Chapter II: Preface

This volume is a history, or a story, of an evolution in the professional care of the sick. It begins in inexperience and in a haze of medical superstition, and ends with a faith that Nature is the all in all in the cure of disease. The hygiene unfolded is both original and revolutionary: its practicality is of the largest, and its physiology beyond any possible question. The reader is assured in advance that every line of this volume has been written with conviction at white heat, that enforced food in sickness and the drug that corrodes are professional barbarisms unworthy of the times in which we live.

E. H. DEWEY.

MEADVILLE, PA., U. S. A.,
_November, 1900_.

CONTENTS.

THE NO-BREAKFAST PLAN.

I.

PAGE

Introduction--Army experiences in the Civil War--Early years in
general practice--Difficulties encountered--Medicinal treatment
found wanting as a means to superior professional success 13

II.

A case of typhoid fever that revolutionized the Author's faith
and practice--A cure without drugs, without food--Resulting
studies of Nature in disease--Illustrative cases--A crucial
experience in a case of diphtheria in the Author's family 26

III.

A study of the brain from a new point of view--Some new
physiology evolved illustrated by severe cases of acute disease 34

IV.

The error of enforced food in cases of severe injuries and diseases
illustrated by several striking examples 42

V.

An apostrophe to physicians 56

VI.

The origin of the No-breakfast Plan--Personal experience of the
Author as a dyspeptic--His first experience without a
breakfast--Physiological questions considered--A new theory of
the origin and development of disease and its cure--The spread of
the No-breakfast Plan--Interesting cases 60

VII.

Digestive conditions--Taste relish--Hunger relish--The moral
science involved in digestion as a new study--Cheer as a
digestive power--Its contagiousness--The need of higher life in
the home as a matter of better health--Cheer as a duty 81

VIII.

The No-breakfast Plan among farmers and other laborers--A series
of voluntary letters to an eminent divine, and the writer put
down as a crank--The origin of the Author's first book--How the
eminent Rev. Dr. George N. Pentecost was secured to write the
introduction--His no-breakfast experience--The publisher converts
a prominent editor--The case of Rev. W. E. Rambo, a returned
missionary--The publishers' missionary work among missionaries--
The utility of the morning fast--Its unquestionable physiology--
Why the hardest labor is more easily performed and for more hours
without a breakfast 85

IX.

The utility of slow eating and thorough mastication unusually
illustrated by Mr. Horace Fletcher, the author--What should we
eat?--The use of fruit from a physiological standpoint 105

X.

Landscape-gardening upon the human face--A pen-picture--
Unrecognized suicide--Absurdity of the use of drugs to cure
diseases--A case of blood-letting--Mission of homoeopathy--
Predigested foods 110

THE FASTING-CURE.

XI.

The forty-two day fast of Mr. W. W. C. Cowen, of Warrensburg,
Ill., and its successful end--Press account--The twenty-eight day
fast of Mr. Milton Rathbun, of New York, and its successful
end--Press account--A second fast of Mr. Milton Rathbun, of
thirty-five days, in the interest of science, and its successful
end--Press account--Adverse comments of Dr. George N. Shrady, an
eminent New York physician 117

XII.

The remarkable fast of forty-five days of Miss Estella Kuenzel,
of Philadelphia, resulting in a complete cure of a case of
melancholia--Press accounts--A still more remarkable fast, of
fifty days, of Mr. Leonard Thress, of Philadelphia, resulting in
a complete cure of a bad case of general dropsy--Press
accounts--General dropsy in a woman of seventy-six relieved by a
fifteen-day fast, with the cure permanent--Rev. Dalrymple's fast
of thirty-nine and one-half days without interruption of pastoral
duties 136

XIII.

Insanity--A study from a new point of view--Its radical cure
deemed probable in most cases by protracted fasts--Feeding the
insane as practised in the hospitals sharply criticised--Some
direct words to physicians in charge 157

XIV.

The evolution of obesity, and its easy relief by fasting--
Overweight prevented by a limitation of the daily food
and without lessening any of the powers or energies--The
evolution and prevention of apoplexy 177

XV.

Chronic alcoholism--The evolution of the drunkard--His complete,
easy, rational cure by fasting--No case so grave as to be beyond
cure by this means--Asthma; Its cure through dietary means--A
railroad tragedy--The need of railroad men to save their brains
from needless waste of energy in their stomachs--An illustrative
case--Some of the Author's troubles from the ignorance of the
people--The death of Mrs. Myers, of Philadelphia, on the
thirty-fifth day of her fast--Adverse press accounts and
comments--Adverse comments of Prof. H. C. Wood, M. D., L. L. D.,
on fasting and fasters 183