The Jersey City news., 1906-06-04

lem in the end,
We are not surprised that the physi-
clans are disturbed by the various
] apostles of diet, because it is time that
We knew how or whether our chances of
life are affected by pork, almost-food and
beer. says the Brooklyn Eagle Here
Is one, crying in the wilderness, who says
that We shall avoid rheumatism if we
will eat only fruits and vegetables, and
| the listener plies himself with strawber-
ries and cider and is filed with knots
that cannot be smoothed out in a wear.
At the same time his next door neighbor
consumes mutton and beef, and with
them uric acid, so that he too takes to
his couch and has session that lasts
until it is time to put on his winter
clothes.
We have. been told that we must not
eat bread of fine flour. but take the
coarse and brannys bread; yet another
protestant gibes at our credulity and
proves that white flour is all of the
flour, and bran is innutritious as well as
uninteresting. Here are physicians who
would cure us with milk, and others who
cure by compelling us to avoid it; physi-
clans who will not permit us to eat su-
gar, and others who cloy us with sweet
stuff; physicians who would have us
/ gorge to repletion, and others who insist
that we must go without breakfast and
dinner and eat piece of cheese and an
apple at noon.
Amid the multitude of counselIors
whom shall we heed? Diet is not an
exact science. any more than is medicine.
Surgery is, but there are many things
that surgery does not cure Beside. it is
pleasanter to be treated with puddings
sand claret than with scalpels If some
l.
unity of purpose and plan were secured
IN the investigation of the claims of diet,
it would result in a better increase of
knowledge OH the subject than we gain
from individual and unrelated observa-
tions. If the hospital authorities. for in
stance, would test the effect of coffee on
patients Of all classes. and people who
are not patients. in all countries and eli
mates and seasons, We should know
whether it. is permitted to us to drink it
or feed it to the swine, az, some would
have us do. So with meat diet, fish,
starchy foods, alcohol. fruit. salads, and
what not.
Yet there is a certain class that goes
on it's way unheeding. 1t does not even
know that diet is under discussion. and
possibly does not care what diet is. so
long as one can eat it. The members
of this class breakfast on fapjacks and
sausages; they lunch on soups and
roasts and pie and beer; they dine on
corned beef, cabbage, milk toast and
pickles; they eat bananas and peanuts in,
the cars; they have a couple of Welsh
rarebits before going to bed; when not
busy they will eat sandwiches and cam
dy, to fill in the time and an aching void
and if they please to butter their water
melon they butter it, and it is nobody's
business. And his large and fortunate
class is practically the whole American
people. II drinks good deal of patent
medicine, in the faith that it ought to
have something the matter with it. but
it is peptic and enjoys it's victuals, and
foodless food and bran food and other
factory leavings do not cencern it. Only
the sick man needs to think Of his diet.
and few of US will fOrego terrapin and
tea. if we are invited.
Chairman shonts confesses that the at