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table productions of the earth, except perhaps a little milk and butter. I do not remember, being then young, and thinking very little about medical subjects, what change was produced on my feelings and health. I believe I was as well as before; and the increased pleasure which I began to take in literary and scientific employments at that time, inclines me to suspect that a state of mind more friendly to mental enjoyments might possibly have been induced by a change to the light diet on which I began to feed. I may mention in this place, that during this period, I once being in Surrey, in the summer time, fed for more than a week almost entirely on the fruits of the garden, chiefly raspberries, strawberries, and currants; I am sure I was never better nor stronger in my life.

I may here observe, that while living in this manner I lost the dark incrustation on the teeth; a disagreeable appearance for which persons have commonly recourse to the dentist.

I left off the vegetable diet more from a notion of the convenience of eating as other people did, than for any other reason. I continued eating a mixed diet till 1811, when I studied anatomy at St. Bartholomew's Hospital, where it was the fashion among many of the students to eat vegetable diet. Many had adopted it for ill health, and told me of the benefit they derived from it; while others made the experiment in compliance with the habits of their friends. Hypotheses are very contagious, and I was infected, and determined to make the experiment fairly and completely. I lived for more than sixteen months on a strictly vegetable diet. The change at first produced was an augmentation of nervous sensibility, which was only temporary, and after a short time my health, which was always good, was now nearly the same as when on a mixed diet. I think I can say, however, that I was more disposed for and capable of laborious mental occupation than when feeding on mixed diet.

That numerous persons have enjoyed good health on vegetable diet is doubtless; but whether this diet produces the same degree of muscular strength and activity, is more doubtful. In my own case it certainly did. I frequently walked twenty miles in a morning, and took other hard exercise when on that diet, and I seldom felt fatigue. I am quite satisfied with the experiment, and having repeated it on others to whom I have recommended the vegetable diet, that people in general may, after a time, live as healthy on it as on a mixed diet. Whatever change may be produced at first, a very similar state of health appears to return after the continuance of any diet

when eaten in moderation; at least as far as temporary appear. ances indicate. How far a mixed diet lays secretly the foundation for future disorders, or may abridge the term of life, I am unable to say. I leave this to yourself and other ingenious persons, who make it a subject of their study. But I am confident, in general, that people err considerably in the quantity of food they take, and the frequency of taking it, and in the manner in which they stimulate their stomachs by spirituous and fermented liquors.

One circumstance which strongly impressed me with the small quantity of food which was necessary to sustain us in health, and which shows the safety and efficacy of a sudden adoption of vegetable diet, was the following. Last midsummer I received a severe wound on the back of the hand. Apprehending inflammation and its consequences, I left off all diet except a few potatoes and some strawberries for many days, and vegetable diet for many weeks. The wound continued healthy, and the perfect use of my hand returned in less than six weeks, without any considerable inflammation or any fever, during the progress of the reparation of the injury. I did not perceive any other inconvenience (after the intense pain which shortly followed the accident was over, which was only cutaneous and lasted a few hours) than that of being obliged to wear my hand in a sling for a few weeks. I was perfectly strong and healthy, though my diet was only on vegetables, and diminished to one fourth of the ordinary quantity; and this adopted after a copious bleeding from the wound.*

To return to our subject; I recommended A. B., about twentyfour years of age, who for a continual state of diarrhoea had been kept by his medical attendants on meat alone, to alter a plan from which he derived no benefit; he began at first by eating biscuits and other farinaceous substances, and by degrees habituated his stomach to vegetable diet; he grew healthy, lost the diarrhoea, and after being restored took to common mixed diet again; but used much less in quantity, and remains well. I mention this case out of numerous others in which vegetable diet was successfully used, because it was a case in which, from

* It is evident that my ingenious correspondent has followed the common opinion, that the absence of inflammation was occasioned by the temporary change of his regimen. I have already given my opinion in the preceding pages that this doctrine is erroneous; and should attribute the slightness of the suffering, under this accident, much more to the soundness of constitution produced by the previous long-continued habits of temperance and abstinence than to the living on vegetable diet, after the accident had happened.—Note of the Author.

the irritable state of the patient's stomach and bowels, the fruit and vegetables were regarded by the medici who attended him as particularly dangerous.

I must say, in conclusion of this hasty letter, that all I have observed of the good effect of vegetable or any other diet, appears to me referable to its power, arising either from some idiosyncrasy, or some peculiar state of the patient's system, of tranquilizing stomachic and intestinal irritation; by this means of insuring better digestion, and producing that tranquillity and healthy action of the chylopoietic viscera, which is necessary to the cure of every disorder whether general or local, which is the principal condition of the maintenance of health. Of the remote effects of peculiar diets on the animal system, where digestion upholds temporary health for a while, I know absolutely nothing. I must therefore confine my practice of medicine to actual experience of facts; and be contented till, by your labors, and the future inquiries of chemical physiologists, more is known about the component substances of the animal fibre; to recommend people to acquire and preserve, by mental tranquillity, temperance, and exercise, and to restore by simple medicines in diseases, the healthy action of those important organs, which nature has designed to repair the daily waste, and to restore the accidental injuries of our mutable fabric.

