HdJSs &&1 Surgeon General's Office N„. UVJrl Sfeaoac ag^co.'gogg^Q^gQg^^^^ THE SCIENCE OF MAN APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS: THEIR CAUSE, CURE, AND PREVENTION. LEWIS S. £[OUGH MAN S LIFE IS HIS UNIVERSE. SfJ "'o •^ , • •» * ~: •• ~r- ■ O BOSTON: PUBLISHED BY BELA MARSH, 25 CORNHILL. 1S49. WA Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1849, by Lewis S. Hough, in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of Massachusetts. A. Forbes, Printer, 37 Cornhill. PREFACE. These pages are to illustrate the nature of Epidemics generally. That the people of our Republic may be prepared to resist, not only that scourge of nations — THE SPASMODIC CHOLERA-- but EVERY OTHER EPIDEMIC incident to the human race. These several epidemics will be separately treated. Boston, July 4, 1849. CONTENTS. LECTURE I. Epidemics.— Human Pathology. — General Description of Or- ganic Tissues, Organs, and Vital Functions. — Evils caused by their Derangement.—Healthful Action.—Nature of Epidemics. &c. 5-50. LECTURE II. Vital Republic. — Nutrition. — Proper Quality and Quantity.__ Cause of Disease.— Vital Conduction of Organic Tissues. — Or- ganic Laws.—Nature's Curative .Power.—Empiricism. — How Pain is caused.— Diseases Approximating to Epidemics. — What Cholera is, how Caused, Cured, and Prevented, &c. 5J -93. LECTURE III. Fever Epidemics. — New Febrile Theory. — Full Theory of Animal Heat. — Modus Operandi of Febrile Action. —True Mode of Treating Fevers.—Means of Prevention.— Fever and Chills. — How Caused and Cured.—General Nature of Spasmodic Action, &c. 94 -124. LECTURE IV. Religious Epidemic. — Speculation Epidemic. — Martial Epide- mic. — Amatory Epidemic. — Their Cause, Cure, and Prevention. — General and Special Socialism of Human Nature.__Evils of Licentiousness. — The Sanctity of True Matrimony, &c, &c. LECTURE V. Vital Laws of the Human Organism, in relation to Nutrition.__ Variety of Paradises. — The True One. —Moral Excellence.__ How Attained.— Various Crystallizations. — Their Beauty and Utility.—How Secured. — Anti-Organic Substances Dieteticallv Used, &c. 174-194. J LECTURE VI. Human Psychology. — The Natural and Revealed Theory of a Future State. —The Relation of the Earthly Body to the Future Spiritual Body. — True Bible Doctrines versus Scholastic Perver- sions. — True Christianity. —Individual and Social Reform, &c. 196 » 259. THE SCIENCE OF MAN APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. LECTURE I. Epidemics. — Importance of Correct Principles in Human Pathol- ogy.— Disease Defined, and its Nature Illustrated by Natural Agencies. — Brief Description of Organic Tissues. — A General Description of Vital Functions, and their Organs.— Heart Arteries, Arterial and Venous Capillaries, and Veins. — Vital Calorification and Elimination, and the Two Surfaces through which they are effected. — Function of the Liver and Kidneys. — Arterial Blood.— Venous Blood. — Membranes. — Organi- zation.— Evils caused by Derangement of the Calorific Func- tion. — Vital Architecture. — Alimentary Organs. — Their Healthful Action. — Nature of Epidemics.— Their Intagion and Contagion. Epidemic is a name given to such diseases as ex- tensively prevail in a community, affecting many similarly and simultaneously, and often spreading fear- ful mortality among the inhabitants of the earth. Such diseases have existed, at times, more or less from remote ages of antiquity : sometimes breaking in upon the people, like a sweeping tornado, rolling fear and trepidation before, and drawing heavy destruction in its way : at other times, their progress has been less violent, but still fearfully fatal. l 6 THE SCIENCE OF MAN If the joys of life are worth possessing, it becomes a matter of importance to individuals and nations to know the means by which they may be secured from such sweeping devastation. Every man's life is him- self, and hence his universe. If he loses that, he loses all. If the publication of this work, shall prove the means of saving an individual universe, I am amply rewarded for my labor. But reader, while I shall unfold to you some of the principles conducive to so important an end, do not attribute to me other motives than those truly republican. " Every man to his business," is a commercial maxim. Every one ought to know his own line of business, better than those otherwise employed. What then ? does it set one man above another, because he knows his own business best ? Not in the least; but rather binds each to all, and all to each, in one community of in- terest and sympathy. Let us then meet each other in this matter as true republicans. Co-operation is re- quisite to effect any good. One must ascertain and unfold correct principles, another must hear, and both must practise. The one who hears and obeys the truth, deserves just as much credit as he who ascer- tains, and proclaims it to others. All true excellence is individual. Each one has within himself the ele- ments of merit, or demerit. Each for all and all for each, is the great social law of the universe. Some attribute the cause of disease to fatalism, or contingency, or Divine will, or Satanic agency, or some other cause entirely beyond their own control. All these positions are wrong, dangerously wrong. There is no other fatalism, than a fixed relation be- APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 7 tween cause and effect: the cause being avoidable or removable, the effect is also. If one hold his hand in the flame, will he complain of being scorched by fatal- ism? Everything in the universe, from a solar con- stitution, to that of the minutest atom that floats upon the breeze, is under inflexible law. Where then is contingency ? As to the Divine will, both the word and works of God proclaim him as " taking no pleasure in the death of him that dieth," but desiring rather that they should live. And as to Satanic agency, it is so apparently fallacious as not to need an argument. These views, ascriptive of diseases to fictitious causes, are full of danger. They induce a recklessness as to habits of life, and thus exposure to various forms of disease, which may quickly fall the transgressor out of life. Nature has much elastic bend, but when she breaks, all is gone. When there is a possibility of re- covery, wrong views as to the cause of disease, often lead to such means for recovery, as either precludes or greatly reduces that possibility. Human Pathology, like other science, has certain data or principles, as its basis. If the foundation is good, the superstructure is safe ; if not, all is in danger. If a man lean on a broken stick, shall he not fall? If he does not completely fall, elastic Nature saves him, in spite of the broken stick. Of how much value life and health, and pleasures of terrestrial existence may be to man, of so much value also are true principles of human Pathology. For " as a man thinketh, so is he." According to his views so will he act. And according Jo his acts, he lives or dies: if right he lives, — if wrong he dies. It is easy to be acted out 8 the science of man of life, but the reverse is difficult. When the linger- ing flame is almost on the point of expiration, one false move may extinguish it forever. On the other hand, if that flame is truthfully guarded from external injury, it may kindle up, and burn again, clear and beautiful. Disease is vital action disturbed by a wrong condi- tion of vital organism. There is, throughout nature, a fixed relation between agencies and the material media through which they act. Each arrangement of matter is fitted to its own agency, and all to their several agencies, and thus all for mutual action on each other. Thus, electricity has its own arrangement of matter, on which its acts in preference to any other. When the electric fluid meets its own arrangement of matter, it flows smoothly and safely along its rapid way. But when the electric fluid meets with non-conducting substances, it breaks tornado-like, through the obstruct- ing mass, drawing destruction in its way, and rolling ruin on every side. So also with heat; when it acts on a heat-conducting substance, its action is steady, constant, uniform, and safe. But when it meets with non-conducting substances, it swells into a furious flame, sweeping every thing in its way. This relation between agencies and things acted upon, holds in the vegetable world. Every tree, and plant, and blade is, in the texture of all its parts, fitted to the agency of vegetable life. And that texture, of the several parts, must be retained, or vegetable life must cease to act, other arrangements of matter having no adaptation to its action. This relation holds also in the animal world. Every tissue, composing the animal organism, applied to epidemics. 9 is, during health, fitted to the agency of animal life. Every organ and part is in its texture adapted to re- ceive, retain, conduct, and circulate that vitality which acts upon the whole organism, in carrying on all the functions of life. While the texture of the several organs and parts remains in this state of vital conduc- tion, vital action goes healthfully on, each organ being made to perform its own function, and all their several functions, with ease and pleasure and profit to the indi- vidual, who thus becomes conscious of a fine flow of health and strength, and intellectual and moral power. This right condition of the tissues of the organism, induces healthful vital action through those tissues, and such vital action results in the true pleasures of ter- restrial existence. The human body is composed of solids and fluids, having fixed relations to each other. The solids con- sist of bones, cartilages, ligaments, tendons, muscles, nerves, membranes, and membranous appendages. The bones form the substantial frame-work to the body. Cartilages and ligaments are used in forming joints and bands in connecting the bones into one system, called the osseous. The tendons connect this system of bones to the system of muscles. The muscles being thus connected with the bones, act upon them, as a series of cords upon a system of levers. The muscles form a considerable portion of the bulk of the body, and clothe the bones with symmetry and comeliness. The muscular tissue is the medium of all positive mo- tion in the organism, and hence is distributed wherever such motion is required. The nervous tissue is the most delicate of the ani- l# 10 the science of man mal structures. It forms the brain and spinal marrow, with their numerous cords and branches, dispersed through organism, and the nerves of organic life, dis- tributed to the vessels and viscera of the general organism. These together, form the nervous system. The nerves are distributed throughout the general organism, wherever vital function is required, and are thus the medium through which vitality acts on all the other tissues, and through these on the external world. In its close texture with all the other tissues, it forms what may be termed a telegraphic communication be- tween all parts of the vital republic, by which impulses are transmitted from the brain, as a common centre, to all the organs of voluntary motion, and impressions re- turned to the brain, of the condition of the muscles thus brought into action. By which communication also, from the central mass of the nerves of organic life, as a common centre, and from the many special and subordinate centres, impulses arc transmitted to all the muscles of involuntary motion, and impressions re- ceived back to the same, of the condition of the mus- cles on which they act. The nervous tissue thus forms two classes or systems of nerves, which together com- pose the nervous system, — the nerves of animal life, usually termed the cerebrospinal system of nerves and the nerves of organic life. These last consist of a common centre, (Fig. 1. a) having connected to itself, by numerous branches of nerves, other smaller and subordinate centres, (Fig. 1. o) and these in their turn, give off numerous branches, some entering the texture of the blood-ves- sels, formed for their use in constructing particular NKKYKS OF OKU ANN' LIl'T': //,/./. RESrilUTOfiY NERVES. Jfy. ?. CEHEBKO SPINAL SYSTEM Jh,..:i. A. YV ss^r -\&K - > A. / 1^\ { . 'Xnx>w - v vr ^^xtt T J&.Hi'J^* X \x/> r '* V' -« > AV ' APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 11 organs of the viscera. Large nervous cords unite these subordinate centres, and numerous branches from each centre, interlace and unite, and form nervous knots with branches coming from the several other special centres, and from the common centre. (Fig. 1, v). Other similar distributions of these nerves are represented by the letters s, x, z, of the same figure. The branches and twigs of this system of nerves, in their distribution to the vessels and viscera of the body, cross and unite, and divide and interlace, so as to form one extended net, the meshes of which are smaller and smaller, as the nerves diminish in their approach to their minute terminations in the texture of the organs. This system of nerves is the medium through which vitality acts, in forming, and developing, and sustain- ing the vessels and viscera of the body, and in the formative process, are thought to produce through the two series of nervous masses extending along the whole length of the spinal column, (x) the spinal nerves, and the cerebro spinal system generally. The cerebrospinal system of nerves, consists of the brain and spinal marrow with their numerous cords, branches, and twigs, dispersed mainly to ex- ternal portions of the organic domain, but interlacing also with branches of the nerves of organic life, in the texture of organs concerned in respiration and nutrition. This last distribution of nerves is repre- sented by Fig. 2. These are called respiratory nerves arising by numerous roots from the top of the spinal marrow (A) and distributed by their numerous branches and filaments, to the oral cavity (8) neck, (3) dia- phragm, (12) lungs, (5) heart, (6) stomach ; thus 12 THE SCIENCE OF MAN interlacing extensively with the nerves of organic life. The spinal marrow is that soft, nervous substance lying in the hollow of the back-bone (Fig. 3, E E E). Connected with the spinal marrow, through small in- tervertebral openings, on each side, are thirty pairs of nerves, called the spinal nerves, those on each side being similar (Fig. 3, Nos. 2, 3, 4, 5, 6.) The letters A A B B &c., in Figs. 2 and 3, denote corresponding parts in the two figures, as also localities, that we shall not here describe. The brain consists of the cerebrum and cerebellum, the latter in the lower and back portion of the cranium, the former, all the upper and front portion. The brain is divided into two hemispheres, and in anatomic descriptions, each hemisphere is subdivided into three lobes: an anterior lobe lying in the fore- head, — a posterior lobe in the back part of the head and over the little brain, and a middle lobe in the region of the ear. The brain is the medium of the moral and intellec- tual powers, it being a congeries of instruments, each fitted to its own function, and all to their several func- tions, in the manifestation of the several mental and moral powers. From the brain is transmitted, through its distribution of nerves, the impulse of will to all the muscles of voluntary motion, and to it is returned through another set of nerves, perception of the con- dition of those muscles to be moved. From the com- mon centre, and the special and subordinate centres of the nerves of organic life is transmitted vital impulse to all the vessels and viscera with which that system of APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 13 nerves is connected, while through another set of nerves, perception is returned to those special centres, and the common centre, of the condition of the parts brought into action : thus, by these two sets of nerves, the one presiding more directly over the organs of vol- untary motion, the other over those of involuntary mo- tion, yet both interlacing with each other in the texture of several organs and parts, all portions of the body are bound together, in the closest sympathy. The membranous tissue, usually called the cellular, forms envelopes to every bone and cartilage, and liga- ment and tendon and muscle and nerve, and sheaths to every filament, and fibre, and bundle, composing each tendon and muscle and nerve, and composes mainly the structure of the lungs, and separate envel- opes to the several organs, and lines all the internal cavities, and covers the whole external surface of the body. The hair and nails, though in reality, distinct structures, are usually spoken of as appendages to the skin : each hair and nail having its own organism, and interwoven with the general organism, in such a man- ner as to partake in its welfare or injury. These tissues compose the animal solids, being so woven together in forming the several organs as to bind each to all and all to each, as in one sheet of sympathy. Let us now briefly notice some of the vital functions and their organs. For the continuance of healthful, vital action on the organism, there are two general functions, that must be constantly maintained, — that of Accretion and Decretion. The accretive func- tion is performed by a system of capillary vessels 14 the science of man distributed to all the solids, and communicating direct- ly with the arterial extremities through which fresh nutritive blood is conveyed to all parts of the body. These minute vessels ihen take up this blood, and manufacture it into the various solids, thus forming bones, cartilages, ligaments, tendons, muscles, nerves, membranes, and every structure of the body. The decretive function is performed by another set of ves- sels called the lymphatics. These are minute vessels distributed to all the solids, and while the accretive organs are constantly adding new material to the structures, these lymphatics are constantly removing the worn-out material, by reducing them to a fluid state, to be eliminated, through the skin and lungs, from the organic domain. Subservient to these functions, are other functions with their organs. Directly subservient to these two functions, is the Circulatory Apparatus. This consists of the heart, and arteries and veins, and their capillary extremities. The heart is a muscular organ, lying in the lower part of the thoracic cavity, between the two sheets of the pleura, the central partition of the chest, and is surrounded by a membranous sac, called the pericardium, by the exhalations of which it secures requisite moisture. The heart is a double organ, composed of two corresponding halves, — each half having an upper and lower cavity. The upper cavities are called auricles, and the lower ones ventri- cles. In the action of the heart, the two auricles contract simultaneously, and the two ventricles simul- taneously. And each auricle and ventricle, contract alternately. As the two auricles contract, the two APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 15 ventricles dilate ; and as the two ventricles contract, the two auricles dilate. The cavity containing the internal organs, or viscera of the body, is divided by the diaphragm into two apartments; the upper one being called the thorax, and the lower one the abdomen. The thorax con- tains the lungs and heart, and a portion of the large blood-vessels, and the meatpipe. The abdomen contains the liver, stomach, intestinal canal, pancreas, spleen, kidneys, &c. (Figs. 4 and 5.) Associated with the heart in the circulatory func- tion, is a system of tubes, called arteries and veins. 16 THE SCIENCE OF MAN Those leading from the heart to all parts of the body are called arteries, — those leading from all parts of the body back to the heart are called veins. The arte- ries are composed of three coats. The external is of cellular tissue, dense and strong; the middle fibrous, being elastic and contractile for flowing the blood ; the internal is a thin serous or mucous membrane present- ing a smooth, polished surface for easy transition of the flowing blood; this mucous membrane being continuous with the lining membrane of the heart. The minute extremities of the arteries are called arterial capil- laries. The arteries rise from the heart in two large tubes, the one from the left ventricle of the heart, is called the Arterial Trunk or Aorta ; the other arising from the right ventricle is called the Pul- monary Artery. The Aorta arises from the left ventricle of the heart, and sends off branches to the upper extremities and descending through the tho- rax and abdomen, gives out branches to all the portions of the trunk, and then dividing into two large branches, extends through the lower extremities. These large branches to the upper and lower extremi- ties, divide and subdivide, like the main branches of a tree, till they are distributed in their minute termina- tions, to every solid of the body. The lungs and all the viscera are supplied in this arterial distribution. Those arteries thus distributed to the structure of the lungs are called bronchial arteries, and are entirely distinct from the pulmonary arteries that convey the dark blood to the lungs for vital calorification and elemination of its worn-out material. So likewise the blood-vessels themselves have their APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 17 minute vessels, called vasa vasorum, by which their own structure is maintained, being in no case nourish- ed directly from their own current of blood. These arteries are named usually from the several parts to which they are distributed. The two main arteries rising to the brain are called carotid arteries, and the distribution of these carotid arteries to different por- tions of the encephalon, are differently named, accord- ing to the parts to which they are distributed ; those in the frontal portions of the cranium being called temporal arteries, and others differently according to the parts supplied. Those two entering, one the right and the other the left arm, are called subclavian arteries; those branching out from the aorta in its descent through the trunk, are variously named, according to the various parts to which they are distributed, as intercostal, ven- al arteries, &c. In the lower part of the trunk, where the aorta divides into two branches for supplying the lower extremities, they are called iliac arteries ; as they proceed still further down, they are called femoral ar- teries ; below the knees, these subdivide into two others, each femoral artery sending out two branches, one called the tibial, and the other the peroneal artery. Thus, these main arteries in their extension through the trunk, and the upper and lower extremities, are con- tinuously sending out branches, and these spreading themselves into smaller sub-branches, and these into arterial twigs, and these minutely dispersed to all the solids of the system. The Pulmonary Artery has its origin from the right ventricle of the heart, and ascends obliquely to the under surface of the arch of the aorta, where it di- 2 18 THE SCIENCE OF MAN vides into two branches, one passing to the right lung, and the other to the left. Each branch divides and subdivides, till in their minute terminations they be- come dispersed through all the inner surface of the mucous membrane of the lungs, thus bringing their contents in close contact with the external or air- exposed surface of that membrane, thus exuding in a vaporized state, the worn-out material of the blood, or rather bringing the carbon of the dark blood into contact with the atmosphere, and thus effecting that vital combustion producing animal heat, and then throwing out in a vaporized state, through this surface, the carbonic acid gas and waste materials produced by such combustion. Thus the pulmonary artery, in its division and subdivisions, and minute ramifications to all the internal surface of the pulmonary mucous membrane, forms an extensive net-work embracing the air-cells, into which the external surface of the same membrane is arranged by a corresponding division and subdivisions and minute ramifications of the windpipe. The pulmonary artery and its branches convey the dark blood from the right ventricle of the heart to the lungs. The aorta, and all its branches convey fresh nutritive blood to all the solids of the body. The minute ex- tremities of the arteries, are called capillaries. These capillaries bring the fresh blood into contact with the minute accretive organs dispersed through the whole organism. These little formative organs are furnished to all the animal solids, every tissue having its own set of accretive organs. Thus one set manufacture bone, another set cartilage, another set tendon, another set APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 19 muscle, &c, &c, each animal structure, having its own set of organs,—and all their several sets resembling each other in general structure, and yet distinct, in this respect: each set is so formed as to take up similar particles from the same blood, and arrange them in such a manner as to produce its own structure. Thus the accretive organs furnished to the bones, are so formed as to take up the vitalized particles from the blood and arrange them in such a manner as to form bone, while those accretive organs furnished to the muscles, are so formed as to take up similar particles from the same blood, and arrange them into muscle ; and so of the several sets of accretive organs employed in forming severally, cartilage, and ligament, and ten- don, and nerve, and membrane, &c. The accretive organs, from their general function of organization, may be termed organics. Every animal solid has its own accretive organs by which its own structure is sustained. This vital process of manufacturing differ- ent solids from the same fluid, is analogous to some chemical processes, by which different compounds are formed from the same elements, by different modes of arrangement into which those elements are