XXXII.—Smoking.
“Though smoking is decidedly prejudicial to health, it is not so bad as drinking to excess.”
“Smoking irritates the nerves and promotes the secretion of saliva, which is withdrawn from digestion.”[5]
“By blunting the nerves, a man, as in drinking, may stand a great deal of smoking without being visibly affected by it.”
“A person who, previously to undergoing the water-cure, could drink a gallon of fermented liquor, may, after it, be affected by a single glass—from the fact of his nerves having recovered their sensibility.”
“Persons who previously to the treatment were great smokers, are frequently rendered ill by very little smoking after it.”
“The nerves are strong and vigorous in proportion to their sensibility and freshness.—He who goes through a thorough water-cure treatment, gains a great moral as well as physical command over himself.”
“It is generally the weak and debilitated who are the most sensual and debauched.”
“The sound man has purer tastes, independent of his greater self-command.”
“We find amongst the children of nature, amongst simple peasants who have had but little contact with civilisation, the purest virtue and truest feelings of honor.”—Priessnitz.
Observations.—Persons who consider themselves in health, will derive advantage by six weeks’ or two months’ treatment at Gräfenberg, and will learn how to apply it to themselves or families.
Parents will there acquire the habit of using cold water, be prepared to ward off disease from themselves, and learn, by simple means, how to preserve the health of their children.
Officers in the army, who have an insight into hydropathy, will have nothing to fear from epidemics; they will find that fevers and inflammations are diseases which form the easiest part of Mr. Priessnitz’ practice.
The water at Gräfenberg has no advantage over that which we find everywhere, except that it is peculiarly cold and fresh. In the general purposes of the cure, water should be soft, that is to say, it must possess the quality of dissolving, and for this reason it must be cold, and divested of all mineral properties; for to prove its fitness, linen cloth washed in it must become white, and vegetables dressed in it tender. Trout living in water does not prove its softness, but frogs do; the softest of all waters is the rain. Hard water makes the skin rough, but soft water, on the contrary, renders it smooth. When water, with the slightest acidity in it, has been suffered to remain in leaden pipes, pumps or cisterns for any length of time, it absorbs the dangerous qualities of the lead; and this has been known to produce serious consequences. It is necessary, therefore, that water should be drawn off before any is drunk.
Those who wish to begin ablutions in winter, should do so in a warm room, and as a beginning, instead of washing, they may wet a towel, and with it be well rubbed all over twice a day, or use the rubbing-sheet. The morning immediately on getting out of bed, is the best time for the first ablution; the other should be undertaken two or three hours after eating, never on a full stomach, nor immediately after making any great exertion. The rubbing should be continued from three to five minutes.
It is conceived that one ablution a-day, and the drinking of cold water, will enable those who are in health, and in the enjoyment of life, to continue in that state. After any excess, instead of resorting to drugs, the rubbing sheet should be resorted to, and an increase in cold water as a beverage. The same means may be resorted to by persons who have any reason to suppose that they have caught cold.
In answer to the question, whether there is not some risk of catching cold whilst washing, we answer, “Not the least.” There is no better way of guarding against colds, or of hardening the skin, to contend with atmospheric changes. But in cold weather it is as well that all the body should be wetted simultaneously. Even in cold weather the temperature of the room to which the body is exposed, is higher or warmer than the water used, which cannot, in consequence, produce a cold. The contrary remark may be applied to warm water, as we have all experienced on getting out of a warm bath even in summer. A Russian lady of the author’s acquaintance took a warm bath immediately after dinner, the result was, a want of reaction, and a complete paralysation of the whole of one side of the body.
Before entering cold water, we ought to wash the head and the chest, in order to prevent the blood ascending to those regions.
People, without knowing whether hot or mineral waters will be beneficial or otherwise, make use of them because it is the fashion so to do, or because their application is agreeable. A little reflection would show them that there will not be a wholesome reaction; that taken inwardly they must necessarily injure or destroy the coats of the stomach; and when applied outwardly, weaken the skin, thereby rendering the body susceptible to every change of weather.
Those who resort to sea-bathing in general pay little or no attention to diet. To derive advantage from a trip to any of our watering places, the latter, for the time at least, should be attended to.
The fact that the action of the human heart is repeated at least one hundred thousand times a-day, with sufficient force to keep in continual movement a mass of from 50 to 60 lbs. of blood, might lead to the inquiry what watch, what machinery could be more easily deranged? Can we wonder at men being ill who are constantly eating too much, who indulge in acid wines, in thick and adulterated beer, or spirituous liquors, or hot liquids of whatsoever nature they may be?
Few of us sufficiently appreciate pure cold water. What will not man submit to rather than adopt such means of cure—adapt himself to such self-denial? What pain will he not endure; what poisons swallow or rub into his flesh, rather than consent to seek relief from such a humble source?
Animals, when thirsty, repair to the brook to quench their thirst; when wounded, to assuage the pain. Water is nature’s medicine and man despises it.
