscular strength or suppleness of athletic days.

The food invited by Appetite at this stage, the nutriment in which counter-balanced the waste in each twenty-four hours, consisted of about thirty ordinary mouthfuls of potato, bread, meat, or anything selected by Appetite, masticated and manipulated to the end.

One meal a day was taken for convenience, and because it seemed, under the then existing circumstances, hot summer weather, to be the time set by Nature for eating. "I rise in the morning," as a champion pugilist once put it, "when my bed gets tired of me," which at the time was usually before, or at, daylight, and began writing or other work. By one o'clock I usually was "worked out," but had already disposed of practically a day's work. Then, in the middle of the day, when all the animals rest and some of them chew the cud, I took my meal. I had not, meantime, experienced a moment of craving for anything since the meal of the day before, but I sat down with an epicurean appetite.

The article of food on the menu that first attracted me, I fixed my desire upon. At the time it was usually a meat or a fish, and there accompanied it only a cup of coffee, nine-tenths milk, bread and butter, and potato. Sometimes the meat selected was an entrÉe, and was garnished with rice and other fruits or vegetables.

About thirty mouthfuls of these, disposed of in something less than twenty-five hundred acts of mastication or other movement of the mouth, and taking about thirty minutes to thirty-five minutes, satisfied the appetite so perfectly that all the ices and desserts on a sumptuous bill of fare had no attraction.

In the meantime, water was drunk, in small portions slowly, and ice water at that, without restriction, to satisfy thirst, but not when any food was in process. In the mouth the water was almost instantly brought to body-temperature and its coolness was very agreeable to all the senses. I now rarely take any water except in very hot weather when perspiration is active and then only enough to quench thirst, excess giving discomfort and necessitating more perspiration. Water injures digestion by being taken with meals only because it is used to wash down food not yet prepared for the stomach. It is the unfit food that is carried down by it and not the water that does the harm.

One cup of cafÉ au lait, well sweetened, sipped and enjoyed according to the epicurean method, satisfied all desire for other sweets and created a harmony of variety that was simply perfect, while it was perfectly simple.

I did not try to work, or think, for some time after the meal; that is, I did not force thought; but reading, a cat nap, a walk, a matinÉe, a ball game, or a ride in a trolley car were recreations which I was able to enjoy as a sort of pousse cafÉ for two or three hours after the meal, and then the energy for work returned, so that if there were something yet to be done in the time before the accustomed bed hour, another day's work was easily accomplished.

Athletic work, physical labour, extreme activity in any form, all benefit by the same treatment, as I have since been able to prove both personally and by experiment with others. The only difference is the greater waste of tissue, and the greater need for restorage, demanding an evening meal and possibly an earlier midday meal.

Exercise, work, activity—anything that creates a demand for nutriment is the especial friend of Taste. It gives healthy appetite and hence there is plenty for Taste to do and he likes to be of service.

At first, rules have to be followed in order to serve Economic Nutrition to the best advantage, but they soon become habits of life, or living, that will naturally come of themselves from attention to Taste according to these directions.

It has been our experience, that if there are any diseases growing out of overstraining of the lower intestines, kidneys, liver, etc., they will soon disappear.

Perfect nutrition does away with the waste until there will be no invitation to discharge oftener than once in four or five days, when the response will be easy and final, with less than half the quantity of an ordinary daily contribution.

There are wealth, health, strength, long life, abundant usefulness and much resultant happiness offered as a reward for learning and following Nature's Perfect Way.

When we learn that obeying Nature's Laws emancipates us from the slavery to cravings of unnatural appetite, releases us from constant attention on meals, does away with at least half the drudgery of woman's work and makes us immune from the attacks of microbes of disease, it is then no hardship to take a few lessons in the Art of Economic Nutrition.

Every artificial method that has been suggested to coax Nature into changing her problems to suit man's poor interpretation has failed, but Nature has been patient withal. Her door to reform is never closed, and her patience is boundless towards prodigal and foolish children.

Nature has put the keenest of the senses at the threshold of life to serve both as hosts and servants, but Appreciation has heretofore failed to recognise their true office, while Ignorance, blinded by Greed, has spurned and abused the best of servants.[16]

SOME PERTINENT QUERIES

If Nature has revealed a perfect way to the easy solution of all of her problems, as related to the affairs of animals and plant life, WHAT SENSE is there in thinking that she has discriminated against her Chief Assistant in Cultivation, Man?

If Nature has provided animals with keen discrimination in the matter of healthful food, WHAT SENSE is there in doubting her good intentions toward the highest form of animal in this regard?

If Taste is the sentinel of the stomach and also the purveyor and inspector of nutrition, WHAT SENSE is there in ascribing to it the lowest place in the list of the senses?

If we enjoy eating, and are eating, partly, for the pleasure of it, WHAT SENSE is there in throwing away a morsel until the taste has been extracted?

If "dirt" is "matter out of place," which is the accepted definition, WHAT SENSE is there in calling unnutritious food by any other name?

If taste is the evidence of nutrition, and ceases to act upon dirt, WHAT SENSE is there in hurrying food past the sentry-box of Taste without giving the inspector time to select the nutrition and reject the dirt?

If the last flash of taste in dealing with a morsel of food is the best of all, WHAT SENSE in believing that Nature did not furnish that allurement for the wise purpose of inducing mastication to the end of taste?

If saliva is the medium of Taste, without which there is no expression of taste, WHAT SENSE is there in thinking that it is nothing but a lubricant, to enable food to be easily swallowed?