brought. All the animal solids are supplied also with another set of minute organs called lymphatics. These are decre- tive organs ; their functions being directly the reverse of those just mentioned. They are so extremely minute, that in many parts they cannot be detected without the aid of a microscope, and in some instances not even with microscopic aid, where there is reason to believe they exist, from the nature of their function. While the accretive organs from the same blood, manufacture the various solids, these decretive organs 20 THE SCIENCE OF MAN take hold of the worn-out material of these various solids, and reduce them to a fluid called lymph, and pass them into the venous capillaries. Similar lymph- atics, though somewhat differing in size and arrange- ment, are distributed to every tissue of the body, their function being to reduce the worn-out material of these tissues to a fluid state preparatory for elimina- tion. These decretive organs or vessels, resemble in their general texture, the veins. They have two coats, — the external, cellular and extensible—the inner coat lies in valviform folds, like those of the veins. These vessels rise in immense numbers from every internal and external surface and substance of the body, thus leaving not a particle of matter in the whole organism beyond their reach, and hence these vessels distributed throughout the organism are the decretive organs. These vessels when arranged or col- lected into masses, and folded in membranous cover- ings form lymphatic glands or ganglions. This is analogous to that chemical process by which different elements combine in such a manner as to produce a similar compound. Here by vital action through the lymphatics on different solids, as bone, muscle, nerve, &c, those structures are reduced to a similar fluid. In close connection with this system of lymphatics, dis- tributed through all the textures of the body, arise the venous capillaries. These gradually converge and form minute veins. These inosculating, or running into each other like net-work, form larger veins, and these uniting, form branches corresponding with the arterial branches, and like them, lead into large ascend- ing and descending trunks, conducting to the heart. APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 21 From or near the extremities of the arterial capilla- ries arise the venous capillaries. These minute tubes running into each other, form small veins, and these continuing to inosculate, form larger ones, and these unite in forming general branches, corresponding with the large arterial branches. And these venous branches unite to form a large venous trunk, called the Vena Cava, through which the blood is conducted to the right auricle of the heart. The veins from the lower extremities, and lower and middle parts of the body, form the ascending vena cava, leading up by the side of the large arterial trunk (Fig. 5. V.V.) The veins from the upper part of the body, the upper extremities and the head, form the descending vena cava: both the ascending and descending conducting the dark blood, to the right auricle of the heart. The pulmonary veins arise in their capillary ex- tremities from the arterial pulmonary capillaries, dis- persed through the internal surface of the mucous mem- brane of each lung, and running into each other, become larger and form branches corresponding with those of the pulmonary artery, till they swell into large veins, emerging from the lungs by the side of the arteries, and lead to the left auricle of the heart. These veins convey fresh red blood from the lungs to the heart for general distribution through the aorta and its branches. The veins, in their structure, are similar to the arte- ries, being composed of three coats ; the outer being dense, cellular, and very strong,—the middle, of longitudinal fibrous texture, — the inner, very thin and smooth, and similar to that which lines the arteries and heart. In veins conducting the blood to the o* 22 THE SCIENCE OF MAN heart, against gravity, this inner coat is folded into a kind of valves which hold the blood from a downward course, while the contracting sides of the veins urge it onward to the heart. The veins, like the arteries, are supplied with their own minute vessels, vasa vasorum, by which their own structure is maintained : each vein, as each artery, having its own minute arteries and veins, on which its organism depends. The nerves which enter into the structure of the blood-vessels, and preside over their functions, are distributions from the nerves of organic life. The heart, arteries, arterial capillaries, organics, lymphatics, venous capillaries and veins, constitute the vascular system. In anatomical descriptions, the heart is not usually classified with the vascular system, but only the arteries, veins, &c. But in nature, these are all closely associated, so much so, that the arteries and veins, and their capillaries may be considered as an expansion of the heart to all parts of the sys- tem : the contractile tissues of the arteries, and veins, being continuous with that of the muscular tissue of the heart; their external cellular coat being analogous with the membranous covering of the heart ; and their inner coat being continuous with the mucous mem- brane lining the internal cavities of the heart. These, therefore, form one system, and as the heart is a hollow organ and all its tubes hollow, for holding and flowing the blood, they may be termed the vascular system. As the vessels taking up the fresh blood from arterial extremities, and manufacturing it into solids are exceedingly minute vessels, as those also reducing the worn-out material of those solids into lymph ; they APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 23 may together with the arterial and venous capillaries, be termed the capillary system. The accretive ves- sels, I shall term organics, as all vital organization is effected by them. The decretive vessels are called lymphatics, from their reducing solids to fluid. The heart, arteries, veins and their capillaries are, in their circulatory function, subservient to the organics and lymphatics in the accretive and decretive function. The left auricle and ventricle of the heart, and the arteries, and the arterial capillaries, are subservient to the organics, in conveying to them the fresh blood, for the accretion of new material to the solids, — while the right auricle and ventricle of the heart, and the veins and the venous capillaries are subservient to the lym- phatics, in taking up that fluid reduced by the lympha- tics from the worn-out material of the solids, and con- ducting it back to the heart, to be sent to the lungs for vital calorification, and elimination of carbonic acid, and residuum resulting from such vital combustion. The action of the left auricle and ventricle, and arte- ries, and arterial capillaries, in conveying the fresh blood to the organics, for accretion to the solids, may be termed the arterial function. The action of the veins in taking up the dark blood, and conducting it to the right auricle of the heart, and of that auricle and ventricle in flowing the dark blood into the pulmonary artery towards the lungs, may be termed the venous function. The arterial function is subservient to the accretive function, and the venous function is subser- vient to the decretive function. But a continuation of each of these general functions, renders requisite two other functions, —that of elimination and nutrition, — 24 THE SCIENCE OF MAN decretion requiring the former, and accretion the latter. Elimination is effected thus: the worn-out material of the solids, is reduced to a fluid state by the lymphatics. This fluid is mainly animal carbon. This carbon, in a fluid state, is partially brought into con- tact with the atmosphere along the whole surface of the external skin. Here this fluid carbon, being at a requisite temperature for combination with the oxygen of the atmosphere, combines with that oxygen in the production of animal heat along the whole surface of the skin, while through the numerous pores of the skin, the carbonic acid and residuum, resulting from such vital combustion, is thrown off in a vaporized state, and thus entirely expelled from the organic domain. Mean- while, that fluid carbon reduced from worn-out mate- rial of solids lying deeper in from the external surface, and such as is not thus eliminated through the external skin, is gathered up by the veins, and conducted to the right auricle of the heart, and thence to the right ven- tricle, and thence through the pulmonary artery to the mucous membrane of the lungs. The pulmonary sur- face exposed to the air, is equal, if not greater than that of the whole external surface of the body,—the vas- cular arrangement of the pulmonary surface, being such as to swell out at every inspiration, like an inflated bel- lows, and thus presenting a much greater surface to the air, than might be supposed. Through this sur- face, the remaining carbon of the dark blood is brought into contact with the inhaled atmosphere, the oxygen of which combines with that carbon, in the production of animal heat, and elimination of carbonic acid, and the residuum of such combustion from the vital domain. APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 25 Thus, by exposure to the atmosphere through the ex- Fig. 5. A, the aorta; B, the bladder; G, the gall-bladder; K, the kidneys; L, the liver turned up, showing the under side; P, the pancreas; R, the rectum; S, the spleen; U, the ureters; V, the vena cava. 26 THE SCIENCE OF MAN ternal skin and this internal skin, the carbon of the dark blood is brought into combination with the oxygen of the air, in the production of animal heat, and in eli- mination of waste materials resulting from sjuch com- bustion in a vaporized state, from the vital domain. The animal heat thus generated throughout this inter- nal and external surface, is diffused by the heat- conduction of the tissues, through the whole organism, thus producing and retaining such a temperature as best fits all the tissues for vital action. Before the dark blood reaches this internal surface for vital calorification and residual elimination, it is secreted from by two sets of glandular organs, -—the kidneys and liver. The kidneys are of glandular for- mation, being in shape spheroidal, oblong and oblate, and situated in the region of the loins. (Fig. 5, K.) Their structure is held, each by a similar fold in the serous membrane, that lines all the internal cavities of the chest and abdomen, and folds over all the organs formed in those cavities, thus holding all in their place and structure. The cavities and the ducts of each kidney are lined by mucous membrane, which, con- tinuing from each, forms or lines two long tubes, descending from the kidneys on each side, and open- ing into their common reservoir. (Fig. 5, U. U.) The liver is a large organ of glandular formation, situated in the right side, below the diaphragm, and is composed of several lobes. Its upper surface is con- vex, its under surface concave. All the venous capilla- ries arising from the extended surface of the alimentary canal, together with those from the spleen, pancreas, and other glands, run into three large veins, called por- APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 27 tal veins, which unite to form a venous trunk, which instead of advancing directly to the vena cava, pro- ceeds obliquely upward, to the right, and plunges into the liver, where it divides and subdivides, in the man- ner of an artery. And where these veins terminate in the ramifications of the biliary duct, other venous capillaries arise, which running into each other, form the hepatic veins, and these take up the blood received from the portal veins, and the hepatic artery, and con- vey it to the vena cava, where it joins the dark blood, gathered in from other parts of the body, and on its course to the heart. Thus, all the dark blood gathered in by the venous capillaries and veins, from the viscera of the body, is, on its conduction to the vena cava, filtered through this large glandular organ, and thus has separated from its fluid carbon, all such substances as might impede from, or unfit that carbon for vital combustion on its exposure to the air through the extended mucous membrane of the lungs. These im- purities thus secreted from the returning blood, are probably conveyed off through some vascular commu- nication to the kidneys, whence through their descend- ing ducts (fig. 5, U. U.) to their common reservoir, (B) and thence through its excretory duct, eliminated from the vital domain. Meanwhile the kidneys, through a vascular communication with the veins, such as is common to all glandular organs subservient to decre- tion, secrete from the dark blood being gathered in from external portions of the body, such impurities as the liver secretes from the dark blood gathered in from the viscera, and thus purify the carbon of that blood, for vital combustion through the external skin, and the 28 THE SCIENCE OF MAN remaining portions of that carbon for similar combus- tion when it shall have reached the surface of the internal skin — the mucous membrane of the lungs. These impurities from the fluid carbon of the blood, being thus secreted from the dark blood, by the kidneys, is conveyed off with that received from the liver, through the ureters, to their common reservoir, and thence through its excretory duct, eliminated from the vital domain. The spleen is probably an appendage to this secretory apparatus, (fig. 5, S) it serving as a reser- voir to the excretory secretions of the liver, till those secretions are conveyed off and excreted, in the man- ner above mentioned. But while the spleen probably serves as a reservoir for the excretory secretions of the liver, there is another reservoir for another secretion of that organ. This is called the gall-bladder, being a reservoir for the bilious secretion designed to act as an alkali on that portion of oily matter, and the acids contained in the alimentary contents of the intestines, thus converting that oily matter into a saponaceous sub- stance soluble in the pancreatic secretion that is poured into the same section of the alimentary cavity, with the bilious secretion. Thus the function of the liver is two-fold, — that of excretory secretion for elimina- tion, and that of bilious secretion for digestion, the reservoir of the excretory secretion being the spleen, and that of the bilious secretion being the gall-bladder. And as this last reservoir has its duct leading to the duodenum, it is highly probable, if not certain, that the spleen has some vascular communication with the kid- neys, through which it conveys its contents to those organs, to blend with their own similar secretion, for APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 29 conduction through the ureters to the bladder, and thence through its excretory duct, to be passed from the vital domain. Thus the liver and kidneys, with their excretory reservoirs and ducts, are an eliminating appa- ratus for purifying the carbon of the dark blood, by de- tracting therefrom those impurities which unfit it for easy and perfect vital combustion, when brought to the sur- face on the external and internal skin, into contact with the air. In ordinary combustion, the perfection of the pro- cess depends upon the purity of the carbon with which the oxygen of the atmosphere combines. This is true in vital combustion. If the carbon of the dark blood be carried to the air-exposed surfaces, full of impuri- ties, the vital combustion resulting therefrom, will be very imperfect, and in some cases entirely suspended thus leaving the patient shivering with " the chills," or forever palsied, by the icy touch of death. By impu- rities of the fluid carbon, I mean such substances blended with that carbon, as render it unfit for easy and perfect vital combustion. Vegetable carbon, be- fore undergoing the charring process, is blended with anti-combustible materials, which considered in relation to the carbon, may be called impurities. These are such as result from vegetable organization, as moisture and other anti-combustible properties. And hence the difficulty of burning green wood. — But when that wood has been dried, and kept under shelter a long time, it affords easy combustion, its anti-combustible qualities having passed off by evaporation. Or if that wood be reduced to perfect charcoal, its combustion will be still better, as the carbon is then entirely pure. 3 30 THE SCIENCE OF MAN This illustrates what I mean by impurities in the car- bon of the dark blood. The animal carbon as it exists in the animal solids ; is in a condition analogous to that of the vegetable carbon as it exists in the recent vege- table solid, though strictly speaking, it is not carbon till formed by a reduction of those solids. It exists in combination with other materials resulting from animal organization. Before it can furnish perfect vital com- bustion, this carbon must be perfectly reduced from those anti-combustible materials with which, in the animal organization, it is combined. The first step towards such reduction, is general vital action on those solids. This gradually wears out the organism of the particles composing those solids. The second step is lymphatic action, or vital action through the lympha- tics, in taking hold of the worn-out particles in those solids, and reducing them to a fluid state, and present- ing such particles as are perfectly carbonized, along the external surface, to the air, effecting thereby vital com- bustion along the whole surface of the skin. The third step is kidney and liver secretion from the dark blood reduced by the lymphatics from more internal solids, thus leaving that fluid carbon almost, if not entirely, free from impurities, thus fitting it for perfect vital combustion when it shall have reached the mucous membrane of the lungs. It is highly probable, that, were it not for dietetic errors and other habits of life invariably sequent to such dietetic errors, the changes wrought on the carbon of the dark blood, would be so effective, as to render it perfect carbon, by the time it is brought to the external and internal surface, and thus result in perfect vital combustion, and conse- APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 31 quently producing perfect calorification throughout the vital domain, and thus rendering the individual per- fectly secure against the impressions usually caused by the extremes of external heat and cold. The vital combustion would be as perfect as that produced by a combination of oxygen with diamond or pure charcoal, thus leaving the lungs and skin only the light labor of exhaling the carbonic acid gas, generated by such com- bustion, and the pure vapor by which that carbon was held in solution during the circulatory process. Thus the venous function is subservient to the de- cretive function, and also to the eliminating function, and this last is subservient to the calorific function ; and the organs by which these several functions are effected, have been briefly noticed. The arterial func- tion is subservient to the accretive function, and subser- vient to the arterial function is the nutritive function. But as this function is for replenishing the arterial blood, let us briefly consider the composition of the arterial blood. Chemical facts wrongly applied, have greatly misled on this subject. Because chemical analysis of blood furnishes certain quantities of muriate of soda and pot- ash, of phosphate of lime, iron, sulphur, &c.; therefore, some have concluded that these mineral substances exist as such in the living blood; and hence have been led to the fallacious, and often ruinous position, that it is proper, and at times necessary, to introduce such substances to the blood, as mineral cathartics, astringents, and tonics. This opinion is wrong, danger- ously wrong. Scientific truth proves its theoretic fal- lacy, and its common application proves its dangerous 32 THE SCIENCE OF MAN tendency. Modern chemical science has demonstrated the principle, that the qualities of all material things depend entirely upon the modes of arrangement into which elementary atoms are forced by the several agencies acting upon them. And hence that every material substance is what it is, merely from that pecu- liar mode of arrangement into which elementary atoms are forced in forming that substance. Hence, phos- phate of lime, iron, sulphur, or any mineral substance, are formed each by a peculiar arrangement of element- ary particles, and hence must exist wherever these particles are, by mineral agencies, forced into these several arrangements. Thus elementary particles, which, under one arrangement, were not iron, may be forced out of that arrangement, and drawn into another, under which they are iron, and so of any other substance. When the blood is drawn from its living vase, it comes directly under the exclusive control of mineral agencies. And hence its former organism, received from, and maintained by, the vital force, is soon broken down and completely destroyed by mineral agencies, and the resolved particles forced into mineral ar- rangements, and thus form mineral substances; and hence the phosphate of lime, iron, sulphur, &c, &c, detected in materials reduced from, but not existing as such in living organic structures. Because the mu- riate of potash may be obtained by a chemical process from the residuum of woody combustion, will the chemist assert that vegetable structures are composed of muriate of potash, &c. ? If so, let him take the muriate of potash, &c, and form them into such APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 33 structures. If they are identical, they are mutually convertible. Before the muriate of potash is formed, there must be a complete destruction of the woody structure, thus leaving resolved particles, ready to be forced into other arrangements under which they form entirely different substances, than what they formed in the woody arrangement. And if we speak of these new substances in connection with the former one, we mean only that the vegetable structure had pressed into its own arrangement, such materials, as when forced out of that arrangement, and drawn into a another one, form another substance. Thus when we speak of vegetable or animal carbon, we mean only such materials in vegetable, or animal structures, as when reduced, or forced out of those structures, and falling into another arrangement, form carbon. Says a distinguished physiologist, " The furthest that our knowledge of the living blood extends, is that, when first taken from the living and healthy vessels, and examined under a microscope, it is found to be composed of a fluid containing innumerable minute globules, which are surrounded by a kind of pellicle or tunic of coloring matter. A substance called fibrin, is also said to be contained in the blood : but there is reason to believe that the fibrin is nothing more than an arrangement of the globules just named, divested of their coloring matter ; and that the fibrin as such, is not to be found in the actively circulating blood. When taken from the living vase and permitted to stand a short time, the blood coagulates; or a portion of it gathers into a thick clot, called the crassamentum, and the remaining portion is a thin, transparent fluid, 3* 34 THE SCIENCE OF MAN called the serum. By washing the clot freely in water, its coloring matter is removed, and it becomes white and has a fibrous appearance." The arterial blood consists mainly of these minute globules, each invested by its thin covering, and lubri- cated by the serum, in such a manner as to be rolled smoothly and easily along the arterial tubes to their extremities, dispersed to all the solids, where these globules are taken up by the organics, and arranged into the different tissues of the body. Membranous covering prevails in every department of vital architec- ture. Every bone in the osseous system, is surrounded by an expansion of ligament into a fibrous membrane, as also every cartilage and tendon. Every bundle and fibre and filament, composing each muscle and nerve, have their separate sheaths of membrane, and every internal organ folded in membrane, and every external organ covered with membrane, and every internal cavity of each organ, and every internal surface lined with membrane, and the whole external surface covered with membrane. Each organ, considered by itself, presents a serous membrane to others with which it is associated, while its own internal cavities are lined with mucous membrane. These two kinds of mem- brane, however differ from each other, mainly in firmness and thickness of structure, both having a similar construction. The mucous membrane is thin and transparent, and very smooth, and secretes mu- cous, a fluid corresponding to its own qualities. The serous membrane is more substaatial in structure, and secretes serum, a fluid similar to the other. The serous and mucous secretions lubricate surfaces APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 35 and contiguous parts, to render motion and transition easy ; while the membranous envelope and lining of each organ and part, and the membranous lining of the whole internal surface, and membranous covering of the whole external surface, preserve the individual structure of each organ and part, and the general structure of all the organs and parts in forming one organism. In every department of vital architecture membranous envelop- ment is completion. From general analogy, it is evident that each ele- mentary globule elaborates to itself a thin membranous covering, by which it becomes fitted for further vital action in being rolled along the arterial tubes to be taken up by some one of the organics and lodged in the mesh-work of the general organism, whereby com- bination with other similar globules, it forms bone, or muscle, or nerve, or other