An argument on behalf of the primitive diet of man ... / by Frederic R. Lees.

  • Frederic Richard Lees
Date:
1857
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An argument on behalf of the primitive diet of man ... / by Frederic R. 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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    of a vegetable diet, without any stimulants. ... Many of the attacks in Great Britain arise from eating and drinking too much. .., It may be said that the Polynesian race are little liable to disease of the brain, but this is not the case; for among the Malays in Ceylon—a similar race—apoplexy, epilepsy, mania, paralysis, and delirium tremens, are all to be seen; but if they do not drink alcohol [which they do in tod- dy], they stupefy themselves with opium. “ The exemption of the New Zealanders from Dropsy and Kidney disease, may be chiefly attributed to their abstinence from spirituous liquors; and part to Scarlatina being as yet almost unknown among them.” Such facts are proper to remind us that our sufferings as a nation are self-inflicted—not the result of some inscrutable Providence, but the penalty most wisely and justly attached to our wilful persistence in evil. Favnirtie to § 39. Amongst the ethical reasons for preferring vegetal to animal xempniuK food is the fact, that while a free flesh-diet tends to intemperancein liquor, the, use of vegetal-oils, or the constituents of fat (starch and sugar), give a distaste for alcoholics, since the two substances would retard each other’s combustion. Vegetarianism, therefore, is a physio- logical guarantee of fidelity to Temperance. * § 40. The intimate bond which exists between the food, the blood, the nerves, and the brain, is never questioned by reflecting men. Nay, even physiologists will admit the truth of our theory in relation to certain persons or classes, but make some door of escape for men in general! They cannot be made to see the absoluteness of a tendency, or the essence of a principle. The fact of the relation between creatine (or gravy-essence) and eaffein has been already stated : and to show how impossible it is to rank such substances amongst nutrient matters, we will give Professor Lehmann’s experiment:— “ Five persons, one of whom was Prof. Buchheim, now at Dorpat, coffer. after taking from 5 to 10 grains of this substance, were unfit for any business the next day. f “It may be assumed that Nature would not suffer substances even more highly nitrogenized than creatine, as creatinine, to escape thro the leidneys, if they could be employed to further advantage in the organ- ism ; since we find so careful a providence over recognized nutrient matters, as for instance, albumen, etc., that even in disease they are ouly rarely found to escape with the excreta.” * “ Those who take much fat, butter or oil, cannot take wine, and feel no desire for it.”—Prof. Gregory’s Organic Chemistry. 1852. f Physiological Chemistry, vol. i. p. 142.
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