It may be well to observe, in the course of this inquiry, that if your doctrine and experience should be able to show that people may live healthily in all climates on vegetable productions, the same quantity of land would sustain more human beings; a fact of which agriculturists have assured me that people would be more free from disease, and from inducements to gluttony and intemperance, and that the removal of the disgusting scenes of cruelty, practiced on edible animals, would be gratifying to those who are organized to feel benevolently, would cease to operate as an incitement to the bad feeling of others, and would tend in time to a better state of society.

A circumstance may be mentioned here, of great moment in the education of youth, namely, that the principles of all human actions are in the organization, though education and external influences are necessary, generally, to excite their activity. Examples have the most powerful influence in rousing either the good or bad feelings; and precepts are of little avail in comparison. The constant habit of destroying animated beings, both for food and for amusement, is therefore one of the most fertile sources of the ferocity and brutality of the human character. Hence we see the moral benefit of any diet

which would diminish, in any considerable degree, this baneful example. Children, says an eminent author, begin with killing flies, and end their lives at the gallows for the crime of murder! Yours, etc.,

MEDICUS.

London, Jan. 21, 1815.

CASE XVII.

Hypochondriasis, Headache, Indigestion, Costiveness, and Jaundice.

DEAR SIR,

FROM A CORRESPONDENT.

The incalculable benefit which I have, for these last two years, experienced, and am daily experiencing from the vegetable regimen, with distilled water, would have been, independent of any other consideration, a reason sufficient for complying with your wish, to have the principal facts of my case. There are yet other considerations which have much weight with me; you have made me greatly, and I would not hope ungratefully, your debtor for all which I now enjoy of health, of tranquillity, and of serenity of mind. Besides, it is but just, that you should be put in possession of every instance wherein evident and acknowledged good has resulted from the diffusion of your opinions, since it is only by the multiplication of facts that the truth of your position can be made to “come home to men's business and bosoms.'

Should you judge the detail of my case worthy of publication, perhaps it may not be misplaced to observe, that I made trial of the vegetable regimen when you were unknown to me, even by name; and therefore I was not influenced by any previously formed opinion of what food is most natural to man. Imperfect as was my trial of the regimen at first, much benefit was derived from it; many unpleasant and intolerable sensations were alleviated; still something was felt to be wanting to its completion, when it was my happiness to become acquainted with you, who instructed me in the necessity of abandoning every thing animalized, and of adopting a strict vegetable regimen, with distilled water; since which time my health has sensibly increased, and is daily increasing; felicity of mind, which had been despaired of, has been obtained; and ultimately there will be assured "quiete et pure et eleganter actæ

ætatis placida ac lenis senectus." Having premised thus much, I will state my case.

At a very early period of life, and, indeed, during the whole of my education at school, my health was uncertain and précarious. What particular aliment I labored under cannot at this distance of time be remembered; perhaps, however, an opinion may be formed of the nature of my complaints, when it is known, that between my thirteenth and fourteenth years, I was very severely attacked with jaundice; and that previously, for many years, distressing headaches, and symptoms of indigestion, with habitual costiveness, had been experienced. Various were the means had recourse to, besides the aid of medicine, to alleviate my sufferings, to re-establish my health, and to correct a constitution, denominated bilious; all was of no avail, and I dragged on a miserable existence until the age of fifteen, when I was removed from school, and was for a series of years laboriously and actively employed. This situation in life did certainly improve my health; and no doubt but much more would have been done by my active employment, toward the re-establishment of my health, had I not suffered myself to be influenced by the general opinion, that labor and activity can only be gone through when animal substances and fermented liquors are used; hence I was neither sparing of the former, partaking of it thrice in the day; nor very temperate, though not intemperate, in the latter. After the expiration of that series of years, my views and intentions in life having been changed, and otherwise directed, my labor and activity were succeeded by sedentariness, and studiousness; here again I was inconsiderately persuaded by persons equally inconsiderate and unreflecting with myself, who, however, as medical men ought to have been better instructed, that the labor of the mind cannot be endured and supported, but by having recourse to solids and liquids of a stimulating quality. The ill effects of such mode of living, the seeds of which most certainly had been sown, and deeply, between my fourteenth and twenty-first years, now became manifest. In a very short time, I was wholly incapable of continuing my mental labor; was harassed by giddiness, and confusion of the head; my stomach was much more disordered, and my bowels were very much more irregular; my mind became depressed, and disturbed by all the melancholy forebodings of a thorough hypochondriac, experiencing

"mortis formidinem et iram, Somnia, terroses magicos, miracula, sagas, Nocturnos Lemures portentaque Thessala."

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