solid, according to the kind of organics effecting its accretion. Being thus lodged it retains its station, till by vital action its thin membranous envelope becomes worn away, and hence its own structure unfit for further vital action among the solids, when the lymphatic, corresponding with the organic that lodged it there, seizes hold of that divested worn-out globule and reduces it to a fluid state, and starts it into the veins to become perfectly carbonized, and thus fitted during its outward course, for perfect vital combustion, when it shall have reached either of the two great calorific and eliminating surfaces of the body. We know in relation to the vital organism generally, that each organ is fitted for vital action, only while it retains its membranous envelope. But the larger membranes have blood-vessels by which 36 THE SCIENCE OF MAN their structure is maintained, while these exceedingly thin membranes, enveloping these very minute glob- ules, have no such means of sustaining their delicate structure, and hence, must be constantly wearing out in sustaining that vital action, to which as a compo- nent part of its solid, it is brought. This investment of elementary globules, is found to commence in the thoracic duct, directly after their elaboration and con- veyance thither by the lacteals. It is a law in vital organism, that each part measurably adapts itself by the action to which it is called to that kind of action. Thus, the surface of the hand accommodates itself to to the kind of labor to which the hand is brought. Thus, these elementary globules, having now entered the thoracic duct, the vestibule of the general circula- tion, each globule begins by its rotary motion to elabo rate to itself from the mucous exhalation of membranous parts, its own covering, and as it is carried up the thoracic duct, that covering gradually gathers to itself consistence and delicate firmness till at its transition from the thoracic duetto the left subclavian vein, it is safely equipped for contact with the carbonized blood flowing in the veins. It then passes on preserving its own integri- ty amid the dark current of unsocial carbon, till it arrives at the lungs, where its antipathies being caught in the ethereal blaze are completely lost in combustion and eli- mination, thus leaving these isolated globules to settle into social embrace with each other and close pressure with the pure air, and thus receive their finishing touch for future incorporation with the solids of the body. These fresh, vitalized globules do not in the least contri- bute to that vital combustion which produces animal APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 37 heat, like the Hebrew captives in the fiery furnace, they stand, each protected by its own vitality, amid the general conflagration of carbonized blood, and come off entirely unscathed by the flame. These globules, now bright, clear and beautiful, return in easy flow to the left auricle of the heart, and thence to the left ventricle, and thence into the aorta for general distribution. There is an essential difference between arterial blood, or that flowing from the lungs, and thence to and from the left auricle and ventricle of the heart, through the aorta and its branches,—and venous blood, or the counter current to the above. The first is bright, red and nutritive — the last is dull, dark and utterly unfit for nutrition, being mostly fluid carbon, fit only for vital combustion and elimination. Nevertheless, in this respect, it serves a very important, indispensable purpose in the vital economy. Indeed, every vital function is very important in its place. Each works for all and all for each. Calorification is equal- ly important with nutrition. For, of what use would be the richest productions of the earth to a republic, deprived of carbon ? Eternal winter and deep dark- ness would hovei over wretched mansions. Behold the wisdom and goodness of God in this wonderful provision, by which carbonized blood, so utterly unfit for any other purpose in the vital economy, is thus made to subserve so important an end, — as organic calorification. There is no mechanism in the universe so wonderful as is the'? human constitution. How im- portant that it should be well understood, that its laws of vital action may be known and obeyed, that human beings may be recipients of that full flow of real and 38 THE SCIENCE OF MAN rational pleasure of which vital organism is suscep- tible. If vital combustion be deranged, by a surplus of, or imperfectly carbonized blood, or by diseased lungs, much constant and dangerous evil will result. If a large quantity of imperfectly carbonized blood be rushed in upon the lungs, it produces great distur- bance. All the pulmonary blood-vessels become fear- fully distended, while the imperfectly carbonized blood comes in contact with the air through those distended vessels, like a mass of crude, non-combustible materi- als thrown upon a flame, tending to extinguish it for- ever, thus producing sometimes instantaneous death by congestion. But if the disturbed pulmonary vessels can press upon their fearful load, and bring the crude mass into partial contact with the air, the calorifica- cation and elimination is very imperfect, thus leaving a portion of crude blood to be returned to the heart and thus into the general circulation. And thus, the whole circulation becomes freighted with crude im- perfectly vitalized and partially carbonized blood, thus causing constant and excessive irritation to the whole vascular system, and through that to all the nerves of organic life, and the whole nervous system, and through these to the muscles and all the structures of the body. All the solids are imperfectly formed. The impure blood rushes to the brain, sometimes produc- ing congestion in that organ, and thus, sudden death ; if not resulting thus, it still greatly impairs the nerves of special sense and their external organs, and the whole brain, thus impeding all the mental powers, per- ception becoming blunted, and the memory greatly APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 39 impaired or destroyed, the whole mental and moral organism clogged, and thus, all the mental and moral powers prostrated. The glow of health fades from the features,.and all lively expression from the eyes, and deep languor and gloom settle in the whole counten- ance, and deep, constant, and distressing melancholy fills the soul. The calorific function being deranged, leaves painful impressions to be made throughout the vital domain, from the slightest changes in the atmos- phere. Meanwhile the patient, may be ascribing all this flood of evils to external causes, perhaps not even suspecting that the trouble is all from within, and the cause resulting from his own habits. In this condition he often adds to his already accumulated load of suffering, by cursing himself to full and repeated doses of mineral or vegetable poisons, or to some of the numerous news- paper nostrums and catholicons, with which our age is so abundantly cursed. But of these evils I shall treat more fully in another place, when I come to speak of curative means. Again, the arterial function is so closely associated with the venous function, that it invariably reflects through that its own derangement. If improper qual- ity of food be used, the arterial blood becomes replen- ished with improper material, and this furnished to the organics, is formed into imperfect solids, their imper- fection corresponding with that of the arterial blood, and this last with that of the food, and its assimilating process from which that blood was replenished. The lymphatics acting on imperfect solids, reduce therefrom imperfect lymph, and this furnishes imperfect venous blood, and thus imperfect vital combustion and calor- 40 THE SCIENCE OF MAN ification, &c. If the food be of a right quality but excessive quantity, the organics and lymphatics are greatly overtasked, and consequently accretion and decretion hurriedly and imperfectly carried on. The carbon of the dark blood is exceedingly impure, being blended with crudities furnished by imperfect lympha- tic action on imperfect solids, but imperfectly worn by imperfect vital action, thus rolling on a full tide of im- perfection, through all the venous function, resulting in imperfect vital combustion and calorification, and elimination, and thus reflowing the heavy tide of woe through the arterial function, etc., &c, in successive rounds of constantly disturbed vital action. The vital functions and their several material media or instruments, now briefly noticed, are accretion and decretion, and subservient to the first, arterial function, and to the last, venous function, subservient to the calorific function and eliminating function : the instruments or organs of accretion, being the organ- ics, those of decretion, lymphatics, — those of the arte- rial function, the pulmonary vein and branches, and the left auricle and ventricle, of the heart, and the arteries and arterial capillaries, — those of the venous function being venous capillaries, and veins, and right auricle and ventricle of the heart, and pulmonary artery and branch- es ;—those of the eliminating function are the glandular organs that secrete from the dark blood, excretory mat ter, and their reservoirs or membranous sacs, and ducts for conveying off that excretory matter in a fluid state, from the organic domain, — together with the minute pores of the skin, and mucous membrane of the lungs, for exhaling whatever of impurities remain in the car- APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 41 bonized blood, after being secreted from, by those other organs ; —the organs of the calorific function are the extensive surface of the mucous membrane of the lungs, and of the external skin. Let us now consider the nutritive function and its set of organs, subservient to the arterial function. The nutritive function is that series of vital action, by which an external substance becomes incorporated with the living arterial blood. Its set of organs con- sists of such parts of the general organism, as are directly used in that series of vital action. And this mode of defining will apply to the several vital func- tions, and their several material media, — composing the whole series of vital actions, and the whole system of organs, used by that series, which taken together, form man or woman. Each set of organs, may be termed an apparatus to its own function. The nutritive, or digestive apparatus consists of the alimentary cavity and its appendages, associated with conducting tubes, and with the lungs. The alimenta- ry cavity is formed by an internal expansion of the enveloping membrane of the body. This internal expansion, called the mucous membrane, commencing with the lips, lines the oral cavity, folds over the tongue and palate, descends in forming a funnel-shaped cavity, called the pharynx, tapers downward and gathers into a tube, called the oesophagus or meatpipe, and continues downward, some twelve or fifteen inches, and enters through a small opening of the dia- phragm, into the abdominal cavity, where it suddenly expands into a sac called the stomach, having some- what the shape of a pear, and lying across the upper 4 42 THE SCIENCE OF MAN part of the abdominal cavity, with its largest end towards the left side, and on the right contracting into a tube, considerably larger than the meal pipe. This tube, though six or eight times the length of the body, is folded together in such a manner as to occupy but a small compass. It is called the small intestine, and its upper, middle, and lower portions, sometimes desig- nated as the duodenum, jejunum, and ileum. This tube, at its lower extremity, suddenly expands into a much more capacious tube called the colon. This ascending on the right side to the stomach—arches over all the convolutions of the small intestine, and descends on the left side, forming in its lower part a flexure, called the sigmoid, in shape of an S; and then gathers into a somewhat smaller tube called the rectum, at the lower extremity of which, the mucous membrane again blends with the external skin. All the limiting and lining membranes of the body have a similarity of structure and functional capability. The lining membranes, however, being less exposed, are less substantial or thinner in texture than envelop- ing membranes. A peculiar membranous texture covers the whole external surface of the body like a sac, — continuing over the lips and up the nostrils, it lines the cavities of the mouth and nose, covering the tongue and palate, and lining the tubes leading into the pharynx, from the nose and internal chambers of the ears, and continuing backward and downward, it covers and lines all the parts of the throat, and lines the windpipe, extending through all its branches in ihe lungs, lines all the air-passages and cells, thus present- APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 43 ing to the air in the lungs, an extent of surface equal to, or greater than the whole external skin. This same membrane, by a continuous expansion, lines the whole alimentary cavity, and all its ducts ingressing ami egressing. This membrane, through its whole extent, is a delicate net-work, of extremely small meshes, with an intertexture of minute blood-vessels, with their accompanying accretive and decretive or- gans, and their presiding nervous filaments. These vessels and nerves are so minute and numerous, and closely blended, that it is impossible to puncture the skin in any place with the point of the finest needle, without wounding both a nerve and a blood- vessel. To lubricate these delicate little organs, main- taining the structure of this extensive membrane, and thus preserve them in a right condition, for the performance of their functions, they are every- where imbedded in a thin body of mucus. This, on the external surface, is called the rete mucosum, or mucous layer of the skin. As a still further protection to these delicate little organs, from rude and improper contact with external things, the whole external surface is covered with a thin, transparent, horny substance, called the epidermis or cuticle. This, though usually thin, becomes very thick and hard on portions of sur- face subjected to much friction, as bottoms of the feet, palms of the hands, and insides of the fingers of labor- ers. Some have supposed that this epidermis super- ficially lines the internal membranes, as that of the alimentary cavity, and that of the lungs. It is higlily probable, if not certain, that it does, though so extreme- ly minute and thin in structure as not to be easily per- 44 THE SCIENCE OF MAN ceptible. All membranes lining internal surfaces, are superficially lubricated by a thin, transparent fluid, called mucus or serum, corresponding to the rete mucosum of the external skin. This great enveloping and limiting membrane in its expansion over the exter- nal surface of the body, is called the skin, and in its continuous expansion over internal surfaces, having direct communication by ingressing and egressing orifices, with the external world, as those of the lungs and alimentary cavity, is called the mucous membrane ; and in its separate expansion over inclosed surfaces, as those of the thorax and abdomen, and folding over all the organs in those cavities, is called the serous membrane. The skin, or external membrane, is an envelope to the whole organism. The mucous membrane lines all the internal surfaces of internal organs. And the serous membrane lines all internal cavities containing those organs, and folds separately over, or externally covers the several organs in those cavities. That kind of membrane surrounding each bone and cartilage, and tendon, and lining the spinal canal, the cavity of the cranium, &c, is usually called fibrous membrane, as that also forming separate sheaths to every filament and fibre and bundle, composing each muscle and nerve ; there might also be classed with the same, that which probably forms minute separate envelopes or pellicles to all the elementary globules, composing by their several peculiar arrangements, all the various ani- mal solids. The whole body seems to be formed by elementary globules, membranously enveloped, and forced by vital action into a gelatinous arrangement, and this extended into a general mesh-work, and this APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 45 filled up by other similar elementary globules, but forced into such arrangements as severally to form bone, cartilage, ligament, tendon, muscle, nerve, and each of the animal solids. These wonderful processes in vital chemistry, by which similar elementary globules are forced into such arrangements as severally to form the various animal solids, are analogous to those of inorganic chemistry, by which similar elementary par- ticles are forced into such dissimilar arrangements as severally to form entirely different compounds. All these facts go to prove the grand principle, that the several qualities of all material things depend upon their several forms, and their several forms depend upon the several modes of arrangement, into which primordial atoms are forced by their several agencies. But of these things I shall treat in another work which I intend for publication. The mucous membrane, in forming the alimentary cavity, is supported externally to its internal surface, by subjacent tissues, and these so arranged, in different sections of that cavity, as to effect successive changes on the food in reducing it to arterial blood. Thus, several cavities are formed where the food is succes- sively retained in each, till each has effected its own appropriate labor on the food, and then passes it on to the next, &c, till the food has passed through the whole process of assimilation, when it is arterial blood. Connected with these several cavities, either directly, or by means of tubes, are glands for secreting from the blood, solvent fluids to be poured into these several cavities, when called into action by the presence of food. These cavities are the oral, gastric, intestinal, 4# 46 THE SCIENCE OF MAN and colon, each of which has its own division of labor in the digestive process, and the action of each effects a certain change on the food, and passes it on to the next, and thus of each, till it is passed through the whole process. Muscular fibres are everywhere attached to the back of the mucous membrane in forming the alimentary cavity. These fibres are arranged in dif- ferent sections, according to the action required in each ; but through the whole extent, the arrangement is similar. It generally consists of two layers: the first is composed of circular fibres, like rings, or like sections of rings, whose ends lap by each other, so as to give the muscles more power of action. The se- cond layer is composed of longitudinal fibres, or such as run lengthwise of the tube, or section of the tube to which they are attached- By the circular fibrous con- traction, the calibre of the cavity is diminished. By the longitudinal fibrous contraction, the parts are short- ened ; and by their combined action they give the parts a vermicular, or undulating motion. Embracing this muscular coat of the alimentary canal, is the serous membrane, which lines the thoracic and abdom- inal cavities, and folds over all the organs in that ca- vity, and serves to lubricate them all, to render their mutual action easy and safe, and to hold each in its place, and all in their several places. Thus the ali- mentary canal, like most other vessels and viscera of the system, is composed of three coats or layers, —the mucous, muscular and serous, with an intertexture of blood-vessels, organics, lymphatics, and nervous cords and filaments, presiding over the action of all. Along the surface of the alimentary canal, are dis- APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 47 persed a set of minute vessels or organs similar to the lymphatics. These arise from the mucous surface, and lead off externally like small tubes from a large one. These are called lacteals, and their function is to elab- orate chyle from the contents of the alimentary cavity, and convey it to the thoracic duct. Their function differs from that of the lymphatics, in this: lymphatics act on worn-out material of solids, in reducing it to lymph, forming the dark corbonized blood for calorifi- cation and elimination ; — lacteals act on fresh mate- rial, in reducing it to chyle, and conveying it to the thoracic duct, thence to be conveyed to the heart, and thence to the lungs for perfect vitalization, and future incorporation with the animal solids. The lacteals mostly abound along the intestinal region. The several cavities, in the order of their action, are oral, gastric, intestinal, and colon. And their several functions and results are,— 1st, oral function, includ- ing mastication, mucous and salivary secretion and solution, resulting in comminution ; 2d, gastric function, including muscular contraction, gastric se- cretion and solution, resulting in chymification ; 3d, intestinal function, including muscular contraction, bilious and pancreatic secretion and solution, resulting in perfect chymification ; 4th, lacteal function, in- cluding elaboration and transmission of chyle to the thoracic duct, resulting in chylification ; 5th, pulmon- ary function, including atmospheric pressure, resulting in perfect vitalization ; 6th, colon function, including muscular contraction, resulting in complete separation of the innutritious portions of the aliment, and trans- mission of the same through its ascending, transverse, 48 THE SCIENCE OF MAN and descending portion to the sigmoid flexure and rec- tum. The subordinate and intermediate acts are,—■ 1st, prehension and transmission to the oral cavity; 2nd, deglutition ; 3d, pyloric transition ; 4th, thoracic duct, and venous and arterial transmission ; 5th, rec- tum excretion. When these organs are in a healthful condition, and proper food, at proper times, and in proper quantity, is submitted to their action, they furnish perfect blood, and hence perfect solids formed from that blood, and hence perfect vital action through those solids, and hence perfect health, and hence perfect security against all epidemics. Disease is vital action disturb- ed by a wrong condition of vital organism. If that organism is in right condition there can be no disease. When vital action is greatly and fearfully disturbed by the depraved condition of its organism, that disease takes on epidemic symptoms. Similar organisms in similar condition invariably take on similar action. Healthful organisms invariably manifest similar health- ful action, and organisms similarly diseased invariably manifest similarly distuibed action. If a community of human beings, by similar habits of life bring their or- ganisms into a similar diseased condition, the abnormal action or disease induced will invariably be similar, and such disease becomes epidemic. When the in- ternal and external organs of any number of individu- als are by similar habits of living, brought into a similar state of derangement, those individuals will all become affected and manifest a similar disturbance of vital functions, — will possess and exhibit similar symptoms of disease. And many individuals thus similarly and APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 49 simultaneously affected, present the phenomena of a contagious disease or epidemic. But the contagion of epidemics, invariably arises from their intagion, that is, they first touch within, and then without, — first in- tagious then contagious ; their contagion being necessa- rily consequent to their intagion. All that is requisite, therefore, to create an epidemic in any community or nation, is that individuals composing that community or nation, should, by similar habits of life, bring their several organisms into a similar condition of derange- ment, and thus induce similarly disturbed vital action, and hence the epidemic. As disease is disturbed vital action, and epidemic disease is greatly and fearfully disturbed vital action, each caused by different de- grees of departure in the condition of the vital organism from its right condition, — to gain a correct knowledge of epidemics, it is requisite in each case to consider, 1st, healthful vital action, 2d, disturbed vital action, and 3d, greatly disturbed vital action ; the 1st being a state of health, the 2d a state of disease, and the 3rd a state of epidemic disease. For the nature of diseases called epidemic, is the same, whether it comes on one, or five, or five hundred. The name epidemic (epi, upon, and demos, the people) is applied to them, from the fact, that they usually come upon a number of peo- ple simultaneously, and this caused by the fact, that the social condition of the human race is such, that their habits of life are usually similar, so much so as to bring individual organisms into similar states of derange- ment, and thus, induce similar states of greatly dis- turbed vital action. But if a man by previous trans- gression of organic laws, has brought his organism into 50 THE SCIENCE OF MAN such a state of derangement, as to induce the spasmo- dic cholera, or any other epidemic, he will be certain to have that disorder, whether alone, or among the mul- titude, and it is the same to him in either case. Every human organism is a vital universe by itself, and if by any moans that universe is destroyed, the nature of its destruction is the same, whether alone or simultane- ously with other similar universes, by similar means destroyed. All, therefore, who wish freedom from epidemics, should look well, each to the condition of his own organism. If that be right, he is safe ; if wrong, he is in danger. A right condition of the organism, is when all the tissues composing that organism are in a state of per- fect vital conduction, or when all the fluids and solids of the body are in such condition as to be perfect con- ductors of vitality. While in this condition, vitality flows with perfect freedom through all the fluids and solids, like electricity flowing on a series of perfect conductors. In this condition of the organism, vitality pervades freely and fully and equally every tissue and organ, and part, imparting to each its functional power, and to all their general fund of power. Each organ performs its own function, and all their several functions, with ease and pleasure, and satisfaction to the individual. While this condition of the organism remains, ihe person has, of physical, mental and moral power, a rich, constant, and constantly increasing fund, which renders existence to him a source of real, con- stant and overflowing pleasure. APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 51 LECTURE II. Vital Republic —Nutrition.