An argument on behalf of the primitive diet of man / [Frederic Richard Lees].

  • Frederic Richard Lees
Date:
1855
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An argument on behalf of the primitive diet of man / [Frederic Richard Lees]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    Histology of man. Lehmann oxygen. ]8 ON THE PRIMITIVE DIET OE MAN. matured, and the masticating apparatus fitted for the permanent forms of food, the proportion of ready-formed oil is lessened. In the dietary now appointed in the order of Nature, starch takes the place of sugar- of-milk, and common saccharine-matter that of much of the oil. Why P Because, in the teleology * of nature, it is best that the stomach and liver should not be disordered or oppressed with an excess of such material, or the general circulating current impeded in its course; and therefore the salivary and pancreatic juices, and the liver, are destined to convert starch into sugar. The histology of Nature illustrates the law of gradation and procession—and altogether abhors the stuffing- plan which our fashionable Dripping-doctors so rudely recommend. \ 26. The practice of consuming fat-of-cattle, or fat-of-cods, is how- ever not more discordant with the analogy of nature, than the theory of it with the most certain facts of physiology. Liebig had need to have rendered great services to science to make amends for his huge and often pernicious mistakes, amongst which we must rank the repre- sentation that oxygen is the foe of life, always bent upon ‘consuming’ the organism, and to be made placable only by burnt-offerings of the ‘ fat-of-rams’ and the fluid oblation of oleum jecoris Aselli! The latest dictum of science is thus stated in the magnificent work of Lehmann : “ There are no acute, and but few chronic diseases in which the oxidation of the constituents of the blood is not diminished or impeded. There is no disease characterized by a too sudden or rapid oxidation of the blood.” f (The italics are not ours.) Oxyphobia—the fear of fresh-air— is a foolish-fear: for oxygen is the necessary correlate of high vitality and health. The use of animal-fat, beyond all doubt, contributes to clog the vital functions, and to retain within the circulation effete mat- ter, and especially interferes with the function of the Liver, which is that of renewing the blood-corpuscles and preparing a more vital-fluid for absorbing oxygen and inducing energetic reaction. Dr Careen- ter, in his strictures, recommends the vegetal-regimen as a cure for dyspepsia, liver complaint, and similar disorders : but the virtue of it, as cure, is negative—it relieves nature from accumulated oppression, so that the constitutional forces are at liberty to manifest their recuper- ative and repairing action. The organism, as a matter of course, re- turns to its normal functions. | “ The first thing,” says Lehmann, “ in many diseases, is to furnish a copious supply of oxygen to the blood, which has been laden with imperfectly decomposed substances, and * Teleology is the science of final-causes—of adaptation to purposes, f Physiological-Chemistry. Vol. i. p. 219. f iii. On Respiration. f In epilepsy. Vegetarianism always prolongs the interval of attack—often cures permanently.
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