The physiology of digestion, considered with relation to the principles of dietetics / By Andrew Combe.

  • Andrew Combe
Date:
1845
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The physiology of digestion, considered with relation to the principles of dietetics / By Andrew Combe. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    themselves serious injury in this way, and then complain loudly of the dis- comfort which attends the subsequent indigestion of a heavy dinner. To re- lieve the weakness, arising not from exhaustion but from the oppression of satiety, they resort to wine, as if by adding fuel to the fire they could rea- sonably hope to extinguish the flame! Even in fashionable life the supe- riority of Nature’s arrangements over those of man is so far acknowledged, that it is an almost universal rule for children to dine early in the day; and there cannot be a doubt that the prac- tice is attended with manifold advan- tages to the young, although, as re- gards their moral training, these would be greatly increased were they to asso- ciate at meals with their parents, in- stead of being left entirely to the com- pany and management of servants. Here I cannot refrain from earnestly soliciting the attention of the reflect- ing parent to the injury inflicted by the irrational mode of life and educa- tion to which the young are generally subjected. As growth and nutrition are in their highest activity in youth, it follows that at no period of life is strict adherence to the organic laws of so much moment as then ; because, if the system does not receive at the proper intervals the supplies of food of which it stands urgently in need, it must necessarily become impaired in tone, and more liable to the in- roads of disease. The completed and compact frame of an adult may resist for a time delay or irregularity in its supplies; but the undeveloped and sus- ceptible organization of the young suf- fers from the very first, and the evil increases in proportion as the aberra- tion from the order of Nature is re- peated. Hence reason, affection, and enlightened benevolence, all concur in enforcing a strict adherence to an early dinner-hour for the young. On no account whatever ought it to be de- layed beyond one or two o’clock. And yet if we examine the customs of so- ciety, especially in the middle and higher ranks resident in towns, we find the school-occupations so irra- tionally arranged, that while the chil- dren are obliged to breakfast early, even in winter, to reach school in time, most of them find it impossible to dine till five or six o’clock—eight or mine hours after their first meal, in- stead of four or jive. And when stunted growth, feeble digestion, delicacy, or bad health results as the natural con- sequence of exhaustion, instead of as- cribing it to its true cause—the depri- vation of sustenance—and trying to cure it by a better regulation of the diet, it is usual to leave the evil to do its worst, and to content ourselves with complacently lamenting the de- generacy of the age, and boasting of the marvellous constitutions and har- dihood of the children of our younger day, whom neither wind nor weather could hurt. If it were a favourite colt or dog whose training we were super- intending, the folly of shutting it up all day in a confined atmosphere, and denying it exercise and food at proper intervals, would be at once perceived. The evil, however, is the source of much suffering and disappointment ; and, as it cannot be corrected until the public is rendered fully aware of its existence and influence, it cannot be too often brought under notice, or too strongly condemned. The teacher alone has not the power of providing aremedy. The concurrence and co- operation of the parent are indispen- sable ; but both combined could easily effect such a distribution of the time and business of the school, as to leave at least a couple of hours in the middle of the day appropriated to dinner and play after it in the open air. It is no valid objection to say that in winter the day is too short.to allow the “sa- crifice” of somuch time. The shorter it is, the greater is the necessity for making the most of it by adequate at- tention to the laws of health. The real “ sacrifice” of time is when health is impaired and progress retarded by un- due confinement and deprivation of exercise in the open air. The very shortness of the day, indeed, implies
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