— Proper Quality and Quantity.— Morbific Material within the Organism. — Vital Conduction of Organic Tissues. — Vital Equilibrium. — Vital Excitation.— Organic Laws. — Nature's Curative Power. — Nature's Anta- gonists. — Empiricism.— Pain, how caused and intended for what. — Difference between killing Pain and curing Disease. Organic Treason. — Modus Operandi of Medicinal Action. — Healthful Vital Action, how retained.— Diseases approximat- ing to Epidemics.— What Man is and what he might be.— Law, its Extension and Design. — Obedience and Disobedience to Law.— Results. — Diarrhoea, Colic, and Cholera Morbus, how Caused, Cured, and Avoided. — Heavy Servitude of Dis- eased Action. — Combustibles and Solidities. — Cholera, its Cause, Modus Operandi, Curative Means, and Prevention. — Wh t kind of Physician to call. — Nature's Catholicon. That assemblage of organs composing the human body, is a vital republic, all the parts of which, by the general texture of the tissues, are bound together each to all and all to each, in one community of inter- est and sympathy. The enjoyment of each is partici- pated by all, and that of all, by each ; if one suffers," all suffer, being all woven together, as into one sheet of sympathy. Vital action on the solids, gradually wears the material of those solids. This waste is met by appro- priations from the arterial blood, in a manner as I have before described. But this constant drawing on the 52 THE SCIENCE OF MAN arterial blood, gradually diminishes it. To replen- ish this fluid, the organs of nutrition are brought into action. To form perfect blood those organs must be supplied with some nutritive substance, which when reduced, shall furnish elementary globules held in solu- tion by the serous fluid, such as constitute perfect arterial blood. When such food is received at proper times and in proper quantity, and thoroughly acted on by healthful organs, through the several stages of digestion, it furnishes perfect blood, and hence perfect solids, and hence perfect vital action through those solids, and hence perfect health and happiness. As to what proper food is, I will speak in another place, and only premise here, that very many of those substances dietetically used by the human race, are wide departures from perfect food ; and that wherever such improper substances are used, there is also a cor- responding departure in quantity, as well as quality, both of which are entirely hostile to true health and enjoyment. And that is not only so, but needlessly so ; as the Creator has fully furnished to man the means of providing for himself an abundance of perfect food, and given him reason and power to restrict himself to such a quantity as shall best promote all his physical, mental, and moral powers, and all the real and ration- al, and lasting enjoyments of life, and thus his true welfare both present and future. All Material not reduced nor reducible to some of the tissues of the body, or to the mucous, or ser- ous fluids lubricating those tissues, or to the fluid secretions used as solvents in digestion, or the ex- crementitious matter to be passed off through its applied to epidemics. 53 natural channel is foreign matter to the organism, OR SUCH MATERIAL IS NON-CONDUCTING TO VITALITY, and hence a morbific cause to such part or parts with which it comes in contact, and through this, or these to the whole organism. All material that is thus reduced or reducible, by vital action to some of the tissues of the body, or to their moistening and lu- bricating fluids, or to their solvent secretions used in the digestion, becomes life-conducting in its organic arrangement, and hence retains the whole organ- ism in a state of vital conduction, in which state vitality flows freely and fully and equally through every tissue and organ and part, causing each and all to act easily and pleasurably, and harmoniously, and thus diffusing healthful and delightful action, through the whole organism. When I speak of vitality flowing equally throughout the organism, I mean that the vital fluid, in its diffusion through its whole series of vital con- ductors, or all the parts composing the organism, tends constantly, to an equilibrium. And as I shall show in another work, all the vital functions are severally effected by this tendency of the vital fluid to an equal diffusion throughout the organism, in its distribution to each organ,or set of organs, of that amount of func- tional power requisite in each for a due performance of its own function in relation to the several functions, and their several organs, composing the general organ- ism. That all vital action is carried on by this constant tendency of the vital fluid to an equilibrium. I use the term vital fluid, as identical in meaning with the word life or vitality, —just as we use the term electric fluid, as synonymous with the word electnci- 5 54 THE SCIENCE OF MAN ty ; the word fluid always implying ease of motion. In harmonious vital action, such as results from a right condition of all the tissues composing the organism, each organ or set of organs by a slight accumulation of vitality in its own tissues, caused by a previous dis- charge of vitality from the tissues of surrounding or- gans and parts, is brought into a state of vital excita- tation, in which it becomes fitted for a discharge of its own vital function, and by which discharge there is a vital equilibrium restored throughout the organism. And this equilibrium being restored by vital action through the several organs and parts, becomes disturbed by a slight accumulation of vitality in the tissues of each, and by successive action in each becomes suc- cessively restored throughout the organism. If all the functions, subservient to accretion, as the digestive, arterial, and organic, are perfectly perform- ed, all those subservient to decretion, as the lymphatic, venous, and eliminating and calorific, will be rightly performed, as a natural result, of a right performance of those functions subservient to accretion. And if those subserving accretion, be badly performed,— those subserving decretion, will, as a natural result, be also badly performed. Our true wisdom, therefore, is to set a guard around the gate of organic admission, to see that nothing but true and proper substances are admitted, and then all the avenues and gates of dis- mission will take care of themselves. Indeed every vital function will take care of itself, if we will only guard it from external injury. Or in other words, if we will conform our voluntary habits to the organic laws of the body, we shall soon find that all the vital APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 55 functions will take care of themselves, without any anxiety on our part. All that Nature asks of man is, " to clear the track" for her own truthful march, and she will effect the rest. Seek first the reign of that truth, which God has established in the nature of things, and all other desirable things shall be added. If man in his wide departures from organic truth, will cease from further transgression, and gather up what he may have left from his squandered vital forces, and use that remnant of vital power truthfully in freeing his organism from present obstructions to vital action, and from further derangement, and by enduring such temporary reaction as may be caused in that organism, by such reform, and thus prepare the way for a full and constant and perfect inflow of vitality through all his organism, for the remainder of his terrestrial exist- ence, —then he ensures to himself the highest enjoy- ment and welfare of his earthly being, besides having that embodied vitality matured into a glorious spirit form or spiritual body, fitted to its own bright sphere in a universe of life, as lasting in its nature as is the immortal God, who first formed it by imparting a portion of his own life to a material form. Let us then keep in mind, that if the organic gates of admission are closed to everything except their proper substances, and these received at proper times and in proper quantities, that all the vital functions subservient to accretion, and those subservient to de- cretion, will be easily, healthfully, and pleasurably per- formed, and thus the whole organism, retained in its proper condition for vital action, and consequently a regular increase of general vital power in the tissues of 56 THE SCIENCE OF MAN the organism, and thus a maturing of embodied vitality into a spiritual body, for immortality or ever enduring life and pleasure. And let us keep in mind, that in knowing and obeying the organic laws of our nature, that we are in no way renouncing the true pleasures of terrestrial existence, or the real blessings of this life, but rather dropping all impediments to those plea- sures and blessings, and beginning to live as rational beings should. God made us to be happy, and wills us so to be, and if we are not happy it is because we do not obey his will, but disobey, by transgressing those organic laws, which God has established in our nature to make us happy and give us a full, constant and constantly increasing fund of true pleasure and rich enjoyment. If therefore, we would obey God, we do not throw ourselves out of pleasure, but rather into pleasure true and rational and lasting. But to obey God in all things, we must conform to the organic laws of our nature, which God has established. And as a means to conforming, we must first know those laws, and then like rational beings bring ourselves to obey them. But we must make up our mind in the outset to suffer some reaction caused by former trans- gressions, and yet keep cheerfully in mind, that Nature will do up her curative work, thoroughly, substantially and truthfully, and that if we trust implicitly to those curative powers with which God has endowed her, meanwhile removing as far as possible all obstructions to her own curative process, that she will invariably come out right and set us down on a sure platform of health, and say to us,— " Go and sin no more." She does not, like some applied to epidemics. 57 fallacious pretenders in the curative art, set her patients down, with ghastly features and sunken eyes, and loose, out-falling teeth, and fetid breath, and palsied limbs and rotten bones, — a wreck of what they were! Nature never trifles or fools thus with her children, that trust themselves to her life mode of cure. True, she has in some cases effected cures in spite of her antagonists; but in such cases her strug- gle has been long, severe, and constant; and then she has been robbed of her just praise by her antago- nists, who, if they do not completely kill, invariably claim the credit of cure. But these antagonists to Nature and to Nature's God, should fear lest they share a fate similar to that of one of the Ilerods of old, who on a certain day made an oration to the peo- ple, and gathered all the praise to himself. Man's life is his universe. If he loses that he loses all. If Nature's antagonists wish totrifle, let it be on something less sacred than human life. If the cheat ended in the purse, it were endurable, but when it often ends in cheating one out of the precious life, it is time that every friend of his race should raise a warning voice against such ungodly trifling. And it is better that the " baser sort" of diplomacy should "flutter" than that a universe should continue to suffer. For I am persuaded that only the " baser sort " will "flutter" at the principles I advocate. The pure and noble-minded of that profession will harmonize with these views. Indeed, in some cases, they have already acted upon them in their treatment of patients, and that too, with the greatest success. It is far better to pay a truly scientific and intelligent physician for 5* 58 THE SCIENCE OF MAN judicious advice and treatment of the sick, than to pay a diplomatic drone, or brainless quack for administer- ing poisons, or to pay for the numerous nostrums and catholicons, puffed out by flaming advertisements, in showers of death all over our afflicted Repub- lic,— and coming up like the Egyptian plagues, into our houses and parlors and bedrooms, — emblazoned forth in capitals, large, dark and red, and full freighted with falsehood and disease, and wo and death to all who are duped thereby ; — pernicious, health-destroy- ing, life-repelling, execrable things ! conceived by spurious brains, and concocted by vile hands and wholesaled to the trade, and retailed on the unwary, for ungodly gain, to deceive and ruin, and give abun- dance of labor to planes and spades! And why should this crowding out of life be longer tolerated ? Is there not room enough for us all to live in this beautiful world of God's creation ? Is there any true reason for our being thus drugged, driven out of life, to the shades ? Are we not all the work- manship of God ? and have we not therefore a right to tarry awhile and drink in the true pleasures of earthly existence, and get well matured for a future state ? Who has any right to hurry us out of life ? If the scowling face of some old grannied sire is exhibited to our view in the newspapers, dolefully calling for patronage, and bitterly complaining of SOme BASE COUNTERFEITS ! ! to his MATCHLESS NOS- TRUM ;— let us, if the old gentleman is in real dis- tress, inclose him a dollar and send to his relief, — and at the same time advise him to pour his " wonder- ful" mixtures on his garden for enriching its soil, or APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 59 if that would prove destructive to vegetation, to pour it into the gutters of the street, a place of reception much better fitting such ingredients than the human organism. But, if we value health or life, let us never tamper with such vile trash : or if a long string of anti- thetic claims, are rung in lasting changes on the vision tired, let us act on a similar principle, and thus save our strength and health. Money is nothing in comparison with life. Vile and unblushing empiricism wastes life for money. Let the community be wise, and save life, either with or without wasting money. If the vultures are bent on their prey, give, give ! But oh ! if you value health or life, do not receive. It will do to give to the noisy brood ; but in the name of Heav- en and Truth, I solemnly and earnestly admonish you not to receive their health-destroying compounds. They are all of a class, whether got up by male or female pretenders. All are a string of unblushing falsehoods, managed by those who are full willing to see full grave-yards, if by that means, they can see full coffers ! Humanity, beware ! Thou hast but one life at thy disposal: that gone, all is over. The "genuine labels" and shroud-making are both of a piece. Anxious certitude for getting the " genuine article," and a tasteful local selection in the bone- yard, are in harmony. Again, I say, humanity be- ware ! When nearly a full column is made up, by assertions of quick salvation to old and young, and sure reprieve to the last stages of organic destruction, and the full redemption of thousands of lives! what mind of any perception does not at once see the fraud in all its baseness and folly ? The velveteen softness 60 the science of man drawn over delicate fingers, is not always manufactured from the membraneous covering to which it pre- tends. The thousand and one wonderful cures said to be wrought by such medicines, are all a tissue of falsehoods, and when confided in, entirely fal- lacious and often ruinous. As life is the tenure by which man holds himself, and every thing in his possession, and as a right con- dition of the organism is the tenure, or bond of union between life and its series of material instruments through which it exerts itself on the external world, and thus increases itself to a lasting fund of power, and permanently embodied vitality, — it becomes a matter of serious importance to man to know when the condition of his organism is becoming so deranged as to endanger, or tend to endanger that union. God, in the riches of his goodness, has appointed within the human organism a monitor, by the admonitions of which, man may know when his vital interests are endangered. That monitor is pain: Heaven's own monitor to transgressing man! much abused! mis- understood ! much trifled with! God-sent monitor! When will man learn to appreciate thy worth ? obey thy dictates, and come back to the truth of his being ? Were it not for this divinely appointed monitor, man would rush into the arms of death, without the least premonition. Without this monitor, he would be far more reckless of life and health than he now is, and lawless run from all order and true pleasures of ex- istence. Whenever the tissues of any organ or part become so changed from their right condition, that vi- tality cannot freely flow through those tissues, the APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 61 person becomes conscious of pain in the part or parts thus affected. Thus, when the delicate nervous tissue of the brain, becomes so far changed from its proper condition, that vitality cannot freely flow through the texture of that organ, the person becomes conscious of pain in the head, or headache. When the bony structures of the teeth become so changed from their right condition, as not to be good conductors of vita- lity, the person becomes conscious of pain in the teeth, or toothache. When the tissues of the stomach, heart, lungs, or any other organ become so changed from their proper condition, as not well to conduct the vital fluid, such a state of things is indicated by pain in the organ or parts thus affected. When from over- nutrition, there is thrown such an abundance of blood into circulation, that the function of accretion, and that of decretion, are greatly overtasked and hurriedly carried on, that in such rapid succession of accretion and decretion, organization can be but imperfectly maintained in the bones and joints, &c, the person becomes conscious of rheumatic pains in the parts thus affected. And hence the propriety of the name rheu- matism, from the Greek verb " rheo," "flow," indi- cating too rapid succession in the accretion and decretion of solids. The nutritive particles, before they get fairly organized, or stationed in the mesh-work of the structures, are, by the accretion of other particles, made to "flow " out again into the returning circula- tion. And these particles being but imperfectly vital- ized, by the rapid transition through which they are urged, are bad or imperfect conductors of vitality, and hence produce pain in those parts where such imperfect 62 THE SCIENCE OF MAN organization is maintained. If a person feels sharp, shooting pains through the side, back, shoulders, or any other part, it indicates, at once, a wrong condition in the tissues of those parts, — that organization is but imperfectly maintained in those parts, which are thereby becoming bad or imperfect conductors of vita- lity. When the tissues of the parts become very much deranged and there is considerable danger approaching, those pains become very severe and excruciating, and strongly admonish the sufferer to cease transgressing organic laws, by which health and life have become endangered. People generally mistake pain for disease, and thus suppose that if by any means they can kill pain, they cure the disease. A more ruinous mistake could not be committed. Pain is only an indication of dis- ease, and not the disease itself. Disease is vital action, disturbed by a wrong condition of the tissues of the organism, and pain is only the monitor of such a state of things. If sentinels, stationed around a republic to guard it from the intrusion of surrounding foes, should not fire their alarms at the approach of danger, what would become of the safety of the republic ? The foe unseen rushes in, and all is lost. But what do Nature's antagonists, many of them, in this state of things ? Every sentinel of those stationed through the organic republic, that true and faithful to his duty, fires the alarm of approaching danger, is shot down, at once, by these officious meddlers. Laudanum or some other pain-killing substance, is their first administra- tion. Instead of turning themselves against the danger to which that organic republic is exposed, forsooth ! APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 63 they turn themselves to slaying the faithful sentinels, for pointing out the danger. Again, when the foe has rushed in, and nature has rallied all the available forces of the vital republic about the endangered part, to repel and subdue the invading foe, these officious ones in the depth of their diplomatic wisdom, and ruinous folly, gravely talk about counter-irritation! and hence the poulticing, blistering, gouging, &c. &c. That is, while nature has gathered all her forces about the proper scene of action, for a combined and manful resistance to the invading foe — these are for calling off those forces, and distributing them to other points of action, and thus leaving the true and proper place of resistance in still greater danger. In a civil repub- lic, the person or persons doing such a thing, would be arrested and condemned under that statute pre- scribing for those who " give aid and comfort to the enemy." But all the arrest I wish to see in this matter, is that of such fallacious and often fatal treat- ment. My contest is with wrong and dangerous prin- ciples, and not with persons; with patheisms, and not patheists: and this too, from a sincere desire to pro- mote human welfare. Pain may be, and frequently is killed by means which tend directly and powerfully to increase the dis- ease. There may be substances taken into the ali- mentary cavity, and thence through the circulatory medium, diffused throughout the organism, that shall render the tissues not only imperfect, but almost non- conductors of vitality, and thus, by deadening the sensibilities of the parts, kill the pain by greatly increasing the disease. Or in other words, they des- 64 THE SCIENCE OF MAN troy the pain by superinducing upon the diseased condition of the organs, a poisoned condition also ; the last state being so much worse than the first, that vitality cannot now flow sufficiently on those parts, as to give them any feeling whatever. And the deluded patient may suppose all the while himself to be much benefited by the dose, because he no longer feels pain. When the truth is, that by how much he may have been relieved from pain in this way, by so much has he been thrown towards the land of shades. But if by any possible effort Nature can cure him after such treatment, she brings him back not only from a dis- eased state, but from a poisoned state also. A lady feels a severe headache. The delicate ner- vous tissue of the brain has been, by dietetic errors, and wrong habits of life, consequent on such errors, thrown into such a wretched condition for vital con- duction, that vitality can hardly flow there, and hence she feels a severe pain in the head. She must have a cup of strong tea as a sure remedy for relieving the pain. She sips the narcotic beverage; and, lo! ac- cording to her expectation, the severe headache is removed as by magic. Who, by theorizing, can invalidate such facts ? Considerate woman ! permit me to tell you how this magic cure has been effected. First, the introduction of a new foe to the organism, has detracted so much vitality from the diseased tis- sues of the brain, that you have hardly any vitality left there. Again, the narcotic qualities of the tea, by rapid transition through the circulatory medium, have become lodged in those diseased tissues of the brain, and thus thrown them into such a condition, that they APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 65 can scarcely conduct what little vitality is left there.