Crossville chronicle. [volume] (Crossville, Tenn.) 1894-current, 1917-11-28
Copyright. 1914. by A. S. Gray)
CONSTIPATION.

state of the blood from time imme
mortal has been held responsible for
most OF ills humanity is heir to-
In the past constipated patients
were piled with pill and powder, oils
salts. waters and other laxative com
pounds, both natural and manufac
tured. One after the other invari'
ably they all failed in the end and
the doctor had to be again consulted.
Generally he only varied the dose of
this or that or prescribed another
drug, without any attempt at a
thorough investigation, and generally,
too, without even SO much as a cur
sorry examination. Finally the public
caught the idea and ceased going to
the doctor for such a minor allment
and experimental with various pills,
powders and waters, such as the in
genuity of the manufacturer could
devise or the druggist could sug-
gest.
Aided and abetted by the artistic
photographer and the circus bill post
er, an educational campaign for in.
struction on how every man may be-
come his own physician now forms
a highly suggestive background to the
general landscape throughout the
country. AS the result of clever ad-
Vertis1ng campaigns the carrying of
box OF laxative tablets pills or
candy in the pocket in order to facili-
tate the regular daily dose of the
remedy has become habitual with a
large percentage of our people.
Constipation unfortunately Is not
an Insignificant local affair that may
easily be overcome by some simple
remedy but. on the contrary, it is gen.
orally symptom of slowly develop
ing constitutional condition, the spe-
.cific name of which will appear in
the death certificate of the victim.
It is only Of late years that that we really
have begun to understand the relations
existing between constipation and the
rest of the body; to comprehend that
functional inactivity in the gastric |
tract is perhaps but part of gen.
eral functional arrangement certain
to end disastrously if not corrected |
by comprehensive readjustment of
individual habits and relations.
By far the most important factor in
the maintenance of health is food. To
the average individual food means
something edible and palatabie, which
will satisfy the demands of hunger
and thirst and enable him to maintain
normal strength Of body and mind.
Up to very recent time textbooks on
taught that the three chief
foods of men we're proteids, fats and
Tucked away in an
obscure corner, If indeed they were
at all mentioned, under the name Of
ash the mineral salts received a bare
the author usually explaining
that little or nothing was known of
their action in physiology.
Recently we have come to under
stand that not only are there many
proteids and that some proteids do
not alone suffice to sustain human
life, but we have come to understand
also that proteids, fats and carbohy-
drates are not the three chief foods
Of man.
Going back through millions of
years to the single cell. to the ameba
state Of existence, we find that the
primary food elements were, and still
are, air. water and mineral salts Com
ng up the long ladder of progressive
animal evolution, we finally come to
/ period where proteids, fats and car.
in fixed definiteness and
became necessary to us
is vertebrates; and, while these three ,
classes of foods are absolutely vital
o our existence as higher animals, {
We are beginning to comprehend that s
hey are still subsidiary to the first 6
hree-exactly as our more recently
.cquired brain, superimposed on to
ur primitive sympathetic system, has {
ecently been demonstrated to be SUBJ l
idiary to the ductless gland system I
our primordial nervous t
ystem. c
The individual workers of the body, \
he cells composing our bodies, are 4
ourished by the blood stream, and c
ne most valuable components of that a
'onderful fluid are known to be the t
lineral salts, and these are absolutely t
ecessary to maintain the normal COM d
osition and activity of the individual s
ell; hence the same must be true | c
the complete organism, because the
rganism is constructed out of the II
Iood stream. e