Counterweight

“ This time, instead of skirmishing valiantly for a space and then being ignominiously and fatly routed by the powerful forces of food and drink, I hung stolidly to the line of my original attack, harassed the enemy by a constant and deadly fire—and one morning discovered I had the foe on the run.
It always makes me laugh to hear people talk about losing flesh—unless, of course, the decrease in weight is due to illness. No healthy person, predisposed to fat, ever lost any flesh. If that person gets rid of any weight, or girth, or fat, it isn't lost—it is fought off, beaten off. ”

“ Every additional pound tempts to the formation of lazy or sluggish habits because of the additional weight that has to be carried around. Everyone knows how hard it is to walk a few blocks a little briskly carrying a suit case that weighs thirty pounds. Even twenty pounds soon proves to be a burden. Fat in the tissues, though it seems to be a portion of the individual, is really quite outside of him and consists of extra food material that the body is carrying round, having accumulated it for the purpose, apparently, of using it at some time when it should be necessary. ”

“ The great pound is just two small pounds; they call the great weight by the name of beasemar, and the small they call the skallawaight. With this small weight they weigh their silver coins, of which the Emperor hath commanded to put to every small pound three rubbles of silver; and with the same weight they weigh all grocery wares, and almost all other wares, which come into the land, except those which they weigh by the pode, as hops, salt, iron, lead, tin, and batrie, with divers others. Notwithstanding, they used to weigh batrie more often by the small weight than by the great. ”

“ If now a weight of 1 pound is suspended from the bar at some point, say 12, the balance is disturbed, and the bar swings about the point F as a center. The balance can be regained by suspending an equivalent weight at the opposite end of the bar, or by applying a 2-pound weight at a point 3 inches to the left of F. In the latter case a force of 1 pound actually balances a force of 2 pounds, but the 1-pound weight is twice as far from the point of suspension as is the 2-pound weight. The small weight makes up in distance what it lacks in magnitude. ”

“ If, instead of human labour, we introduce the work of a weight, and hang to the block a load of 400, and at a, where otherwise the labourer works, a weight of 100 pounds, the block is then in equilibrium, and, without any appreciable exertion of the arm, may be set in motion. The weight of 100 pounds sinks, that of 400 rises. Without any measurable expenditure of force, the heavy weight has been raised by the sinking of the smaller one. But observe that the smaller weight will have sunk through four times the distance that the greater one has risen. ”

“ I had been experimenting principally upon the cutting down of weight. Excess weight kills any self-propelled vehicle. There are a lot of fool ideas about weight. It is queer, when you come to think of it, how some fool terms get into current use. There is the phrase "heavyweight" as applied to a man's mental apparatus! What does it mean? No one wants to be fat and heavy of body—then why of head? For some clumsy reason we have come to confuse strength with weight. ”

“ Perhaps you will wonder how it is that if we have a weight of 15 lbs. pressing on every square inch of our bodies, it does not crush us. And, indeed, it amounts on the whole to a weight of about 15 tons upon the body of a grown man. It would crush us if it were not that there are gases and fluids inside our bodies which press outwards and balance the weight so that we do not feel it at all.
This is why Mr. Glaisher's veins swelled and he grew giddy in thin air. ”

“ Burnett in Washington, and the examinations in the laboratories of Cambridge and Yale all tell the same story of a reformed and increasing efficiency even with five years of added age handicap, so that the logic of the advice originally given in this book stands proved, so far. I have had my weight reduced from 217 pounds to 130 pounds and felt best when lightest. I carry my weight at any figure desired, but most of the time carry a 20-pound handicap in winter and sometimes in summer to calm the fears of solicitous friends, who think I must be ill when I am not looking "robust." ”

“ Limiting the Fluids in Obesity.—Thus it is seen that when the intake of fluids is limited, the body will call upon that surplus which is stored in every nerve, tissue, and fluid throughout the entire organism to assist in the necessary work of the organs, thus reducing the body weight just that much.
Exercise.—The athlete who is overweight, due to adipose tissue, increases his exercise at times, even adding to the weight of his clothing, causing an increased energy output, profuse perspiration, etc., all of which causes the body to use its surplus fuel in the form of the stored fat. ”

“ As the fat weight increases by surplus food, so decrease the disposition and ability for general exercise. As it declines, so do muscle and all the other energies increase, and the use of muscle within physiological limit tends to restore the normal weight and strength.
There are no overweights who would not receive the greatest benefit by a fast that would diminish the pounds to that of the ripest maturity of life, a fast that would be determined by the time required to reach the desired number of pounds. ”

“ Whether fat people possess greater power of resistance as against the fatal wasting of certain maladies or not, does not seem to be known, and I fancy that the popular medical belief is rather opposed to a belief in the vital endurance of those who are unusually fat.
That I am not pushing too far this idea of the indicative value of gain of weight may be further seen in persons who suffer from some incurable chronic malady, but who are in other respects well. The relief from their disease, even if temporary, is apt to be signalled by abrupt gain in weight. ”

“ Here it is evident that if we overbalance the lever by a single grain, so as to cause the long arm with its power to fall down while the short one with its weight rises up, then the long arm will fall three inches for every inch through which the short arm rises; and hence, to make up for this, a single kilogramme on the long arm will balance three kilogrammes on the short one, or the power will be to the weight as one is to three. ”