— And thus you have in reality cured the pain by killing your brain. And for the short time that nature may hold you up under such transgressions, you will inva- riably find, that when your brain comes to life again, sufficiently to appreciate its own condition, that sick head-ache will come back upon you with redoubled vengeance. All narcotics and pain-killing substances act precisely on this principle. They invariably kill the pain by deadening the sensibilities of the tissues with which they come in contact; — or in other words, by throwing those tissues into a still worse condition for vital conduction, than they were before. If you love the joys of life and health, and wish to retain or regain them, trifle not with Nature. Having treated briefly of vital functions, and of the general nature of disease, and of pain, and of the ma- nifest distinction between pain and disease, and the dangerous fallacy of confounding the one with the other, we are now prepared to treat of disease when assuming the epidemic character. All epidemic dis- eases have their approximating diseases, some of which are remotely so, and others closely, according to attend- ing circumstances, or occasions which tend to their development. To gain a clear and correct idea of the nature of epidemics, it is generally requisite to treat of their approximating diseases. And having already considered the organism under healthful vital action, we will now consider some of the approximating dis- eases to that epidemic usually termed the Asiatic, or spasmodic cholera. All the fluids and solids of the body must be a 66 THE SCIENCE OF MAN retained in their proper state, in order to keep up healthful vital action. To effect this, every thing re- ceived into the alimentary cavity, must be reduced or assimilated to some of those fluids or solids in their proper state of vital conduction, and the residuum ex- pelled through its natural channel from the organism. And all this will be effected, when there is received only into the alimentary cavity, proper food, (includ- ing a due proportion of fluid and solid,) at proper time, in proper manner, and in proper quantity. If all these requisitions of propriety are complied with, all the fluids and solids of the body will be retained in their right condition; and, consequently, induce healthful vital action through the whole organism ; and there is, while things are retained in this condition, no possible inlet to disease of any kind. The whole organic system moves on in all its functions, as har- moniously as does the solar system, in wheeling the planets in their eternal rounds about their common centre, all being moved on with the certitude of inflex- ible law. It is utterly impossible for disease in any form to be induced in an organism, retained under the control, or in harmony with organic laws. We might as well talk about drawing the sun from his bright sphere, or pushing the planets from their orbits, as to talk about disease or disturbed vital action, while the vital organism is retained in its right condition by obe- dience to organic laws. Life and health, in such a case, are as sure as is the throne of the immortal one. God has so ordained things in the human constitution, and thus it must be. And happy for man that it is so ! It leaves him not the sport of chance or fate, to APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 67 be driven about and tossed to and fro, like a reed shaken by the wind, to bend or break at the mercy of the curling breeze, or sweeping blast ; or like a me- teor driven by explosive forces, hither and thither, through the celestial deep, till completely dispersed and lost, by being merged by counteracting forces in the nearest sphere ; but it leaves him, if he will know and obey the organic laws of his being, like a substantial planet that cannot be turned from its own orbit, but moves on still, a world by itself, held in its own free- dom and safety by the certitude of inflexible law. All things are and must be ruled by law, or there can be no safety or happiness to things or beings created. Law is the harmony of the Universe. It rests in the deep bosom of Deity, and flows its order and heaven to all worlds. And if sentient beings in any of these worlds, will break away from the holy and happy free- dom conferred by obedience to law, and run them- selves into the slavery and despotism of reckless, lawless action, they may, for a brief period, be reflected on by the light created by former obedience to law ; but as they continue to shoot off in their tangent course from the bright sphere of law-obedience, they soon lose themselves in heavy gloom of lasting night and cheerless winter. Law is as solar light to all worlds: it shines for all. But if a man will injure or ruin his own eyes, so as to render that light painful to him, shall he therefore complain, and wish the solar influ- ence bound or destroyed? Shall he wish to throw a Universe into agony, for his own transgression ? Let him rather repent and obey law, that he may again be happy in the possession of true freedom. If a man 68 THE SCIENCE OF MAN would have life and health, and true enjoyment con- tinued to him, he must obey organic laws, and in order to obey them he must first know them. There is to be no compulsion, however, in this matter. If a man will continue to transgress organic laws, and thus bring his organism into such a condition as to induce the spasmodic cholera, or other epidemic, and have a severe time of it, or perhaps die in it, — if he will do this, then he must. " Whatsoever a man soweth, that also shall he reap." But I trust that some who read these pages will act like rational beings, and receive friendly admonition, and conform their voluntary habits to the organic laws of their being, and thus escape the threatening danger. Such an attack may be trifled with in the distance, but when it comes upon one, it is a matter of serious import. " Take heed to yourselves, lest you be overcharged with surfeiting and drunken- ness, (eating and drinking; and the cares of this life, and that day come upon you unawares." When the organic laws of the body are complied with, in respect to diet, air, exercise, cleanliness, &c, the organism is retained in a right condition for health- ful vital action, and consequently all the vital func- tions are rightly performed. All the vital functions subserving accretion and decretion are healthfully carried on. Each function is perfectly performed, thus leaving a perfect material for the action of the next function. Thus in digestion, each stage of the general process is thoroughly effected. When proper food, at proper time, and in proper quantity, is submitted to the oral function, that food is by a com- plete performance of that function, reduced to a APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 69 state of perfect comminution, and then by the gastric function, and intestinal, it is reduced to perfect chyme, and then by the lacteal function, to per- fect chyle, and then by the pulmonary function that chyle is perfectly vitalized, and thus passed on to the arterial function, and thence to the accre- tive and decretive, &c, &c. While by the colon function the residuum of that aliment is reduced to a state for excretion. And thus are perfectly and healthfully effected in succession, comminution, chy- mification, chylification, vitalization, and accretion, as also, decretion, excretory secretion, and elimination and calorification, and fluid and solid excretion ; and thus perfect organization is maintained throughout the vital domain, and thus the whole organism re- tained in a right condition, for healthful vital action, and constant, increase of the general fund of vital power. Let us now suppose, that instead of food being re- ceived into the alimentary cavity, in proper quality and quantity, and manner, and time, that the whole order is reversed. That is, the food is submitted to the oral function, in such a condition as not to call in- to full requisition dental action, mucous, and salivary secretion and solution, —the direct consequence will be, that the food will be received, too much, and too fast, and thus, instead of being by the oral func- tion reduced to a. state of perfect and natural mucous and salivary solution and comminution, it is in a state of artificial solution ; or in but partially reduced masses passed on by deglutition to the gastric function. The gastric function having received the food in 6* 70 THE SCIENCE OF MAN such improper condition and quantity is itself brought to much unnatural exertion in reducing the chaotic mass, and calls to its aid an unusual appropriation of vital power, from the general organism. Such an un- usual expenditure of vitality through its own tissues, not only restores the ordinary vital equilibrium through the organism, but also destroys it, by an unusual ex- penditure of vital power through its own tissues, and thus, is constantly drawing in, and expending vital power, from surrounding and external portions of the organism. For the forces of the vital republic will in- variably concentrate in the tissues of any organ or part to relieve it from danger, by pouring such an amount of vital energy into its tissues as to enable it to perform its overtasked or unnatural labor. But with all this concentration of vital forces, the gastric function is but imperfectly performed, and hence, very imperfect chyme is transmitted through the pylorus, to the intestinal cavity, where there is but imper- fect completion of chymification. The lacteals being furnished with imperfect chyme, elaborate therefrom imperfect chyle, and this being passed on to the pul- monary function, becomes but imperfectly vitalized, and being passed on through the arterial function, it furnishes imperfect material to the accretive function and hence imperfect solids are formed ; hence from those solids imperfect lymph is formed ; and hence im- perfect excretory secretion, and hence imperfect calo- rification and elimination, thus throwing imperfection throughout the whole series of vital functions, resulting in more or less disturbance of vital action through the whole organism ; that disturbance of vital action APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 71 being in proportion to the amount of imperfection in these several processes effected by these several vital functions. But this is not all the evil thus resulting. There being much more food received into the alimentary cavity than can be disposed of, by incorporation with the several tissues, they are obliged in order to shield the vital organs from immediate destruction to dispose of that surplus material by an adipose arrangement, and lodgment of the same, in connection with the gene- ral mesh-work of the organism, — some of it being dis- tributed along the internal surface of membranes, or beneath the skin, and some beneath the abdominal muscles, and around the heart and kindeys, and other organs. The mesh-work of the tissues of some organs are much less adapted for adipose deposite than others. This is true of the brain, eye, ear, nose and lungs. Hence in an excessive, accumulation and general deposite of adipose mat- ter through the organism, such matter when brought to the mucous membrane of the lungs, exudes through the minute pores of that surface, and is gathered up on the opposite or air-exposed surface of that membrane, and by a convulsive effort of the lungs, ejected through the windpipe into the oral cavity, and thence thrown out, as phlegmatic spittle. Similar matter is also deposited in, and ejected from the nostrils. All of which results from a deposition of adipose matter along the tissues whose embra ing mesh-work is not sufficiently extensible, as to hold in its connection such adipose matter, or whose embracing mesh-work cannot be thus extended and 72 THE SCIENCE OF MAN freighted without immediate danger to their own vital functions. And thus by a general deposition of adi- pose matter through the tissues of the organism, all parts become more or less diseased, as vital action is invariably more or less disturbed, according to the accumulation of such surplus matter among the tis- sues of the organism. But the evil does not end here. By this reception of improper kind and quality of food into the alimen- tary cavity, the great equilibrium of vital forces through the organism, is not only greatly disturbed for the time being, but if those dietetic errors become habitual, it finally becomes entirely broken up, and an abnormal centre of action becomes established. In- stead of a full, free, and equal flow of vitality through the whole organism, it becomes habitually concentrat- ed in the gastro-intestinal region, thus leaving in external organs barely sufficient to feebly carry on their own functions. This gastro-intestinal concentra- tion of vital forces becomes, in such derangement, requisite in order to aid the over-tasked organs, and in order to dispose of the fearfully accumulating materia], in such a manner as to prevent immediate destruction to the whole organism. The vital republic is now in a condition analogous to that of a civil republic be- sieged by a hostile force. All its available resources are spent in resistance to the foe, — leaving none to be spent in social enjoyments and internal improve- ments. Vitality becomes detracted from the external, and centered on the internal. While the true order of things which God has established, is that the inter- nal shall subserve the external, thus throwing the high APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 73 and true pleasures of existence on the exertion of the external, and the others only subserving to this end. But here the great order of Nature and Nature's God, has become reversed, and life is expended mainly in eating and drinking, and perverted sensualism. Whatever mental, and moral, and physical energies remain, are all pressed into servitude. All natural dietetic habitude becomes broken up. The appetite becomes irregular, fastidious, and exorbitant in its de- mands : sometimes constant and tormenting in its cravings, without the least regard to the nutritive wants of the body, and often urging on to frequent and fatal indulgence. And the person may fancy himself about to die for the want of food, while at the same time he may be almost on the point of dying from repletion. These perverted dietetic habitudes being once estab- lished, the condition of the whole organism becomes greatly depraved, and hence constantly exposed to sudden and dangerous disease. It is already diseased throughout, and all that is requisite to kindle up that disease into a form immediately dangerous to life, is some slight casualty, and the work is done. And while the previous and habitually deranged condition of the general organism, was the cause of disease and death to the person, the slight casualty was only an occasion of its final development. It not only takes years to live, but frequently and generally it takes years to die. Life will maintain a partial supremacy over opposing forces and depraved habits, sometimes for years, at least as long as there is any possible hope of reform or benefit to the transgressor. And its last 74 THE SCIENCE OF MAN convulsive effort is frequently like that of desperate Samson between the huge pillars. Life will hold its sway within the organic temple, through many a scene repulsive to its nature ; but when the vital forces finally say, "Let us depart," that temple is soon in ruins. It is any easy matter for perverted sensualism to trifle with life, but beyond all possibility for that sensualism to save itself, when that sacred boon is on its final de- parture. Man is a bundle of habits ; and when those habits are all depraved, he is a bundle of depravities, and hence of dangers. He is like a meteor, by its own ac- tion, gathering in combustibles for its own explosive destruction. If man would remain to shine as a star, he must gather to himself solidities, and not combus- tibles. He must, by obedience to the vital laws of his organism, gather to himself a rich fund of life, and then nothing can destroy him. True, he will at length drop his organic tenement, but that embodied vitality is in itself immortality. The soul only drops its mate- rial instruments when fairly and honorably worn out, having become eternally enriched by their use: as the mechanic lays aside his tools, after having acquired by their use a princely fortune. There is no safety to life and health, without habit- ual conformity to organic laws. And if habits are wrong, they must be changed. But if one will not thus change, he continues to ruin his own health, and is under constant exposure to a sudden and unnatural loss of life. Still, Nature, in her elastic bend in favor of the transgressor, will do all in her power to save hirn from such misfortune. And hence, when by long and APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 75 constant accumulation of morbific or foreign material, it has become dangerously accumulated through the organism, and more especially in the gastro-intestinal region, the vital forces by a concentated effort through the tissues of the alimentary canal move on with tre- mendous power the vast accumulation of morbific mate- rials along the convolutions of that canal, and thus throw open the flood-gate of egression, and with con- vulsive frequency, pour the tide of death beyond the organism. If the patient is wise, and permits Nature thus freely to relieve herself, and ceases at once from dietetic errors, and judiciously bathes himself in soft water once or twice a day, wipes himself thoroughly dry, and then uses freely a coarse towel or flesh-brush for friction over the surface, and continue to do this for a few days, he will entirely recover from such an attack of the diarrhoea. Let him leave off all narcotic bever- ages, and use plain substantial and wholesome diet, and be regular and temperate in all his habits, and after he has entirely recovered, let him still continue to use the bathing and friction, sufficiently often to keep the skin in a perfectly clean and healthy condition, and let him exercise freely in the open air. If he truthfully fol- lows out this plan, he need not fear. When Nature has fully relieved herself of the unreduced or un- vitalized, and hence morbific materials greatly and dangerously accumulated within her domain, — she will astringe herself, and tone all the tissues to health- ful action again. But if by use of artificial astringents or tonics, the patient, in his impatience, seeks to do this for her, he runs himself into two hazards, — first, 76 THE SCIENCE OF MAN that of producing astringency, before Nature's cathartic has fully done its important work of relieving the organism of morbific materials, and thus preparing the way for a return of healthful vital action ; second, the hazard of poisoning the tissues of the organism, by bringing them into repulsive and dangerous contact with the medicinal substances used for that purpose, and thus rendering his last state much worse than the first. If he is true to himself, by being true to Nature, she will soon relieve him of the first trouble, much more readily and easily than she can from the second. There is much and constant, and often fatal deception in mistaking the pain, and the concentrated and often convulsive efforts by which Nature indicates and en- deavors to throw off morbific materials, — for the cause of the disease. Whereas, these materials, or unvital- ized substances within the organism, are the cause of the whole disturbance of vital action, and the pain is only an indication of the presence of such materials as are non-conducting, and hence repelling and disturb- ing to vitality. The violent efforts of Nature for expelling those morbific materials from the organism, are even requisite for the time being, to save the pa- tient from immediate destruction, and prepare the way for a return of healthful and pleasurable vital action. The patient, therefore, instead of viewing his condition as a vengeful visitation, or arbitrary penal infliction, should consider that Nature is doing her very best to save him. And if he will not impede her benevolent design towards him, but keep himself in an aptitude for her own curative work, by means already referred to, and to be presented in other parts of this work, he APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 77 need not despair of ultimate relief from pain and suf- fering, and restoration to health and enjoyment. Vital action disturbed by a wrong condition of the organism, when considered in relation to truly natural and healthful and pleasurable vital action, such as exists when the organism is in its right condition, — is in all curative diseases, health-tending, and although in re lation to the patient's present enjoyment, it is disease, being destructive to that enjoyment, yet considered in relation to the future, that action is right, inasmuch as it tends to clear away obstructions to future healthful action. Let us now consider a variation or increase of the disturbance of vital action, resulting from similar obstructions in the organism. Suppose that accumu- lation of unvitalized material along the alimentary canal, instead of being from such food, as when taken in proper time and in proper manner, and proper quantity, might have been comparatively wholesome, is from food containing a very large proportion of oily matter, as when fat meat and butter are freely used. All kinds of nutritive matter contain some oily matter in their structure, as the thin investment of each kernel of grain, and the envelope of each apple, orange, peach, &c. The bilious secretion of the liver was designed to act as an alkali on this small portion of oily matter, contained in such nutritive material, and thus convert it into a saponaceous substance, and thus render it soluble by the pancreatic fluid, and also in neutralizing the acid qualities of the food, and thus rendering it perfectly soluble by the solvent secretions, and thus reducible by the lacteal and pulmonary 7 78 THE SCIENCE OF MAN function to perfectly vitalized blood. In the truth of Nature, therefore, the bilious secretion is de- signed to act by its alkaline properties, on the acids and small quantity of oily matter in and about the innutritious portion of the food. In healthful action this secretion is, through the biliary duct, poured into the duodenum, where also the pancreatic secretion is poured through the pancreatic duct, and here being blended with the food, acts on the acid and oily por- tion of it, and is thus expended, producing no ri;anner of disturbance to vital action. But in the case before us, the contents of the ali- mentary cavity, having in mixture an unusually large and unnatural portion of oily matter, call for a corres- pondingly large and unnatural secretion of bile, to meet the exigency of the case, caused by dietetic errors referred to; and thus, there is poured into the dt.ode- num, and thence often thrown up through the pylorus into the stomach, a large amount of bile, to aid that or- gan, in impartially chymifying its unmanageable mass, and becomes also diffused throughout the lower convo- lutions of the small intestine, and sometimes through the colon, trying to render soluble the acid, and oily and chaotic mass, and thus fit it for reduction to the fluids and solids of the body, and for expulsion from the organism. And thus the whole gastro-intestinal region becomes a kind of extensive saponaceous fac- tory, whose busy operations are indicated in the organ- ism, by griping, and often excruciating pains through all tliat region. This kind of disease is termed the bilious colic. When it becomes extremely severe, Nature not only throws open the gate of organic APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 79 dismission, in the manner already described, but also reverses the action of the gate of admission, and thus uses it as a gate of emission, in throwing up, like the deep heaving of volcanic action, the accumulated death, and thus expelling it from the organism. When the disease amounts lo such severity of action, it is usually termed the cholera morbus, being character- ized by a large flow of bile, in the manner I have described. What I have said in relation to the treat- ment of the diarrhoea, holds here equally true. The patient should be reclined in as easy a position as pos- sible ; and if the disturbance amounts to severe con- vulsions, and detracts so much vitality from external parts, as to leave the surface cold and pallid, attending friends should employ the time intermediate to those convulsions, in brisk and careful friction with the hands, along the surface and limbs of the patient. The use of the living hand in producing that fric- tion, is far better than that of flannel or any other un- vitalized substance. For it not only produces the friction, but also communicates a portion of vitality to the parts of the patient with which it comes in contact. It is analogous to the contact of two electrical conduc- tors, the one fully charged with electricity, the other but slightly charged,— the fulness of the one imparts to the deficiency of the other. This principle of vital conduction and transmission and communication, is the same as that by which diseases were cured eighteen centuries ago. Indeed it has been acted on in some cases with success, in modern times. Nearly every one knows that the very best way for recovery from cases of drowning, is, as soon as the water can 80 THE SCIENCE OF MAN be forced from the lungs, so as to remove the mechani- cal obstruction to their action, to bring the patient into close embrace with a strong and healthy man, whose animal heat and vital power soon become com- municated to the cold and powerless organism. Vital heat and power gradually become diffused through the tissues of that organism, the lungs inspire, the heart moves, the eyes open, he lives again. And though the clogged machinery moves painfully and feebly at first, yet vital action, by its own power of increase, soon sets all to rights again, and fills up that organism with a new fund of vital power. If, however, the heart or lungs, or any main organ, whose function is essential to earthly existence, should by disease or any external violence, become so disorganized as to break up the series of vital conductors composing the organ- ism, such a restoration to life could not be effected. The principle of vital friction in the treatment of the sick, is of great importance, and to it I shall refer on future occasions. Let us now suppose that this accumulation of unvi- talized material, along the gastro-intestinal region, to have become still greater, so much so, as not only to induce general derangement along the surface of the ali- mentary cavity, but also to throw direct and complete derangement on the function of the liver. Its functional power has become suspended, by the disordered con- dition of its tissues, caused by previous over-exertion, in its excessively large, bilious, and excretory secre- tions ; the bilious secretion being requisite for the partial solution of such an accumulation of the acid, oily and chaotic mass, in the intestinal region, — and APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 81 the excretory secretion being requisite, to purify or thoroughly carbonize the