The Elk County advocate. [volume] (Ridgway, Pa.) 1868-1883, 1871-05-18
Talking Care Of the Teeth.

A good authority in dental matters
says that the various tooth washes and
tooth-powders do the teeth more harm
than good, promoting their decay instead
of preserving them. Poor teeth, like
every other disease, arises from taking
unnatural food into the mouth. If we
would have our teeth good and sound,
we must learn lesson of the animals all
around us. The cow, the horse, or the
dog, never have decayed teeth, because
they will not eat what nature did not
intend them to. Tobacco, alcohol, hot
drinks, and a thousand other hurtful
things taken into our stomachs to keep
up the fires of the system which we are
continually wasting by our fretting,
feeding of passions intended for use in
stead of abuse, and other means of ex-
hausting vital, nervous force. And it is
beginning to be more generally acknowl-
edged that too much meat is eaten by us.
If we had teeth like the wolf. the cat,
and the tiger, there would be some ex-
cuse for every twentieth man keeping a
slaughter-house to feed our carniverous
appetites; but, if we eat meat, why
should not the COW, the horse, and her
bivorous animals whose teeth are formed
like oursl When people follow nature
more directly, they will have fewer all
ments, and doctors and quack-medicine
venders will be compelled to turn their
attention to some other method of get
ting a living. The teeth were never in
tended to be pearly white. Every in
telligent dentist knows that the whittier
the teeth are, the sooner and more GER
tain they will decay; he also knows that
those teeth are the soundest, last the
longest, and are the most useful, which
have yellowish tint; then why provide
powders to take off this yellowish sur
face? The teeth should be washed once
week with white soap, making the
mouth as full as possible with lather,"
so as to be close to every particle of
every tooth for few minutes because
the tartar on the teeth is the product of
living thing, which is instantly killed
with soap suds. A few persons have
another living thing about the teeth not
affected with soap, but which is instant
ly killed with salt; (; hence each person is
advised to wash the teeth with white
soap once a week; and once week also
with salt. Every morning, on rising.
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brush by dipping it in the water, and
rubbing the teeth slowly front and rear
from side to side, and finally twisting
the brush so that each bristle will act as
a tooth-pick at the jennings of the teeth,
so as the more thoroughly to dislodge
anything which might remain in the
hollows between the ridges. The water
in the brush combines with the saliva of
the mouth, and, by its great softness,
makes one of the best solvents in nature
for any extraneous substances about the
teeth. The teeth should be brushed i'm
mediately after each meal with soft,
old brush, with plenty of water, twisting
it up and down as before. After each
washing, the brush should be placed far
back on the tongue and turned from
side to side, SO as to clear off the tongue
this does much towards freeing the teeth
from the odor of the last thing eaten.
If persons would brush their teeth well
Immediately after the last meal of the
day. instead of putting it off until bed
time, the teeth would be clean for four
or five hours more in the twenty-four,
which is not slight advantage.