Admitting this to be dieting, it is, at least, such a kind of dieting as will not be likely, very soon, to cure dyspepsia. And yet to hundreds, if not thousands, dieting is little more than an increased attention to what they eat—I mean, from meal to meal. Yet no changes of food, even for the better, will compensate for this increased watchfulness over—I might perhaps say devotion to—the stomach. The Philippians, to whom Paul wrote so touchingly, are not the only people in the world whose god is their abdominal region. Such an anxious attention to the demands of an abnormal appetite, only tends to increase that determination of blood to the stomach, to prevent which all judicious or effective dieting is intended.
Dyspepsia only renders her devotees—her very slaves—the more enslaved. With such, every attempt to cure the disease by dieting is still stomach worship. They must have their very medicine taste agreeably and sit well. At all events, they must and will have their minds continually upon it, and must and will be continually inquiring whether they may safely eat this article or that or the other.
It would be almost true to affirm that the fall of man from primeval integrity, consists essentially in dyspepsia, and that every descendant of Adam and Eve is a dyspeptic. The attention of mankind generally, is directed too exclusively as well as too anxiously, to the inquiry, what they shall eat, and what they shall drink. That we must eat, and drink too, is quite obvious—nothing more so. That the Author of nature intended, also, that we should take pleasure in our eating and drinking, is scarcely less so. But does he secure to himself the most pleasure who thinks most about it? Most certainly there is pleasure—much pleasure in the anticipation of good. We may, by aid of imagination, then, feast upon the same dish half a dozen times. Yet, does not this—I repeat the idea—tend to determine an increased amount of blood and of nervous energy to the stomach, and to aggravate the disease? Let the reader ponder this question.
My own most deliberate conviction is, that the stomach, in general, is best managed, and the greatest amount of gustatory enjoyment secured, when it is subjected most fully to good habits; that this organ, being blind and deaf, is best served when directed by the wiser head; or, to express the same truth in a better way, instead of asking the stomach at any time what it will have, we should ask the head what is right, and follow its directions. If the stomach is pleased, why, very well; if not, let it go without being pleased. Give it what you think is right, all things considered, and think no more about it. If it rebels, give it a smaller quantity. If it still complains, lessen still more the quantity, and perhaps diminish the frequency of your meals. There is no danger of starving to death, as every one must be convinced who has read carefully the two preceding chapters. When the system is really in a suffering condition for want of nutriment, then the stomach will be able to receive more, and dispose of it. If you give it what is right for it, there will be no want of appetite—at least, very long. Nay, more; the mere animal or gustatory enjoyment of that food which the head tells us is right, and to which we conscientiously adhere, will, in the end, be far greater than in the case of continual inquiry and anxiety and anticipation and agitation about it.
Dyspepsia, I know, has a great variety of causes—as many, almost, as it has forms. And yet I do not believe it can often be induced by other causes alone, as long as the stomach is treated correctly. Give to that organ, habitually, what is exactly right for it, both as regards quality and quantity, and I do not believe we shall hear any more, in this world, about dyspepsia.
But he who would confine his stomach to food which his head tells him is right, will not surely put mince pie into it. He must know that such a strange compound, however agreeable, will in the end be destructive, not only of health, but of gustatory enjoyment.
The mince pie dyspeptic is just the man for quackery to feed upon. He will keep his nerves in such a state as to render him liable to read about and swallow all the wonderful cures of the day—whether hunger cures, nutrition cures, clairvoyant cures, "spiritual" cures, or any other cures. Now it is great gain, when we have got beyond all these, when we simply put into our stomachs what is right, and think no more about it, leaving ourselves to the event; and this in sickness and health both.
A man in the eastern part of Massachusetts,—an asthmatic,—told me he had spent six hundred dollars in fourteen years, on quack medicines, and that he was nothing bettered by them. That man, you may depend, is the slave of his feelings. No man who has been accustomed to dictate to his stomach what it shall have, and make it submit, would ever do this. A very poor woman, on the Green Mountains, assured me she had spent, or rather wasted, four hundred dollars in the same way. We must drop all this. I do not now say we must drop or lay aside all medicine, in all cases; that is quite another question. But I do say, we must rely on obedience to the laws of God, or on doing right, not on medicine. It will be time enough to rely on medicine when our family physician urges it upon us as indispensable.
If I have a single regret with regard to the instruction I have given my patients, from time to time, it is that I have not pressed upon them more forcibly and perseveringly, such views as are comprised in the foregoing reasonings and reflections. They are all-important to the dyspeptic, and by no means less important to the healthy than to the diseased.