dark blood, so as to produce calorification on its elimination through the pulmonary surface. Here then is the two-fold function of a large organ, almost, if not entirely, suspended. What must be the result ? First, the chaotic mass of unvitalized material along the alimentary canal, have no longer the aid of the bilious secretion for reducing the intractable mass, by solution of its acid, and oily and acrid qualities, and hence the whole surface of the alimentary cavity, in contact with these qualities, becomes excessively inflamed, producing at once, the most intense thirst and the most excruciating pains along the gastro-intestinal region. Meanwhile, the mucous membrane, along the entire surface of the alimentary canal, secretes a serous fluid, the acridity of which, corresponds with that of the crude and fiery mass with which it is brought in contact. This acrid fluid is exhaled in copious showers, all along the inter- nal surface of the alimentary cavity, to protect that surface in its bitter contact with the inflamed mass, and if possible, to diffuse through the whole a solvent deluge for reducing the morbid chaos. This constant secretion and exhalation from the mucous membrane of the alimentary cavity, keep up a constant and ex- cessive thirst. The vital forces from other parts of the organism become concentrated in the gastro-intes- tinal region. Nature throws open the gate of organic dismission, and reverses action through that of admis- sion, and thus, with tremendous power, commences her emetic and cathartic process, for freeing the organ- 7* 82 THE SCIENCE OF MAN ism from impending ruin. The deep convulsive action, into which the tissues of the alimentary cavity are brought by a concentration of vital forces there, to aid in this great organic battle between life and death, or of organism against disorganism, — is reflected with tremendous energy through the whole system. All he muscles are thrown into painful spasmodic action. The features of the face become fearfully distorted, and rapidly wasted away; the eyes sunken, dry and 'vacant; the lips and tongue, and oral surface become parched and livid ; the upper and lower extremities are thrown into convulsive action. The heart beats hur- riedly and feebly and intermittently. The arterial and venous functions, are but imperfectly, languidly carried on. Meanwhile the excretory secretion of the liver being also suspended, the dark blood is no longer car- bonized for vital calorification and elimination. Here then are two other fearful evils. The dark blood coming to the eliminating pulmonary surface, (it hav- ing already been driven from the external surface) en- tirely uncarbonized, is wholly unfit for vital combus- tion and its consequent elimination. And hence there is no animal heat produced. And the worn-out parti- cles of the dark blood, usually eliminated by that pro cess, are now retained in the blood, and sent back, full freighted with death to the agonized and deeply agita- ted heart, thence to be distributed in streams of sluggish, livid death through the organism. The svhole external surface becomes extremely pale, and deadly eojd, and covered with clammy moisture. The brain, participating in the general organic disturbance, APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 83 throws the mind into the deepest anxiety and des- pondency. And anarchy, horrid, deep and constant, reigns through the organism. This is spasmodic cholera. It is vital action greatly and fearfully disturbed, by the presence of unvitalized material along the surface of the alimen- tary canal, together with a temporary suspension of the two-fold function of the liver. And this state of things is invariably induced by a previous course of dietetic error, and other wrong habits consequent on such a course. And when the organism is thus brought into this state of derangement, the slightest external casualty may " slip the cable," and spread the canvass, to a full storm of wrath. And unless a skilful hand stands at the wheel of that organic ship, she runs a fearful hazard of being dashed against the rocks, or otherwise completely wrecked and lost. The main symptoms of the cholera are such as I have described. The violence and duration of the attack will be greater or less, according to the previous degree of derangement in the condition of the organ- ism, and its return or a fatal relapse depend mainly on the mode of treatment. But what shall be done in such a case ? The vital functions are all prostrated, and ruin threatens. And yet there is possibility of recovery in most, if not every case, if the patient could rightly ap- preciate his own condition, so as to trust himself to a right mode of cure. But, alas ! the panic and conster- nation of the moment, combined with the force of pre- vious habits and fallacious notions as to the nature of disease and proper mode of cure, are such as to drive him at once, into a quick consummation of his 84 THE SCIENCE OF MAN ruin. Here stand the laudanum, and brandy, and nos- trums, &c, like so many outlets to perdition, to flow the liquid death into the fearfully diseased organism to complete its destruction ! Medicine, ever of ruinous tendency, is ruin itself in cholera cases. The diseased organism already forced to the brink of destruction, requires only a push, and all is over. And medicine will readily finish the work that disease has begun. These two antagonisms to life, go hand in hand in the work of ruin. The latest born of the two, however, does by far the greatest work. The one slays its thou- sands, the other its tens of thousands, and still cries, " Give, give." O God ! arrest the destroyer. Nature has already opened the orifices of the ali- mentary canal, and through them, with tremendous power and frequency, is discharging the foreign freight of death, for the benevolent purpose of saving the organism from immediate destruction. In such a state of things, should any one seek to close the hatch-ways of that organic ship, and thus retain all that dangerous freight below ? If he does, farewell to hope ! and hail, horrors, hail! and thou, profoundest grave! re- ceive thy new possessor! But if the patient and his surrounding friends or attendants will act like rational beings, and thus secure whatever possibility there may be of recovery, let the following course be pursued : Let the patient be reclined in as favorable a position as possible for nature's convulsive efforts in relieving herself. Let the excessive thirst of the patient be met by drinking pure, soft water moderately, and at stated periods, whose frequency must measurably correspond with the severity of the thirst and violence of the at- APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 85 tack. It requires, however, great judiciousness of treatment in this respect. The internal organs may be so deluged with the watery element, as to relapse their remaining energies of vital action, and thus impede Nature in her curative work. Whatever of danger, however, may arise from the use of the pure element, is inconceivably less than that invariably attending the use, internally or externally, of any medicinal subsiance. Pure soft water, therefore, may be used both internally and externally, with considerable freedom and benefit and safety, in cholera cases. The external application, however, should be a little deferred, till the violence of the spasms and internal action shall have partially sub- sided. Meanwhile, the temporary intervals should be employed by manual friction over the external surface and limbs, thus aiding the deranged and almost sus- pended circulation beneath the surface, and restoring, partially, animal heat and vitality to the skin and extre- mities. If the skin is freighted with impurities, as is usual in cholera cases, let the patient, as soon as the violence of the convulsions has sufficiently subsided as to permit, be immersed in a tepid bath, and by a mo- derate use of good soap along the external surface, thoroughly cleanse the skin from impurities, and thus fit it to resume vital action in calorification and elimi- nation. Meanwhile, if Nature's emetic and cathartic process have not been impeded, till having effected their full disgorgement of morbific freight, they will induce their own astringency and tonic condition, and thus prepare the way for a return of healthful vital action throughout the organism. In severe cases, brisk and careful manual friction over the surface 6 THE SCIENCE OF MAN and limbs, may be indispensable to the recovery of the patient. And such superficial friction by the living hand should in no case be neglected. Directly after tepid bathing, 'he whole surface of the body should be carefully and thoroughly wiped with a towel, thus leav- ing the skin clean and dry, and afterwards manual fric- tion successively and successfully applied. If this mode of treatment is strictly adhered to, the vital functions of the several organs will be gradually resumed. The liver will recover from its paralyzed condition, and commence anew its bilious, and excretory secre- tion, for digestion, and purifying or carbonizing the dark blood, for calorification and elimination, and thus animal heat and bright red arterial blood be again pro- duced. The lungs and heart will resume their former firm and regular action, and the arteries and veins, their usual contractions, and the organics and lympha- tics, resume their constant labor of accretion and decretion, and general order restored through the organism. And when the patient recovers.in the way I have pointed out, he may come again into the enjoy- ment of perfect health, and by pursuing a correct regi- men, avoid all future danger from similar attacks, and retain his health to a good old age. If in attacks of the cholera, a physician is called, let him be one of the right order. Let him not be one of those diplomatic drones, or ignorant quacks with which our nation is so abundantly cursed : one, into whose enshrouded mind an idea seldom creeps, and then it comes cold, dead, and beamless from the formulas of the Materia Medica, (Death's Recipe Book,) or glares luridly there, reflected from the tartarean fumes of APPLIED to epidemics. 87 some Cayenne Depository. If you value life, call not such a physician. If such an one is bent on having a fee—fee him doubly, for his absence. Life can pro- duce an abundance of fees, and any and every truly desirable possession : but when life is lost, all is gone. Better not employ any bungler where life is at stake. But let that physician be one of Nature's true nobility, whose diplomacy has not deprived him of human sym- pathy, whose pathological views have been gathered in from the broad, rich, and flowing fields of true science. In short, let that physician be a truly sensi- ble, scientific, intelligent, and honest man. The pre- sence of such a physician, is a treasure to any patient, and of immense value to any community. Indeed, such physicians are among God's own chosen vessels for saving and blessing the world. True to their call- ing, they will watch, control, and direct the morbific storm, and thus co-operate with Nature, in at length dispersing the gloomy clouds that have rolled so fear- fully through the organic horizon, and restoring the bright sunshine of health to the troubled soul. If this mode of treatment is truthfully carried out, within twenty-four or forty-eight hours, from the time of attack, the patient will find himself in tolerable, sounding condition again. He will, of course, feel weak and much exhausted. But if he entirely avoids all stimulating substances, and pursues a correct regi- men as to diet, cleanliness, exercise, &c, he will find his physical, mental, and moial powers gradually re- turning to him, and at length possess them in the fullest vigor and enjoyment. I am fully persuaded that scarcely any cholera cases would be lost, if treated in 88 THE SCIENCE OF MAN this manner. The desperation of cases so common in this, and other diseases, arises mainly, if not entirely, from the wrong modes of treatment used in such cases. When Nature throws pain and disturbance through the organism, she means something thereby. And that important something is this: she will save, unless all her benevolent designs and efforts are counteracted, instead of being co-operated with, by circumstantial action. " He that is wise, is wise for himself," &c. As to prevention of cholera, the method is plain, consistent, and rational: obedience to the organic laws of the human body. These include diet, cleanliness, exercise, pure air, and chastity. Proper diet implies that the food received be of proper quality, quantity, and received in proper manner, that is, the several functions, as the oral, gastric, intestinal, lacteal, pul- monary, and colon, are severally and successively, perfectly performed. A proper quality of food is furnished by the farinaceous grains, when of sound and plump berry, and these perfectly cleaned, and properly and recently ground, and rightly made into bread, to be used at proper times and quantities for the suste- nance of the body. Such bread used with pure, soft water, or with wholesome fruits, when perfectly ripe and sound, furnish the very best dietetic material, of which man can avail himself, for his own health, comfort and safety, and continuance of vitality and true enjoyment. Animal food, improper vegetable food, such as the wilted or partially decayed vegetables and fruits of commerce, should be entirely excluded. If animal food be entirely and forever abandoned, a proper farinaceous and fruit diet will soon be found far APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 89 more conducive to our individual health and comfort and pleasure, and all the social enjoyments of life. Imported fruits, such as oranges and dried figs and grapes, &c, should be entirely disused. Such fruit in its own climate, and plucked fresh and ripe from the tree, would be entirely wholesome food. But when plucked immaturely, and boxed up and transported, wilting and blighting and decay soon take possession, thus rendering them wholly unfit for dietetic use. There is another species of fruit, such as the various nuts imported, which do not become so readily and deeply affected. The consistence of their structure is such as measurably to retain their vegetable organism for a long time. In this respect they resemble the grains, which, if properly protected from external heat and moisture, will retain their organism for years, and sometimes for centuries. These, therefore, may be used with considerable safety, if they are used as a portion of the regular diet, either with or directly after regular meals. Indeed, nothing should be eaten for the mere pleasure of eating, but to replenish the struc- tures of the body, and the gustatory pleasure is then a natural attendant. Twice or thrice a day is as fre- quently as any well person ought to eat, and too often when one is sick. " The more you nourish a dis- eased body, the worse you make it," is the truthful saying of some one. The more labor you put to disordered machinery, the more danger there is of complete ruin. A diseased organism, requires more vitality in its tissues, rather than increase of material in those tissues. " The flesh killeth, but the spirit maketh alive." That is, the material organism, unless 8 90 THE SCIENCE OF MAN held in all its tissues, under the direct, constant and powerful control of vitality, tends fast to dissolution. The healthy tissues of the body, should be sufficiently replenished with proper material, to meet ihe natural wear caused by vital action. Whatsoever is more than this cometh of evil, and tends constantly to disease and death. Voluntary exercise should be such as to give full and free action throughout the vascular system, thus retaining all the tissues of the organism, in a right con- dition for healthful vital action. Such exercise should be regular, and taken as much as may be, in the open air, where the two great respiratory surfaces may come in free contact with the pure element, for producing a flow of animal heat throughout the organism, and for complete elimination, by that means, of all the worn- out material composing the dark blood. For this end, clothing should be loosely worn, that the external res- piratory surface may freely as possible come in contact with the oxygen of the air, and thus render its due share of aid, in producing with the lungs the general and im- portant function of vital calorification, or animal heat. To keep the skin perfectly clean, and thus in a fit condi- tion for a discharge of its respiratory function, a sponge, or shower-bath should be daily used, or at least thrice or twice a week. And directly after each, a coarse towel should be freely used over ihe surface. This not only promotes healthful cutaneous action, but also that of subjacent tissues, by each of which mode* it largely contributes to the general health. The air, in contact with the internal and external surface, should be kept pure. Sitting rooms, and dormitories, should APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 91 be well ventilated. In relation to feather beds, they should be forever disused by all who value life or health. The feathers composing that bed,are all dead animal matter, and hence all so many unchanged con- ductors of vitality which are constantly conducting oft" vitality from the body or bodies which they embrace. The contents of feather beds are fit for nothing but one general conflagration. They are exceedingly injurious to those comparatively well, and still more so to the sick. To'consign a patient to the constant embrace of a feather bed, is enough to destroy him, even if the drugging and dosing were dispensed with. Cotton mattresses and beds of clean, well cured straw should be substituted in their place. Chastity is of the utmost importance as a preven- tive of disease, and greaily promotive of the general health. It implies purity of heart and action, or con- formity to the organic law of reproduction. And this restricts to such use of those organs as mainly corres- ponds with the ohject for which they were established among the other organs. There must be harmony of action through the whole organism, or evil will result sooner or later, and, perhaps, full fatal when it comes. Unfrequency must hold here, so as mainly to comply with Nature's order, or there can be no safety to health. Nature may bear up awhile under transgression, but the storm accumulates, about to burst with ten-fold vengeance on reckless and greatly perverted indulg- ence. Nor is there any thing arbitrary or unjust in this matter. The highest and noblest and best condi- tion of our natures, requires subordination of less func- tions to the greater, and when such subordination is 92 THE SCIENCE OF MAN maintained, all are pure and pleasurable, and promotive of our temporal and eternal good. But when the reins fall into the hands of lust and sensuality, all are en- slaved, perverted, ruined. Civil legality cannot sus- pend Nature's law in this matter. The wise will be a law unto themselves. True connubial pleasures are lost, when perverted sensualism rules. Unnatural fre- quency results in debasement of feeling and repulsion of all true social enjoyment. Conformity to Nature's truth, promotes constant and lasting affection, and finds embraces without debasement. Beauty and health cannot long live under sensual despotism. Both endure under Nature's restriction. Matrimonial selfish- ness is destructive, not only to health, but to all true domestic happiness. " A word to the wise is suffi- cient ; " and " to the pure all things are pure," while " eyes full of adultery and fornication " will generate to themselves pollution and destruction, from every thing with which their fiery rolling orbs come in con- tact. In short, to promote general health, and thus pre- vent disease, and secure the highest welfare and en- joyment of which humanity is susceptible, all the organic laws, or those constitutionally established in human nature, must be mainly complied with, and truthfully observed. And such conformity never induces servitude, but invariably true freedom, and real, constant, and constantly increasing pleasure, till resulting in permanently embodied vitality, and con- sequently everlasting pleasure. God never trifles with the works of his power and goodness. When he calls upon rational beings irrationally inclined, to re- APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 93 renounce perverted and life-repelling pleasures, he holds out to them a universe of true pleasure, of which before they were not conscious. He calls to life and true interest. There is no possibility of deception, to an honest inquirer after truth. The bright fields of life are rich, flowing and boundless. Whoever will, may come and freely partake. An infinitude of vi- tality, cannot be lessened by any number of individual vital impartations. The Fountain is inexhaustible. The full-blown flowers and celestial fruits immortal bloom, and drop ambrosia all around that Fountain. Drink deeply, and pluck freely. But if your previous transgressions have thrown you among the thorns, you should not repine, if the tenacious things should trouble you awhile, and tend to impede your way to that clear and flowing Fountain. When arrived there, all will be safety, freedom, and happiness. 8* 94 THE SCIENCE OF MAN LECTURE III. Fever Epidemics.— A new Febrile Theory.—Cause of all Fevers. — Febrile Modifications. — Extirpation of the whole Febrile Tree. — Mundane Forces. — Four Kinds of Combustion. — Full Theory of Animal Heat. — Pleasurable Respiration, compared with Difficult. — Invalid Delusion. — Modus Operandi of Fev- ers.— True Mode of Febrile Treatment.— Means of Prevention. — Delusion. — Diplomacy, Right and Wrong. — Fever and Chills, or, Fever and Ague. —How Caused and Cured. — Na- ture of Spasmodic Action Generally. — Instances.— External Means for Preventing Epidemics. Another kind of epidemic, I propose briefly to treat, is the Fever Epidemic This more commonlv prevails in the Southern and South-Western portions of our country. But, even in our own rock-bound and mountainous, and partially sea-begirt New Eng- land, and our lake-bordered and imbosomed, and river-channeled New York, and lake and river begirt Ohio, — this epidemic, under some of its varied forms, sometimes holds fearful and fatal sway, — unnerving and prostrating the strength of our land ; — often causing the rose of beauty to fade, and bursting asun- der the ties of Nature, and weaving winding-sheets to human hopes of happiness. All fevers are but modifications of one general form of disease — all are but branches of the same applied to epidemics. 