WHAT SENSE is there in slighting nutrition in the beginning when we know that the derangement of the process will continue throughout all the involuntary stages within the digestive organs, inviting disease and causing suffering?

THERE IS SENSE in carefully attending to the voluntary preparation of the food for the stomach, so that the involuntary functions of digestion and of assimilation may be performed with natural ease and freedom, thereby defying and preventing disease!

If we can save two-thirds of present consumption and yet furnish all that is necessary for perfect nutrition, WHAT SENSE is there in wearing out our Mind-Power Plant with a glut of surplus?

Unless a person has a pressing engagement with his own funeral, WHAT SENSE is there in hurrying with his meals?

If we can devote ten thousand actions of the jaw, daily, to senseless or vicious gossip, WHAT SENSE is there in denying adequate jaw service to the most important function of living?

WHAT SENSE is there in a rich person glutting his Mind-Power Plant with more food-fuel than it needs, just because he happens to have an abundance to glut with, or glut on?

WHAT SENSE is there in calling any glutton "a gentleman"?

WHAT SENSE is there in calling any glutton "a lady"?

If what Taste rejects, after having selected nutriment out of a morsel of food is dirt, WHAT SENSE is there in allowing it to contaminate and burden the delicate organs of digestion?

An indigestible morsel of food is like a runaway team in a crowded street. WHAT SENSE is there, then, in demoralising things in the thoroughfare of our life organism by admitting unruly substance?

An indigestible morsel of food in the stomach, and all the way through the intestines, is like a "bull in a china shop." WHAT SENSE is there, then, in smashing the delicate utensils in the laboratory of our Mind-Power Plant by rushing "bulls" past Sentinel Taste?

A SCIENTIFIC POINT

Physiological Chemistry declares that an important function of saliva is turning the starch of foods into dextrose—sugar—which is one of the high forms of nutrition.

An eminent physiological chemist, who is a friend of the author, and who has been experimenting with the suggestions offered by the discovery of new uses for Taste in securing perfect economic nutrition, says that the inexpressibly sweet flavour which comes with the last expression of Taste in connection with a morsel of food, especially dry breads, which are largely starch, is evidence of perfect conversion of the starch to sugar by the action of the saliva.

The sweet taste spoken of begins to be apparent in dry French bread after about twenty movements of the mouth, and increases until the whole morsel is dissolved and disappears into the stomach, leaving behind it a most delicious after-flavour. According to the quantity in the mouthful this process will take from fifty to one hundred movements of the mouth and require from half a minute to one minute.

In this connection remember, please, that if you bolt a whole slice, or a whole loaf of bread in the meantime, as soon as it is wet enough to swallow, you will get little, if any, more nutriment out of it, and none of the exquisite taste that Nature's way offers as an allurement for obeying her beneficent demands. The way of Nature is the epicurean way; the other way is nothing less than piggish gluttony.

Even if time for eating is limited, nothing is gained by bolting food. Thirty mouthfuls of bread thoroughly dissolved in the mouth will supply nutriment for a strong man for twenty-four hours, and the eating of it in the way recommended will give pleasure unknown in hurry.

My physiological chemist friend assures me that I am right in asserting that man should not drink anything but pure water, and that for the purpose of quenching thirst. If anything is good enough to drink at all it is too good to waste on an unwilling stomach when grateful and hungry taste-buds are eager for it.

Don't drink soup! Don't drink milk! Don't drink beer! Don't drink wine! Don't drink syruped sodas for the taste of the syrups! Sip everything that has taste so that Taste can inspect it and get the good out of it for you!

TASTE'S APPEAL

Water has no taste, therefore, Taste does not call it to a halt, but says, "Go right on and do your work, there is nothing in you that I can improve; thank you for giving me a freshening up in passing. If people only knew what you and I know they would be wiser, wouldn't they? They would learn a thing or two about keeping their Mind-Power Plant in fine order and get rid of all their physical ailments, and be strong and happy, and live to be a hundred and fifty years of age with their faculties unimpaired. I say! you are on the outside and can give people a hint; why don't you tell them what I am here for! They set me down for a 'capper,' like one of those fellows that stand outside of cheap restaurants and invite passers to come in and eat. They don't know I am an expert in nutriment and can protect them from any harm in eating. I offer them also a first-class bonbon taste, at the finish of my work to induce them to stay by and help me to do proper work, but they are all in such a blamed hurry that they never wait for the bonbon, and the result is that loads of dirt and indigestible stuff get by me and make endless mischief in the machine. I hear about it often enough you may be sure. All the sewer gas the indigestion produces comes back this way, spoils my comfort, and dulls my strength. You see, you can have a chance, perhaps, to learn for yourself and tell the people what I can do for them. I'm lodged in here in the dark where they can't see me and I have no means of informing them.

"I wonder why it is that Mother Nature makes such a mystery of her blessings. She never advertises and never exhibits her best things plainly. All her precious metals are hidden away in narrow seams in the ground; her pearls are guarded by close-mouthed oysters at the bottom of the ocean; electricity is as slippery as an eel and absolutely invisible; in fact, Nature is the most retiring, in her habits, of all the expressions of Deity; and, consistent with herself, she has put me in here, in the dark and speechless, provided with powers of selection and discrimination, which, if understood and made thorough use of, will do for man all that he can desire.

"The funny part of it is that the animals, other than man, use me instinctively and live their appointed time; while man, in his usual big-headed way, centuries and centuries ago, gave me the lowest place among the Senses, classed my chief agent and assistant, Saliva, as merely a 'pusher' of food into the stomach, and ever since he has been in too much of a hurry to live quick to take the time to live long; and that's what's the matter with the world."[17]