Agrippa Nelson Bell

“ Feebleness, on the contrary, though not always appreciated, and sometimes cultivated, indeed, by the practise of that altogether too popular fad, abstemiousness, is always and everywhere a prevailing 'predisposition' to disease; and, associated as it commonly is with inadequate nourishment, it is the most frequent of all incitants to tuberculosis. ”

“ The mistake commonly made with reference to the use of fat food is, that it is only, or especially, applicable to cold climates—an erroneous inference, the same as that cold is preventive of tuberculosis. That fat is the almost exclusive food in Arctic regions is because other food is not obtainable, not because of the frigid climate. It is necessary food, though not in such excess, at all times and everywhere, to supply the potential energy required by the organism to construct the tissues and maintain the body, the temperature of the body being about the same in all climates. ”

“ Education, whether physical or mental, is seriously retarded, if not practically impossible, when the body is improperly or imperfectly nourished. The child of poverty, with body emaciated, blood thin and nerves on edge, because he has not enough to eat, grows up stunted in body and in mind. ”

“ Everybody has learned, when it is unfortunately, in most cases, too late, that cod-liver oil is good for consumptives, but few seem to have learned that food of the same character as cod-liver oil, suitable for the table, is preventive of consumption.
In the whole course of my professional observation, now covering a period of more than sixty years, I have never known a family or an individual that was brought up on a liberal supply of butter and bacon who became tuberculous. Moreover, such food fortifies the system against other diseases as well as consumption; it establishes stamina. ”

“ Communicable as all competent observers know tuberculosis to be, while they equally well know that it is not so under all circumstances, it is indeed questionable whether any one of sound constitution and well nourished has ever contracted the disease from nursing consumptives, or from living with them otherwise, under good hygienic surroundings. ”

“ Recurring to what I have remarked on the superiority of meat that retain the blood as well as the fat, every epicure knows, and every physician ought to know, that the meat of animals of every kind so killed as to retain the blood is more delicious than that of animals otherwise killed. It is also more digestible and more nutritious. All fresh meat is more or less acid, and that from which the blood has been drained requires to be kept until alkalinity is induced by incipient decomposition before it becomes tender and digestible. ”

“ It is not necessary to our present purpose to pursue the subject of the origin and nature of food in its general sense, but to emphasize the importance of the essential elements of food comprehended in the various organic and inorganic compounds of which food consists, as follows: Carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, sulphur, phosphorus, chlorin, iodin, potassium, calcium, magnesium, sodium and iron. ”

“ It is not by any means necessary that a food should yield all these elements, indeed there is but one such food—milk—that is complete in this respect, and perfect, upon which the young of all mammalian animals are, or should be, for a time exclusively nourished. Neither is it essential next following the period of nursing, that every food should be broken up, or 'refined' to facilitate its assimmilation and combinations in the structures of the body, since the functions of the organism are adapted to these processes. ”

“ Relative exemption from tuberculosis, under all circumstances, is, according to my observation, due to the generous use and potentiality of fat food. My conclusion in this regard is fortified by many years' observation and study of the liability to consumption of people collectively, families and individuals, more or less proportional to their abstinence from fat foods. The most prominent example, of which I have never lost sight from youth up, is the negro race in America. ”

“ Moreover, I have observed among people in the tropics, as well as in temperate latitudes, that there is a marked difference in the health of persons whose chief food is farinaceous, between those who but rarely eat anything else and are particularly feeble, lymphatic and scrofulous, and those who eat butter or oil with their rice and similar food, or supplement it with sardines in oil, or oil-dressed salads. ”

“ Abstemiousness, however, is variable in its practise, and uncertain; one may over-eat and yet abstain from some essential food necessary for the maintenance of health. Adequate nourishment and stamina depend upon the supply of nutriment in the kinds and proportions required by our bodies. Food is required for a two-fold purpose; (1) to supply material for the construction and repair of tissue, and (2) to supply fuel for its maintenance, the production of heat and energy. ”

“ No good observer will fail to recognize the coincidence of the condition which diminishes the proportion of leucocytes and the increased liability to disease—that of fasting; or note the no less remarkable coincidence, the diminution in the number of leucocytes and increasing infirmity of old age. ”

“ Practical experience in the dieting of large numbers of men, and other means, have enabled us to establish the fact that such an average man as I have spoken of requires for the maintenance of health, a diet which shall contain about four ounces of plastic material, three ounces of fat and ten ounces of carbohydrates ”

“ Carbohydrates of various kinds contribute to the same functions as fat, under ordinary conditions, but they do not suffice to maintain the stamina of the organism to the highest degree anywhere without the assistance of, or being supplemented by, some kind of fat. ”

“ Consumption is most prevalent among those who are stinted or who stint themselves of 'bacon' and 'butter.' I mention these as ideal and because they are among the most digestible of fat foods; other fat foods are commendable. ”