95 febrile trunk. If, therefore, we effectually use the axe on this trunk with its roots, the whole tree must fall, and its spreading branches and leaves and twigs no longer interpose their broad-cast shadow between the sun-source of true happiness and real pleasure, and the human race. Fever is an accumulation of animal heat in the tissues of the organism. Attend- ing circumstances modify that accumulation of animal heat, and thus give to it type or peculiar symptoms, which determine the kind of fever. Thus in some cases of fever, an accumulation of oily acid, and acrid material, along the alimentary canal, causes an un- usual secretion and flow of bile ; and this with all its vitalized alkaline properties cannot sufficiently act on the chaotic mass of unvitalized material, as to ren- der it soluble by the gastric and pancreatic fluids, and hence that bile enters, not a neutralized substance as in healthful vital action, but with all its alkaline pro- perties, into the arterial circulation, and thus becomes diffused throughout the organism. Such a state of things attending a fever, gives it that form termed bilious, and is analogous to that stage of disease in another form, called bilious colic or cholera mor- bus, already treated. Again, in a still farther derang- ed state of the organism, the secretion and flow of bile become, by a disordered state of the hepatic tis- sues, temporarily suspended, which suspension leaves the imperfectly formed chyme, to be but crudely form- ed into chyle, and this to be but wretchedly formed into dull, heavy arterial blood, and this diffused throughout the organism, tinges all the tissues with a sallow, pallid hue. Such a state of things attending 96 THE SCIENCE OF MAN a fever gives to it that form termed yellow, and is analogous to that stage of disease in another form, called the cholera, already treated. Fever, in this and kindred forms, has more of the immediate danger usually attending epidemics, than other lesser forms of febrile disease. Yet all are more or less destruc- tive to human happiness ; and one form of febrile dis- ease, unless arrested in its course, often leads into some of the more dangerous forms, and thus eventu- ally produces death. Hence every form of febrile disease should be traced back to its cause, and thus, at length, the febrile tree, roots, trunk, and branches, be completely demolished and burned ; and thus the consumer of human happiness, be itself consumed,— the destroyer of health and beauty and longevity, be itself destroyed, and thus untimely death recoil upon itself and die ; and instead of suffusing human hearts and cheeks, with bitter feelings, and scalding tears of arguish, leave those hearts soothed to peace, to beat in joyous freedom, and cheeks bathed in tears of joy, to clear away in smiles, and settle into the calm sun- shine of constant and enduring pleasure. To form a correct idea of febrile action it is requi- site to understand the true theory of animal heat, or vital calorification, of which I have measurably treated in speaking of vital functions. To render the subject more easily understood, it may be expedient here briefly, to state some principles, which I intend fully to treat in another work. And firs: as to the origin or production of heat of any kind. All heat invariably results from a union of oxygen with carbon. Primordial atoms, or such as constitute the APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 97 essential or basis of all material things, are forced into a few general arrangements called elements, and by a combination of these few elements, all material sub- stances are formed. That element called oxygen combines extensively with other elements, in forming the triform, liquid and solid formations composing our globe. Oxygen as it exists in the air, is in a state of more freedom for combination with the other elements, than it is as it exists in liquids, and with more freedom in these than in solids. Though what I said in relation to carbon, when treating of vital calorification, holds equally true here, — that is, an element exists as such only, when entirely uncombined with other elements. The moment elements combine they entirely lose their individuality, and become merged in a compound, where, strictly speaking, they do not exist, as oxygen, hydrogen, carbon, &c, but as entirely a new substance, possessing a new name and new qualities. When, therefore, we speak of oxygen or carbon, or other element, as it exists in compounds, we mean only such material particles, as on a reduc- tion of that compound, resolve themselves into that elementary state, in which they again form oxygen, or carbon, or other element. All material things are held in their several condi- tions, by several agencies, by which primordial atoms are forced into what are termed the elements of matter, and then these forced into various combinations, by which elementary and aggregate combinations, all material things are what they are. The great force forming and sustaining all mundane solids, is the mag- netic, which in its extension to all liquid and gaseous 98 THE SCIENCE OF MAN formations, enveloping the earth, and in its extension, and reciprocal action with other distant orbs dispersed through the celestial deep, is called the attractive force, — this being the result of magnetic power as exerted in pressing matter into a solid state, and hold- ing it there in large masses for spheroidal formations, whose surfaces shall be embraced by liquid and gas- eous forms of matter, and thus fitted up as a basis for the abode of vegetable and animal existence. While the magnetic force acts directly on mundane solids, in forming and holding each solid in its own condition or arrangement, and all in their several conditions, and binding all together into one spheroidal mass, it acts indirectly on all liquid and gaseous formations, as well as on all vegetable and animal structures, in holding them on the surface of that solid spheroidal mass. But the liquid and aeriform substances on the surface of the earth, are formed and sustained by another force, called electricity. This agency pervades the liquids and seriform substances, in and about the earth, and thus instead of permitting all material things to become merged into solids, it holds back a portion of matter in the liquid and gaseous states, thus forming an atmos- phere and water. Electricity, thus resisting the supre- macy of magnetism, creates, along the confines of the two belligerent forces, by the friction thus produced,a new arrangement of particles, composing its own de- partment of matter and this new arrangement induces an agency to its aid, in resisting the magnetic force ; and that agency thus induced, is heat. This agent, by a diffusion of its own arrangement of material par- ticles through the atmosphere, or through liquids, be- APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 99 comes itself thus diffused thrdugh them all. Again, the action of this agency on aeriform and liquid sub- stances, throws those particles into still another ar- rangement, in which condition they will conduct not only electricity and heat, but another agency, called light. And thus these three agencies; electricity, heat and light, by their combined action on liquid and aeriform substances, hold a portion of matter in their several conditions, and thus resist the magnetic force that tends constantly to draw all material things into solid formations. And thus by their constant counter- action to magnetism, they permit only a gradual for- mation of solids, such as is requisite to meet that slow and constant wear caused in those solids, by their own action from the magnetic force. While the aeriform and liquid fluids are supplied by constant appropria- tions, to its upper atmospheric strata, of primordial atoms, radiated from the upper strata of the solar at- mospheric surface. Having thus briefly stated the general operation of these mundane agencies, we are prepared to under- stand the modus operandi of heat production generally, and then of vital calorification. Carbon exists exten- sively in the solid formations of the earth, as in beds of coal, and in various crystallizations. The magnetic force draws every thing in and on and about the earth towards its centre. Hence the oxygen of the air all along the surface of the earth, is drawn into close con- tact with the carbon of its solid formations, and thus made to combine with it in the production of that arrangement of matter fitted to heat-conduction or action. This agent then sweeps through its own 100 THE SCIENCE OF MAN arrangement of those material particles, and is thus diffused throughout the whole, and also produces a co- incident arrangement of the same particles, by which the agency of light is almost simultaneously induced through the same. The result of this slow and gradual combustion, caused by a union of the oxygen of the air with the carbon of the solid formations of the earth, is the production of light and heat along the hemispherical surface of the earth, presented in constant succession to the radiations of the solar surface. Hence we have heat and light, and an absence of the same, or day and night in constant succession. The solar agency, in producing this state of things, is merely radiation of particles from the upper strata of the sun's atmosphere, to the terrestrial atmosphere ; by which radiation those solar particles are brought within the magnetic influ- ence of the earth, which tends to draw them directly to its solid surface. But by the restraining power of electricity, those solar particles are held back and forced into combination with atmospheric particles, but still when thus combined and restrained, they come to the earth's surface with force sufficient to compel a union of the oxygen of the air with the superficial car- bon of terrestrial solids, and thus produce, all along that hemispherical surface of the earth, presented to the solar radiations, a heat, and light arrangement of matter, thus inducing and diffusing heat and light through the atmosphere. This union of atmospheric oxygen and the carbon of mundane solids, may be termed natural combustion. It results in the produc- tion of heat and light along the surface of earth, and in the generation of a small quantity of carbonic acid APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. gas, which being heavier than the air, settles in equal diffusion all along the surface of the earth, and in deep caverns, and thus becomes innoxious to vegetable and animal existence, while in their own proper localities on the earth's surface. There is another kind of combustion, resulting from the same principle of union of atmospheric oxygen with the carbon of solids, which may be termed artifi- cial combustion. When such an arrangement of mi- neral substances, or of reduced or carbonized vegetable, or animal substances, is made as that by friction, there is forced a union between the oxygen of the air and the carbon of those substances, the result is an aeriform compound, having such two-fold arrangement of par- ticles as to produce both heat and light, and hence the diffusion of these agencies all through the atmosphere where such an arrangement of aeriform particles is caused. By the first arrangement caused by that fric- tion, heat is produced, and by the second, the aeriform mass is made to conduct not only heat, but light also. In the day time, such an arrangement of aeriform par- ticles, caused by artificial combustion, is so much less, both in quantity and inferior in quality to the perfection of that caused by natural combustion, that the heat and light produced thereby are but contiguously perceptible. But in the absence of natural combustion, or that caused by the radiation of solar particles to the earth, such artificial combustion shines with apparent bril- liancy through surrounding obscurity. There is still another kind of combustion resulting from the same principle of oxygenic and carbonic union. Every tree and plant and structure composing the vegetable king- 9 THE SCIENCE OF MAN dom, is constantly presenting through its surface of leaves and bark, its reduced carbon, or such as slowly and gradually results from the constant wear of its in- ternal structures in carrying on the functions of vege- table life. Every tree and plant takes in through its minute radical absorbents, such liquid material, as, by the action of these absorbents, becomes elaborat- ed into vegetable sap, from which are formed, by different arrangements, all the solids of the tree. On the other hand, such particles composing those vegeta- ble solids, as become unfit for further action of ve- getable life, are taken up by minute vegetable absorb- ents, and conveyed to the surface and to the leaves of that tree or plant, and thence brought as reduced car- bon into contact with the oxygen of the air, and thus is generated heat; and by the conduction of these parts there is diffused through the whole a proper temperature for the action of vegetable life through all its structures. This may be called vegetable calorifi- cation. Every animal organism is in all its tissues furnished with a set of minute organs for composing those tissues by appropriations from the arterial blood, and another corresponding set of minute organs distributed to all those tissues, for taking up such particles as have be- come so worn by vital action, as to be unfit for further use in those tissues, and reduces them to a fluid state, and flows them into the venous capillaries, where, being secreted from by glandular organs, as the kid- neys, through their ganglionic distributions connected with the veins and venous capillaries, the particles, forming that dark blood, become thoroughly carbo- APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. lUu nized, and thus presented all along the external sur- face, where this fluid carbon comes in contact with the oxygen of the air, and thus produces animal heat all along that surface. Meanwhile, the dark blood formed from the solids, lying deeper in from the exter- nal surface, and that formed from the tissues of inter- nal organs, is gathered up in like manner by the veins, and secreted from by the liver, through its set of lymphatic glands, and thus it becomes also thoroughly carbonized, and then sent on to the mucous membrane of the lungs, through the extensive surface of which, this fluid carbon comes in contact with the oxygen of the air, and thus produces through the whole extent, animal heat. This heat being thus constantly gene- rated through the external surface of the skin and mucous membrane of the lungs, is by healthy tissues, easily and rapidly conducted through every part of the organism, thus retaining in all its tissues such a tem- perature as best fits them for vital action. Dispersed all along on the external skin, there are numerous and extremely minute pores. These minute pores are out- lets to small sacs, reaching internally through the skin, and presenting themselves to the venous capillaries lying imbedded all along among the subjacent tissues. Through these venous capillaries, the fluid carbon is brought into close contact with these thin sacs inflated with air, and thus the oxygen of the air is constantly combining with the carbon of the dark blood all along the external surface, thus producing animal heat, and throwing off, in a vaporized state, thiough all these pores, the carbonic acid gas generated I y such com- bustion. These follicles or small air-sacs, along the 104 THE SCIENCE OF MAN surface of the skin, correspond in structure and func- tion with the air-cells into which the mucous membrane of the lungs is arranged. This membrane is formed on its air-exposed surface, by an expansion of the two branches of the wind-pipe, into numerous branches and minute ramifications, terminating in small air-cells, or sacs, similar to those lying along beneath the pores of the skin. These air-cells are embraced on the opposite surface of that membrane by the minute ter- mination of the branches of the pulmonary artery, send- ing off two large branches, one to the right and the other to the left lung, and these subdividing into smaller branches and twigs, dispersed over the whole internal surface of that membrane. Here the dark blood from the heart is brought into contact with the oxygen of the air, and thus produces calorification and elimina- tion for internal organs and parts, while the skin is doing the same for parts immediately subjacent to itself. The external skin is similar in structure and function to the mucous membrane of the lungs, with the exception that the skin being more exposed to ex- ternal influence and contact, is of more substantial make than the mucous membrane of the lungs, that being designed for contact with the air alone. And whoever understands the structure and function of the external skin, let him transfer his knowledge to that of the internal skin also, and then he knows both, without the labor or repulsion of dissections. The air is in constant contact with the mucous membrane of the lungs, as it is, or ought to be with the external skin. That is, clothing should be loosely worn, so as to secure as free access of air as possible, to the whole external APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. loc surface. Each expiration removes a layer of air in direct contact with the mucous membrane of the lungs, and each inspiration draws in a corresponding layer of fresh air. In healthful, vital action, inspiration is slow and deep, and sends a thrill of pleasure through the whole organism. But from improper quantity and quality of food and drink, respiration becomes exceedingly hur- ried, and often laborious and painful. Said a Southern lady, as she was lifted carefully from her splendid car- riage by a waiter on each side, — " Oh, heaven ! what a hard world this is to live in ! " while the placid, plump features of her plainly fed waiters seemed to say, not so hard after all ! Here high living, or rather low living, and neglect of exercise had brought the the lady into such a state of debility, that it doubtless had become hard work for her even to breathe ; and if, by any possible means, the respiratory function could have been performed for her by another, that important, though troublesome function, would, doubt- less, have been transferred to some faithful, curly- headed functionary, to whom, perhaps, she might safely have committed that office. The greatest work is not always the hardest labor. Fine and robust health, render what might have seemed a Herculean task, both easy and pleasurable. Plain and abstemious and regular living, and daily or tri-weekly ablutions in soft water, and free exertion in the pure air, will, in a few weeks or months, nerve one up to a buoyant tone of vital action and enjoyment, of which before he had no conception. Such a course makes the weak strong, and the strong stronger, and all happy and contented with their condition. If you talk to a gormandizer 9* * ^u THE SCIENCE OF MAN about the pleasure of eating, he may partially appre- ciate your meaning; but if you talk to him about the pleasure of breathing, it becomes all Hebrew to him. His respiratory apparatus has labored so extremely hard for years to save him from immediate destruction, that it has become hard work for him to breathe, and he views it as such, and labors on with the tiring func- tion, because he must either breathe, or die, and as a choice between the two evils, he laboriously respires on, till some vital function essential to life, gives away, and out of life he falls; and if his pockets were well lined, the newspapers will puff him out before the world, as having been mysteriously and providentially, and suddenly and unfortunately taken away. Truly, every man must have his own reward. " A man's life consists not in the abundance of things which he possesses." It is deplorable that mankind do not rightly under- stand the capabilities of their own nature, — of the wonderful vital functions, by which their terrestrial existence is continued. The invalid shivering over the stove or warm fire, and closely housed, does not per- haps even suspect that by judiciously training himself, he could swell out those relaxed and emaciated nerves and muscles, into the full bloom and enjoyment of youthful life ; and that internal and external surface, instead of shrinking at the very thought of the cool air, would become so invigorated as to court the flow- ing breeze, and rejoice at the frosty gems and wintry flakes and playful storm. That keen and painful sus- ceptibility, now usually felt from external cold, arises entirely from a bad condition of the two great calorific APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. lOi surfaces of the body, and from the imperfectly carbon- ized material, presented to those surfaces for calorifi- cation and elimination. And these both arise from wrong dietetic habits, neglect of cleanliness and pro- per exercise, and other perverted habits, following in that long and ruinous train. It is deplorable that a function so vitally important to all the other functions, should be so little understood. That man should know so many other things before knowing how to breathe ! Respiration must be slow and deep, instead of quick and partial. The dark blood must be well carbonized, and calorification and elimination will be perfect, and the bright red arterial blood perfectly formed, and healthfully and pleasurably distributed to all parts of the organism, reflecting full and free and buoyant action, on all the physical, mental, and moral powers — thus filling the whole being with an over- flowing heaven. This is no romancing. The highest ideas the human mind can form of pleasure, are more than a hundred-fold met by the reality. God made man to be happy ; and those who would glorify Him by obeying His will, must live in such a manner as to be happy — constantly and increasingly so. — Live for true and natural and lasting pleasure. This is the true philosophy of life. Wretchedness and misery are antagonisms to human nature. The true will not submit to despotism. Every noble soul will have true freedom and enjoyment. The tyranny of sin, such a soul disdains and repels. We have briefly considered four kinds of combus- tion — natural, artificial, vegetable, and vital, — all resulting from the union of oxygen and carbon, and 108 THE SCIENCE OF MAN producing and diffusing heat, and generating a portion of carbonic acid gas, this being greater or less accord- ing to the quantity of carbon consumed, or forced into combination with the oxygen of the air. Vital combustion should be well understood. Its relation to other functions, is such, that it must be well per- formed or the whole vital economy must suffer. Proper elimination of worn-out materials from the body, depends directly on vital calorification. A de- rangement of this function results in common fevers, as also in those of an epidemic character. In health- ful vita! calorification, there is produced all along the two calorific surfaces, a constant supply of animal heat, and this, by the easy and rapid conduction of healthful tissues, is equally diffused through the whole organism, thus retaining in all the tissues such a tem- perature, as best fits them for vital action. While things remain in this condition, the person is not con- scious of the ordinary range of winter cold, or summer heat, or to sudden changes in the atmosphere, but maintains his own equilibrium of temperature, in full supremacy over external heat or cold. His own ca- lorific power renders him complete master of surround- ing temperatures. He stands as on a rock, indifferent as to the peace or war of surrounding elements. They may smile or frown, and touch at and around him, but him they cannot injure. His own internal vitality is complete repulsion to all external attacks. Vital power protects and composure rules. But when, by a long course of dietetic and other consequent errors, the calorific function has become very much disordered, the person becomes painfully APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 109 susceptible to the slightest changes of the atmosphere, and suffers extremely from winter cold and summer heat. The person thus affected, seeks to remedy the evil, by closely housing himself, and warming himself by artificial heat, and thick and heavy clothing, and heated sleeping rooms, &c. But this all tends con- stantly to make bad worse. And the further such a course is pursued, the more will be the shivering and suffering. Let the patient act like a rational being, and commence a plain, abstemious and regular way of living, daily bathing and friction and out-door exertion, and he will feel his calorific function so much increas- ed, that he will feel himself luxuriantly entertained by the war of elements, that before were such a terror to him, and in winter find himself completely protected from the severity of cold, and in summer find himself inclosed, as by a fire-proof safe, from scorching suns and heated atmospheres. Amid surrounding cold he keeps warm, amid surrounding heat he " keeps cool." He renders himself inaccessible to all febrile action, as well as to ague action, the state opposite to febrile. Improper quality and quantity of food, by throwing imperfection through the several vital processes, pro- duces improper quality and quantity of carbon through the two calorific and eliminating surfaces. That is, the carbon is blended with impurities, and is much more than is required by the calorific function, for producing and maintaining the proper temperature of the body. Here then are two evils : first, the crudi- ties among the carbon, not being in combustible con- dition, do not combine with the oxygen of the air, and thus become reduced to that aeriform or vaporized no THE SCIENCE OF MAN state, fitting them for elimination through the thin air-cells of the skin and lungs, and thus leaves them to find their way into the arterial circulation : second, there being still an excessive quantity of carbon on hand, through the calorific and eliminating surfaces, it combines with the oxygen of the air, and thus pro- duces throughout both of these surfaces, an excessive quantity of animal heat. Meanwhile, the crudities of unreduced carbon, being left in the blood, pass into the arterial circulation, and thus become distributed to the tissues of the organism, like a quantity of wretch- edly damaged material furnished for repairing a house, tending only to make the rent worse. These become lodged among the tissues of the organism, thus render- ing those tissues but imperfect conductors of vitality. Electricity, heat, or any other agent in the material world, acts with perfection, only on such substances as are perfect conductors, to these several agencies. Electricity, when flowing on perfect electrical conduc- tors, acts evenly, uniformly, and safely. So also with heat on perfect heat-conductors, it acts with a flame, steady, constant, even and safe. But present non- conducting substances to either of these agents, and violent, overwhelming, and often fearfully destructive action results. This same principle holds in vital action and heat. While the tissues of the bread the\ habitually use, as also national prospL.ity by the quality of the bread mostly in use through that nation. The common practice of flouring, and packing farina- ceous meals, is a most pernicious one, and highly de- trimental to our welfare as families, communities, and 180 THE SCIENCE OF MAN a nation. Wheat, corn, and all other kinds of grain raised for domestic and commercial use, should inva- riably be packed in barrels or boxes, as grain, instead of flour. And then it can be transported to any sec- tion of our country, or to a foreign country, and afford a wholesome article of diet to the purchaser, who can himself see to its being ground, according as he may wish to use it. It is far better not to have grain ground till near the time of its use, as it is better fitted, when recently ground, to the nutritive wants of the living organism, than after it has remained, and been considerably acted upon by atmospheric agency. Every person who wishes to enjoy health, life, and true comfort, and promote his highest temporal and future prosperity, should be certain that the bread he uses is of a good quality. He should know its mate- rial constituents, and the mode of its constitution. Bread-making is an art which above all others should be conducted on the principles of sound science. Would not an ancient prophet's exhortative remon- strance apply to the people of this, and other cities of our republic. " Wherefore do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your strength for that which satisfieth not ? " &.c. The bread manu- factured by the public bakers in England is not that inferior article or vile trash, called bread in this country. I have tasted of as good bread manufactured by bakers in England, as is usually our domestic bread, and often superior. The reason is obvious. There they obtain their flour fresh, and that usually manufactured from clean wheat, and convert it into bread, without putting in those puffing, and often poisonous ingredients fre- APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 