What organic matter can grow or live without water? We know that animals or plants excluded from its influence die. Observe the vivifying effects of water upon vegetation after a shower. Then what shall be said to vain, short-sighted man, who sets nature’s laws at defiance, by avoiding what they enjoin, and indulging in what they interdict? Why should he live without water more than all else that has life? It may be answered “He does not live his time;” for every day’s experience proves that more than half the inhabitants of the civilised world are tormented by one disease or another, which causes them to die before the natural term of life is completed. This, evidently, was not the intention of Divine Providence, since water, found every where, will prevent or cure disease, enable human beings to attain a good old age, and die without pain.
Stiffened joints, the dull eye, thickness of breathing, an unnatural tendency to corpulency, wrinkles, baldness, bad sight, and sallowness of complexion, are failings which clearly indicate an habitual distaste for water. It cannot be doubted, that in many of these cases, the mere drinking plentifully of water, and washing the body once a day, would afford relief. If they had always been accustomed to this they would not have been thus affected.
What numbers of weakly, crippled children we see? “Parents, do you wash their bodies; do you encourage them in the drinking of water? If not, you are instrumental to their future misery: you deprive them of the power of being healthy in life, or attaining to longevity.” In looking around on the organic world, we cannot but admire the perfection everything seems to attain—the noblest work of creation an exception; we exclaim, with Goldsmith, “Man seems the only growth that dwindles here.”
“Health is the natural state of man.
“The causes of bodily disease, not proceeding from external injury, are material, and consist of foreign matters introduced into the system.
“These foreign matters are divided into four parts:—
“I. Bodily substances which have not been eliminated in proper time.
“II. Substances not assimilated, and notwithstanding which, remain in the stomach, the skin, or the interior.
“Contagious ulcers.
“Corrupted elements; epidemical diseases.
“Every acute disease is an attempt to dispel diseased matter.
“Fever is not a disease, but the consequence of it; it is an effect of an exertion greater than the power of the system.
“The radical healing of acute diseases is only possible by releasing the diseased matter, by means of water, an agent which invariably effects its object, and that always in a manner perceptible to the senses.
“By means of physic and bleeding, acute diseases become chronic; the system, medically treated, effects a partial, but never a total ejection of diseased matter.
“As sooner or later a body must yield to the effects of drugs, it is quite impossible that any one suffering from chronic disease, unless healed by Hydropathy, should die a natural death.
“Chronic disease cannot be permanently cured by drugs: Hydropathy alone will effect this, by changing the chronic evil to acute eruptions, which are cured in the same way that acute diseases are cured.
“Men, like other organic beings, ought to live according to nature’s law, without pain, and die a natural death, that is to say, without illness or suffering. But with us almost every body dies prematurely, from the effects of poisoning in some way or other.”—Arbuthnot.
It was stated to Priessnitz, that in a case of gout, the bowels of the patient by the treatment, had become constipated, to which he replied, “Cold water never produces torpor of the bowels, but on the contrary, it excites.”
“In the cure of disease, that which is most agreeable is not always the best. That which lowers the system, generally soothes and allays pain; bleeding, drugs, opium, and warm baths do this, but they may fix the disease firmer in the system, they diminish the energy so necessary to eradicate the disease. Thus Gout, Piles, and many other complaints, are never thoroughly cured by the faculty; they cannot abate the symptoms without lowering the system.”
“To promote a crisis, dress lightly; warm clothing relaxes the skin. The stronger and harder the skin, the better will a crisis be developed. Every sore and boil cannot be considered a crisis, some degenerate into disease, and have an inward tendency. In a proper crisis of boils, they rise, burst, and heal.”
“For itching rash in the arm, do not wear the bandage, unless great pain ensues, and in that case only at night.”
“Chopping or sawing wood is better exercise for the stomach and bowels than walking.”
To a lady who complained of want of sleep, and much pain from an eruption on her body, Priessnitz said “Take a tepid bath for some days, eat lean meat without salt, and indulge freely in butter, you will get well as soon as the rash has expended itself: there can be no repose for the nerves until the humours that fret them are expelled.”
“Nervous temperaments are the strongest, but most irritable when excited by acid humours.”
“Fingers being white after cold bathing denote weak nerves; the fingers having lost their vitality, the blood ceases to circulate.”
“Constipation and relaxation of the bowels proceed from the same causes, weakness and impurities; hydropathy corrects both.”
“It is impossible to warm, for any length of time, by hot viands and warm water, their constant application only chills the more; by relaxing and dilating they produce the opposite effects to those which are so essential to health, namely Contraction. Cold water determines the Caloric currents outwards from the vital centre, and promotes decomposition.”
“I cannot understand how drugs can reach any destined point; it appears to me that all drugs are inimical to the human subject.”
“Medicine introduced into the system, like the venom of a serpent, permeates all the tissues.”
“Mercury becomes enveloped in phlegm or slime, and remains in the system, notwithstanding the body is continually subjected to the laws of renovation and decay.”
“Powerful medicines act speedily and detrimentally to the constitution. The Water-cure is slow but advantageous in its operations.”
“The wet sheet, which is in fact, a poultice, extracts pernicious matters, as a sponge water from a basin, and brings something away each time it is immersed in it.”