“ I have sometimes lost from ten ounces to a Pound in weight by an Hour’s sparring. If the object be not to reduce the weight, the Food may safely be proportioned to the Exercise.
You will readily perceive, that the plan I adopted, ought only to be resorted to by Persons of sound Constitution and of athletic bodily Frame,—it would be absurd to lay down a general rule for the adoption of all fat men.
I think, with all lusty men, the drinking of malt Liquor of any kind is injurious,—Meat taken more than once a day is liable to the same Objection. ”

“ Generally, however, it may be observed that to lift heavy weights it is desirable first to see what weight can be used without undue strain. Slowly raise this weight from your shoulder over your head, or, if from the ground, raise it somewhat more quickly. See how many times you are able to raise the weight first selected, and when you can perform the exercise with comparative ease, raising it, say, ten times, up to 80 lbs., six times from 80 to 100, and afterwards three times, increase the weight for the next day’s exercise by five pounds. ”

“ If the increase of weight in a small compass of time, rise to above a certain quantity, it will cause disorders.
“I can bear an increase of above a pound and a half in one day, and an increase of three or four pounds in six or seven days, without being disordered; but think I should suffer from an increase of five or six pounds in that time.
“An increase of weight may be carried off by lessening the Food,—or by increasing the Discharges.—The discharges may be increased either by exercise, or by evacuations procured by art. ”

“ Then weighing what they had borne, whether we should find it to be ten or thirty pounds—I cannot guess how much it might be at this distance—one might safely say, without fear of mistake, "The strength of this young lady is equal to ten, twenty, or thirty pounds"—in other words, "she represents a weight of ten, twenty, or thirty pounds" and by a similar plan people have ascertained the strength of the air—that is, the weight which it represents. They have weighed what it is capable of carrying. ”

“ There is no more sense in having extra weight in an article than there is in the cockade on a coachman's hat. In fact, there is not as much. For the cockade may help the coachman to identify his hat while the extra weight means only a waste of strength. I cannot imagine where the delusion that weight means strength came from. It is all well enough in a pile-driver, but why move a heavy weight if we are not going to hit anything with it? ”

“ Any figure bearing an additional weight out of the central line, must throw as much natural or accidental weight on the opposite side as is sufficient to form a counterpoise round that line, which passes from the pit of the neck, through the whole mass of weight, to that part of the foot which rests upon the ground. We observe, that when a man lifts a weight with one arm, he naturally throws out the opposite arm; and if that be not enough to form an equipoise, he will add as much of his own weight, by bending his body, as will enable him to resist such accidental load. ”

“ Never having strained myself beyond my powers, I did not feel any ill effects from the heavy labour I underwent, though 100 lbs. was a weight which very few cared to carry on such a track. Two men who had taken to this means of gaining their livelihood fell victims of their ambition, for, instead of commencing with the calf and ending with the bull, as I had done, they staggered under the full weight of 100-lb. bags of flour, sugar, &c., till their strength gave way, and their coffins had to be prepared for them. ”

“ In refined physical work the practice known as double-weighing is employed to obviate any slight error there may be in the suspension of the balance. A counterpoise which is heavier than anything to be weighed is placed in one pan, and weighed. The counterpoise is retained in its pan throughout the whole course of the weighings. Any substance whose weight is to be found is placed in the other pan, and weights added till the balance swings truly again. The difference between the two sets of weights evidently gives the weight of the substance. ”

“ The normal weight of a man five feet in height is 120 pounds; of a man five feet ten inches, 169 pounds. Now, suppose the latter really weighs 300 pounds by accumulation of fat, what results but that all this superfluous matter has to be supplied with capillaries, and these have to get blood from vessels only constructed to circulate the original quantity? No wonder is it that the circulation is enfeebled and impeded! By this increase of adipose there is no increase of propelling force. ”

“ According to our best authorities, we are subjected to the weight of fifteen pounds to each square-inch of surface, and a man of ordinary size sustains a pressure on him of some thirty-thousand pounds of air. I am a man of ordinary size, but I no more knew that I laboured under the burden of thirty-thousand pounds than I did that I was subjected to the pressure of about the same burden of Mrs. Cribbage who sits on my shoulders all day and squats on my chest all night, till I turned up the matter in an encyclopædia. ”

“ When I protest, however, against making a display and a grievance of the load you have to bear, I am far from maintaining that you are to keep it a profound secret, and hide it away in unsuitable places under your clothes. A man can carry a hundred-weight on his shoulders with less inconvenience than a few pounds about his heart. ”

“ The greater weight is a burden to carry. The muscular tissues have in part changed to fat, and are therefore less able to do their work. The action of the lungs and the heart is interfered with by the pressure of the fat, and the individual quickly becomes exhausted and short of breath. There is the greater demand, therefore, on the part of those who incline to obesity, to exercise with determined persistency and regularity, in order to reduce their weight. ”

“ Instead of the weights swaying sideways and banging against the boxes, as they are liable to do in the ordinary old-fashioned pulley-weight boxes, they travel in boxes, A A, between the rods B B. A rubber bed also prevents the weight from making a noise as it strikes the floor, while another capital feature is the arrangement of boxes, in which you may graduate the weight desired by adding little plates of a pound each, instead of the unchanging weight of the old plan. ”

“ When people are more than 10 per cent. over weight they are in the danger zone, and with 20 per cent. above the normal, decrease must come or the condition becomes inveterate. It is between these two points and not when they are forty or fifty pounds over weight that they need the advice of a physician and the careful institution of regular life to prevent further fat accumulation. After the body has carried thirty or forty pounds over weight for some time, it has acquired the habit of accumulating fat, rather than using it, and this, once acquired, is hard to break. ”