Hunger is the natural expression of the needs of the system for nutrition. Appetite is the index as to the quantity of food that should be taken to replace the loss by waste. It should never be overruled. Appetite is a wise provision of Nature. Gluttony is a degrading habit. Yet numbers of people attempt to justify the gratification of their gluttonous proclivities by the statement that they are “blessed with a good appetite,” while the truth of the matter is, they are cursed with an inordinate lust for food. If people were more temperate in the pleasures of the table, the purveyors of remedies for dyspepsia would find their incomes considerably lessened. Satisfy your hunger, by all means, but do not pander to the vice of gluttony.
Instead of “eating to live,” a large proportion of people simply “live to eat.” But sooner or later Nature exacts the penalty for violation of one of her cardinal laws, which is “temperance.” An outraged stomach will not always remain quiescent, and when the reaction comes, the offender realizes that “they who sow the wind shall reap the whirlwind.”
But people may, and do, continually do violence to that long suffering organ, the stomach, without being gluttons—we refer to the habit, so universally practiced in this country, of bolting the food without properly masticating it. So long as this iniquitous practice is persisted in, and the equally hurtful one of swallowing large quantities of liquids with the meals, and so long as sufficient time is not given the food to digest, just so long will you suffer from a disordered stomach. Speaking generally, Americans are a nation of dyspeptics, because they are perpetually in a hurry. The acquisition of wealth, in moderation, is a commendable pursuit, but it is the height of folly to sacrifice the priceless jewel of health to acquire it. But it is a fact, nevertheless, that the average American considers eating an unprofitable interference with business, without stopping to weigh the advantages of sound health against the almighty dollar.
This habit must be abandoned by those who are addicted to it, before they can expect to regain health or preserve it. Strange, is it not, that a race, proverbial for having an eye to the main chance, should fail to recognize the financial wisdom of husbanding their health, a factor so important in successful business enterprises! They might, with advantage, copy the example of John Bull in the matter of eating.
The average Englishman regards his meals as a solemn responsibility, and tarries long at the table. The consequence is that with them dyspepsia is the exception and not, as with Americans, the rule.
What to eat, when to eat and how to eat are questions more nearly involving the health and happiness of humanity than is generally recognized.
WHAT TO EAT.
From the days of Pythagoras down to the present time it has been a moot question whether a vegetable or meat diet was best for man. Each side can present equally strong arguments; each can point to exceptional instances of physical development under the different methods; each can point to ill results that follow rigid adherence to one method or the other, so that the natural inference would be that a happy mean between the two extremes presents the only rational solution of the question.