“ Besides, the draining or soaking away of the blood from meat impairs its nutritive value. The blood is essentially of the same composition as the flesh, but besides, it holds in solution phosphates of soda, salts of potash, iron and sulphates; all nutritives of vital importance to the human economy. But there is no method of slaughtering animals that entirely divests the flesh of blood, hence to attempt to prohibit eating it, to be effective, should prohibit the eating of meat altogether. ”

“ Hence it is that about one quarter of all the deaths recorded of mankind during adult life, is caused by tuberculosis, and nearly one half of the entire population, at some time in life, acquires the disease. ”

“ The range in different male adults is from 34 to 46 ounces of so-called solid food, and from 70 to 90 ounces of water in some form, taken with and without solid food. For adult females, the average is from 3 to 5 ounces less. For children and youths, proportionally, more in the inverse ratio to age, 0.8 to 0.6 ounces for each pound weight of the body.
If individuals are undergoing great exertion they require more food, and, if they can obtain it, the needful increase is especially in the nitrogenous and fat foods. ”

“ Unfortunately for the infant, however, it frequently happens that after weaning, and if it has been nursed by a healthy mother, or other wet nurse, being well fed on two or three pints of wholesome milk, daily, its food supply is reduced by substitution of one kind or another, more or less devoid of essential elements, with the common result of emaciation and tenderness, and increased liability to sickness. ”

“ With regard to certain infectious diseases to which children are especially liable, in part, doubtless, because of their greater functional activity, but chiefly because their power of resistance has not yet become sufficiently fortified—for it is well known that adults generally who have not encountered those diseases in childhood rarely contract them subsequently—the same relative immunity exists; the strong and vigorous child is much less likely to contract them than the feeble ”

“ A supply of fat, per se, to the blood is essential for histogenesis and for the protection of the tissues, and is also of importance for general use as a source of heat and mechanical force. ⁠2. The carbo-hydrates and albuminoids may supply heat and mechanical force, but they can not take the place of fat in histogenesis and protection of tissue. ”

“ The average daily quantity of fat required by an adult to keep up healthy nutrition, according to various estimates, is two ounces, and proportionally more during the period of growth, after weaning—from half an ounce to two ounces. ”

“ ANALYSIS of vital statistics for the last three-quarters of a century shows an average increase in the duration of human life among civilized peoples from 42.2 years to 48.5 years. The chief increase has been during the latter half of that period, and, for the most part, by the reduced mortality from zymotic diseases, but, above all, from pulmonary tuberculosis, from which the reduction of mortality has been nearly fifty per cent. ”

“ The flesh-eating Mahometans of India are described by historians as being the most powerful, active-minded and hardy race of human beings in the world, presenting the widest possible contrast in physical development to the rice-eating and feeble Hindoos, of whom but few reach the age of forty years. ”

“ And the earliest records of consumption among them are contemporary with the attempted methods of civilizing them—inducing them to leave their tents and live in houses; restricting their game supply and supplying them with an excess of farinaceous food. They have ceased to be a hardy race and tuberculosis is common among them. The Gauchos of the South American pampas, who live almost exclusively upon fat animal food, are alike remarkable for their extraordinary stamina. ”

“ Every structure in the body in which any form of energy is manifested (heat, mechanical motion, chemical or electric action, etc.) is nitrogenous. The nerves, the muscles, the gland-cells, the floating cells in the various liquids, the semen, and the ovarian cells, are all nitrogenous. ”

“ Every intelligent person knows that the power of resisting the ordinary exciting causes of illness, such as sudden changes of temperature, exposure to damp soil, room or sheets, or night air with the windows closed, depends upon one's state of health. ”

“ But the latter is the means by which the principal supply of solid fat is carried into the blood, and is the most important.
⁠4. The mean consumption of oxygen by an adult man of average stature (weight, 150 lbs.) , taking ordinary exercise, is about thirty ounces in the twenty-four hours, and the heat evolved by each ounce of oxygen in combining with carbon, hydrogen, etc., is about 350 British units. Hence, 10,000 British units of heat will be evolved every twenty-four hours by the combination of thirty ounces of oxygen with carbon, hydrogen, etc. ”

“ In many places in the British Islands the same thing is being done. Should we do less in the cities of democratic America? In no other way can we be sure that the schools will, as far as education may, provide equal opportunities for all. ”

“ Also in young persons, during pregnancy, and after great loss of blood, there is a large proportion of colorless blood corpuscles, which probably shows that they are more rapidly formed under these circumstances. ”

“ The average daily amount of food required and of the different kinds, as comprehended in this classification, severally, varies considerably with individual conditions of age, size, exercise, circulation, activity of the eliminating organs, etc. ”