181 quently used by the bakers of our own country. The best article, I ever saw in this country, of commercial bread, was that manufactured by some English bakers in one of our large Western towns. They understood well their business, and usually secured the very best flour in the market, and were careful and neat in its manufacture, and thus usually furnished a very good article of bread, especially when compared with that puff-ball trash usually manufactured in this country. There must be a decided reform in the quality of bread used in this country, or health, joy, peace, plea- sure and beauty will soon have completely fled our nation. As to the use of bulbous roots, or such as grow under the ground, I am persuaded that they are im- proper for human diet. They are fitted only for such species of the granivorous animals, whose facial expan- sion is pioneered by an organic plowshare, for rooting in the ground, and thus bringing these bulbous pro- ductions into nasal and oral contact. One would na- turally suppose, that the potatoe disease, which has for several years, swept through the civic world, should have ere this persuaded the human race of the unfitness of that production for human aliment. But man is ever slow to learn any thing to his own good. When pota- toes are raised on very light, new soil, they might be comparatively harmless, when plainly cooked and used with good bread. And this, perhaps, may also be said of beets, carrots, and some other sub-soil productions. But as a general rule, things that grow above the ground, or super-soil productions, are the articles de- signed by the Creator for the use of man. Melons and 182 THE SCIENCE OF MAN other vinous productions, when perfectly ripe, and used at regular meal times, and in temperate quantities, are wholesome. Cabbage and green cucumbers are fitted only for green stomachs, that could endure grazing with Nebuchadnezzar, without any inconvenience, ex- cept that of cropping the hair and nails very often. Leeks, onions, &c, belong very naturally to the flesh- pots of Egypt, and should never be used by those who wish to attain to the terrestrial Canaan of organic per- fection and happiness. And what possible excuse can a human being render for using such trash for diet, when the fair bosom of our mother earth produces such a rich variety and abundance of wholesome grains and fruits ? Nature requires but little, and that little should be the very best that the bosom of our mother earth extends to us. Man must seek happiness and entertainment from the healthful action of a perfect organism, rather than waste his life in tampering his taste with every possible form, into which nutritive sub- tances can be forced, without immediate destruction to his organism. Man can exist with much ease and profit and plea- sure to himself and others, wherever he can have a pure atmosphere to breathe, good houses to dwell in, pure soft water to drink, and yearly raise enough of sound wholesome grain to meet his yearly wants. Then if his climate will admit of fruit cultivation, let him improve it, and thus make their wholesome juices mainly to supersede the use of water as a drink. It is nevertheless true, that by how much man may depart from his own natural climate, by so much he subjects himself to inconveniences. But as happiness is the APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 183 sole object for which God has imparted existence to man and the lower orders of animal creation, it is fully evident that wherever man can secure that rich boon of his being, he should be content, whether in equatorial regions, or in remote latitudes. Whenever and wher- ever organic laws are mainly obeyed, there is a paradise, whether on burning deserts of tropical regions, or on the arctic highlands of frosty Greeeland, or locked in the embrace of a Lapland winter. It is the man that mainly makes the external world what it is. A truth- ful man or woman makes a paradise any where. While a false man or woman reflect their falsity on everything around, and would soon convert an Eden into Hades. Eden-making consists in healthful vital action, induced by a right condition of vital organism, and this last is secured by obedience to organic laws. But while this is the only true paradise, there are many false para- dises, all bordering on the confines of perdition. For God in forming the human organism as a reservoir for one vast ocean of true pleasure, did it in such perfec- tion of architecture, that even under wide transgres- sion, a kind of diseased pleasure will linger about the chaotic mass of organic ruins. And hence those deeply involved in dietetic errors, and destructive habits of life consequent on such errors, will almost invariably feel a sort of pleasure, even to the very brink of ruin, and the last transgression that precipitates them off the deep abyss of temporal ruin, is often under the spasmodic throes of diseased pleasure. Thus showing that God has so formed Nature, that she will eke out the very last dregs, even of diseased pleasure, to her deluded, transgressing offspring. 184 THE SCIENCE OF MAN The voluntary habits of every human being, deter- mine the kind of paradise to that being. And as is the man or woman, so will be his or her paradise. Truth- ful voluntary habits make a true man or woman, and vice versa. And a true man or woman make a true paradise, and a false man or woman make a false paradise. Hence, there are as many different kinds of paradise in the world, as there are different volun- tary habits in different individuals. A heavy, Dutch lout conceives of no other paradise than that of his own bulky dimensions, in an easy posture reclined, his upper prolongation, that was meant for a head, being constantly involved in clouds of curling smoke from his beloved pipe, together with a plentiful supply of acidi- fied cabbage, meat, bread, &c. An English epicure's paradise is his own dear self, in nicely adjusted broad- cloth, with his lumber locomotives closely invested in long whites, and shining calf and brilliant fastenings, and a corresponding attire throughout; and then that dear self thus attired, paraded before a table, heavily freighted with roast beef, mutton, veal, (like seeks its like) and puddings, pies, porter, ale, &c. A Parisian paradise is a combination of ornaments, wine, lewd- ness, infidelity, and civil rows. A Turkish paradise is a turban, cushion, opium, coffee, and a seraglio of beau- tiful captives. And thus on, of other Eastern nations, according to their several pe uliarities. An American paradise is a corrupting abundance to eat, drink, and wear, and of speculative promptitude. Hence, we find that every human being has a paradise to his or her own liking. But the infelicity attending these false paradises, is, that each gathers to itself such explosive APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 185 materials, that the first thunder-storm of truth, that rolls through the horizon, sends forth its forked, swift messengers, to purify the moral atmosphere, and com- pletely explodes and burns up these corruptible para- dises of false pleasure, and thus sweeps them out of the moral horizon, that honest men may breathe with free- dom and safety. But whoever gathers about himself, or rather develops from himself a paradise of true plea- sure, is entirely safe. There is nothing about to draw the fatal flash. Individual fancies embody forth Edens to individual likings. If a person's fancy is chastened and fully har- monized with truth, the ideal Eden will be a correct one, if not, a false one, more or less so, according to the greater or less degree of falsity in fanciful distortion. Hence, the beau ideal of truth, is the harbinger to the full practice of truth. And a false ideal of pleasure, is the harbinger to the practice of false pleasure. That Eden enjoyed by primitive man, has received a variety of distortions from disordered fancies. And, hence, we often find bound in with our ancient Sacred Writings, the most flagrant, fanciful, pictorial dis- tortions : a man and woman in not very chaste or symmetrical proportions, and these closely besieged by a troop of lions, tigers, elephants, rhinoceroses, wolves, bears, foxes, cattle, sheep, ourang-outangs, monkeys, serpents, fowls, squirrels, &c, all in helter- skelter sport about their king and queen ! Just as if there ever was a time when the whole animal creation were pent into one small space in some equatorial re- gion ! All the lower orders of animal creation have each their own separate paradise, but never blended in 16 186 THE SCIENCE OF MAN Nature's order with that of man. Nevertheless, every one to his fancy in these matters. Distortions, by con- stant familiarity, often become very dear things. A person who, from some sudden accident, finds himself with a hugely deformed nasal protuberance, would, at first mirror-reflection, start back with horror ! But by constant familiarity with his deformity, at length falls into suasion that it is pretty good, after all, and feels the greatest vexation, if any one should dare to call in question his facial comeliness ! This principle holds in all fanciful distortions. Distorted Fancy ! Empress of such minds, As lodgment find in brains disordered quite, Yet bent on scenes that might be holy all, Angelic scenes ! where Heaven and Earth may smile, And harmonize in adoration true and deep : Thy pencil, harpy-like, pollution drops On every thing it touches ! Beauty was, But is no more : its vestige last is swept, By touch of thine, from off the tablet of The soul, and paper leaves and canvas soiled ! Alas ! thy touch destructive stops not here, But gathers round a purer head and paints, And chisels out a huge perversion wild, Of form ascribed to holy Nazarene ! And spreads them out in parlors, churches rich ! And panoramas vast, to public gaze, To fill the mind with crude ideas of Christ, And worship him as dead and not as live In heaven ! But Folly rules the world, and who Should dare to speak? unless for social state, Somewhat advanced in this our modern age, The daring soul that truthful speaks to free The world from evils worst, would share the fate Of ancient friends to man, and pour their blood Through hands they earnest loved and meant to bless ! Hail, Social Order ! harbinger of peace And lasting good ! thy olive-branch extend, APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 187 Till earth one brotherhood become, and throw Its growing shade o'er all the human race ! O Christ! thou hast thy beauty true To truthful, mental eye, that needs no touch, Distorted Fancy gives ! Thou art as thus, The beau ideal of immortal Truth, The image true of the eternal God ! Reflect thy truth in full on man again, And sway these false christs from the face of earth. For many lords, and gods, and christs have filled The world, since pressed by holy feet of thine ! All dead ! and petrified, or putrefied ! To first, the eagles gather, — to the last The buzzards fly, and strike their talons deep! Columbia ! long have thy banners waved To iron-hearted Sin ! and long thy proud And rising eagles struggled with their freight Of petrifactions from those ages dark ! From putrefactions of the Eastern world, Thou hast, in noble pride, broke off thyself, And shook thy banners from their tainted fumes! But still, alas ! those folds develop sin, When truthless hands get hold their staff, and drag Them to disgrace, and martial gods at helm ! From lords, and gods, and christs, that petrify, Now free thyself, and give to truth thy sway, And serve the living God and living Christ. The Palace Caesars ruled did bow to Him ; Why not Columbia's ? Thy eagles then Would soar in solar light, and scatter leaves From tree of life, to heal the nations round! And bless the world with freedom true and large. Moral goodness is the crowning excellence of human nature. It consists in the right feeling and action of all the moral powers. But a right condition and ex- ertion of these, together with that of the mental pow- ers, depends directly on a right condition of the brain and its nervous expansion over the organism, and 188 THE SCIENCE OF MAN sympathetically upon a right condition of the little brain or central mass of the nerves of organic life, and its special and subordinate centres, and their nervous expansion to the whole vascular system, and viscera of the body, and also upon the general soundness of the several tissues of the organism. But this ex- ceedingly delicate nervous tissue extending through, and closely interwoven with, all the other organic tis- sues, and as prime vital medium, presiding over all the the vital functions of the organism, — is more suscep- tible to direct injury from pernicious substances receiv- ed into the alimentary cavity, than any other tissue. Substances are frequently taken into that cavity, on which the digestive organs can effect no manner of change whatever, for reducing them to any of the tissues of the organism. In such an emergency, the mucous or inner coat of the alimentary cavity secretes an un- usual amount of mucus along its surface, and thus reduces those indigestibles to a fluid state, and in this condition they enter the circulation, retaining through the whole, their foreign character, being entirely unre- ducible to any of the tissues of the body, and hence greatly irritating and disturbing and sometimes com- pletely destroying the vital conduction of the tissues with which they are brought in contact, by deranging more or less, or completely destroying the texture of the parts. This is true of all mineral substances received into the alimentary cavity, either as medicine or seasoning material, as the muriate of soda, or common salt. A man's reason, if he will use it, tells him at once that such a substance as salt, cannot, by any possible APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 189 action of the digestive organs, be converted into any of the tissues of the body. There is an instance on ancient record, of the tissues of a human organism being converted into a pillar of salt; but she died forthwith. And yet, the dietetic use of salt by the human race, has become so extensive and universal, that unless Nature's vitality exerted itself with severe and constant labor, to maintain supremacy amid the "briny" mass of languishing and half-mineralized tissues of the body, I verily believe, we should find our public buildings, streets, and highways completely blocked up by modern pillars of salt. Vitality dreads to see its tissues saltify, and will resist the sharp crys- tallization, as long as possible. But when those tissues are thrown entirely beyond its control, the process goes rapidly on, either in forming a pillar of salt, as in the case of Lot's wife, or in briny barreled masses, as in the case of the lower orders of animals. But when a human organism is bent on salification, vitality will retain its hold on its irritated tissues as long as possible, and call loudly and constantly on Neptune for a bap- tismal deluge of the pure element, to break up the stiff crystallizing process. Nature's order and beauty will have only vital crystallization going on within the organic domain. Then she will show her pure gems of bone, cartilage, ligament, tendon, muscle, nerve, membrane, &c, in their full perfection of beauty. Salt crystallization, and that of minerals generally, she chooses to have carried on exclusively in the mineral world, and leaves her vegetable and animal crystals to be formed, each in its own distinct department. But when mineral, vegetable, and animal crystallizations are 16* 190 THE SCIENCE OF MAN all blended in one department of action, it ruins the beauty, utility, and durability of all. " Salt is good," as a mineral substance, in helping to form the solid structures of our globe, as well as the " briny deep; " but when artificially abstracted from its natural rela- tion or condition, and introduced within the sacred laboratory of life ; it then loses its " savor," or its natural utility, and thus becomes " fit for nothing but to be cast out, and trodden under foot of men," and thus returned to its own proper condition in the mine- ral world. Dietetic use of salt has arisen entirely from those artificial solutions of food in common use, such as soups, puddings, and other culinary mixtures. Who would even think of using salt on a piece of good bread, or on an apple, peach, or melon, &c, for the purpose of increasing its relish ? The ocean holds in solution a large quantity of salt. This increases the specific gravity of its waters, and thus renders them a better sustaining medium for the floating monsters of the deep. But even these do not make a dietetic use of salt, but are only floating in an element holding salt in solution. And if man's external surface were fitted for constant, close contact with water, instead of air, it would be advisable for all the habitual salt-users of civic life, to club together, and form one extensive reservoir, or artificial ocean, and bring along their salt- cellars, and salt-sacks, and salt-barrels, and pour their contents into this extensive reservoir, and then plunge in for a constant and heavy soak in the briny flood. Such an external use of salt in solution, would be far less detrimental to health, than the common dietetic or internal use of salt. Besides, they would be far less APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 191 liable to a sudden transmutation to pillars of salt. For salt never crystallizes, as long as there is fluid enough about to hold it in solution. A person would of course feel at first, a squeamish aversion to such a mode of life, just as a verdant landsman does to a sea-faring life. But let him boldly drive out on ocean's wide do- main, and he will soon overcome all squeamishness, and endure it to a charm, and feel as much at home on the rolling deep, as though he held the Neptunian trident in his own hand. The better way, however, for human beings, is, to treat themselves to a plain, whole- some, substantial, farinaceous and fruit diet, so as entire- ly to preclude any desire for the use of salt as a season- ing material. Salt rheums and bad humors generally in the blood, are more or less caused by the use of salt blended with other anti-organic condiments. I have known of violent cutaneous eruptions being entirely cured within two or three weeks, by an entire disuse of salt, pepper, &c, and using only plain food — and this too, after every nook of diplomatic pill-bags had been searched in vain for a remedy. All kinds of spice are also unreducible to any of the tissues of the body, and hence anti-organic in their na- ture, and therefore should be entirely excluded from diet. They are exceedingly heating to the blood, and disturbing to all the tissues. And whoever understands the true luxury of unperverted taste, does not want their aid to give relish to food. Tea, coffee, tobacco, opium, and alcohol in all its forms, all belong to the same class of non-naturals, or anti-organic substances. Human beings may bear up for a while under their use, but their use tends to constant irritation and 192 THE SCIENCE OF MAN disorganization of the tissues. If their use is restricted and joined with other comparatively abstemious, and active habits of life, the person may live along, perhaps for years, in barely tolerable health and partial enjoy- ment. Nevertheless, the deep-seated mischief is im- perceptibly snapping asunder the cords of health, and thus gradually undermining organic durability. My censorship on these ordinary habits of the world, is only premonitory and remedial in its aim. As a race, we are all involved in the common calamity of a wrong physical, mental, and moral education. And let any of us, when we fully see the nature and tend- ency of such errors, speak out for correction, and cen- sure only as promotive of this end. If a human being after hearing his errors truthfully pointed out to him for his own good, will not renounce them, he is, indeed, blameworthy. But after all, he has much the worst of it himself. True, he deprives his friend of the pleasure of seeing him reformed and truly happy, and enrolled among Nature's Nobility. But he deprives himself the most, by taking such a course as mainly to preclude from his being its richest, noblest, and most enduring pleasures. Let every one, therefore, act with perfect freedom in these matters. " He that is wise, is wise for himself," &c. I do not wish to be understood as supposing that all these forms of non-naturals to be equally injurious to the organism. Tobacco, opium, and alcohol are by far more energetic, other things being equal, than tea and coffee. And yet these last, from their more extensive and general use, very likely produce a far greater amount of evil to the human race than the others, which from their almost universally APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 193 known and admitted evil tendency, are pressed into more partial use. Nor do I wish to be understood as considering all those who use these favorite, but perni- cious beverages, as destitute of good intellectual and moral qualities. But only this, that their use tends to disturb the moral equilibrium of human nature, and to greatly impede the mental powers, and detract from the physical energies — by bringing the nervous tissue, and through that, the other tissues of the organism into a state of bad or imperfect vital conduction, thus caus- ing head-aches, almost constant disquietude, imperfect sleep, and wasting of the physical, mental and moral powers. A well balanced organism, will sometimes maintain considerable integrity of vital functions, for a considerable season, under the pressure of very great disturbances, and thus exhibit considerable moral and intellectual worth, in spite of bad habits. Man should consider that as his being is of Divine origin, that his nature ought to possess perfection in every thing. And instead of priding himself in what of moral and intellectual power he may be able to retain under wrong habits, he should consider that it is his duty, as well as his privilege to possess a full, constant, and con- stantly increasing fund of physical, mental and moral power. And instead of wondering at his own partial smartness under these many errors, he ought to regret that his habits have not been such as to have secured to him a full possession of all noble qualities. True perfection generates no pride, but rather humility. It rests not in ostentation, but in deeds of true philan- thropy. It drinks at the pure fountain of Truth, and is satisfied without proclaiming theoretic perfection to 194 THE SCIENCE OF MAN the world, and thundering the fires of perdition to those who do not profess the same. Mere theoretic perfection is one thing, and practical, quite another. Hypocrites may possess the first, but only true men and women the last. Heaven drops rich blessings in silent dews and showers. The tears of harsh, uni- forming censoriousness, flow forth in thundering cata- racts, — angelic tears of purity and true reform, gather in dew-drops. APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 195 LECTURE VI. The Soul's Temple.— Christian Doctrine, by Precept and Exam- ple. — Immortality, — Modern Perversion. — An Essential Dif- ference between True Christianity or Practical Godliness, and Scholastic Abstractions. — The Clergy Right and Wrong, or their Goodness and Badness. — Their Moral Condition, or Spiritual Soundings, and Reform. — The True among them. — Their Bloom amid Thorny Restrictions. — Angular Points in Scholastic Theology, and Shady Crystallization. — Analysis. — Flaming Swords around the Tree of Life.—Golden Sledge- Hammer for breaking up Shady Crystallization.—Ode to the Spirit of Truth. — Origin of Evil to the Human Race. — Eden State. — Lapsus Hominis.— Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil.—That Forbidden Fruit.—Translation.—Natural Death__ Christ's Resurrection and Ascension. — True Scripture Theory of Resurrection versus its Modern Perversion.— The Compara- tive Merits of the Two Theories. — Visionary Things compared with Realities. — Logic versus Sophistry, or Scripture, Reason, and Nature versus Scholastic Perversion. — Earthen Vessels holding Vitality for Immortal Crystallization. — Ode concerning Fallen and Rising Humanity.— Original Sin. — Covenants___ Ecclesiastical Wine-drinking. — Ordinances. — True Standard of Church-membership. — Literary and Scientific Institutions. — Importance of Self-Science. — Harmony of True Science and Religion, and their Devotees. — Hypocritical Pretenders to each. A True Preacher a God-sent Treasure to the World.— God's Nobility. — Immortality Insured. — Revelation versus Mystery. Atonement, Justification, and Sanctification. — Three Modes of Divine Manifestation. — True Mode of Studying Theology.— Faith in Christ, what it is, and how it saves. — Value of the New Testament, and of the Spirit of Truth, its Grand Interpre- ter. — A Pure Temple Requisite to its Residence. — Ancient Wholesome Dietetic Restrictions versus Modern Folly and Ser vitude. — Individual Vitality from the Great Vital Ocean. — 196 THE SCIENCE OF MAN Religious Reform.—Wrong Views of the Atonement—Intel- lectual Strength joined to Moral Blindness. — Samsonian Brothers of the Reformation. —Their Modus Operandi and Re- sults.—Nullifiers and Nullification.— Conclusion. The soul is accessible only through its organic temple. Its temporal union with that tabernacle, is the only possible medium of temporal or eternal benefit. So God ordains, and fanciful theories cannot make it otherwise. If the soul is to be benefitted, it must be through the medium of its material organism. This principle Christ, when on earth, fully recognized. His efforts were directed to the improvement of the bodies of men, and through these to that of their souls. The bodies of human beings were cured, that their souls might gain the freedom of right action through those bodies. His precepts were, "Go and sin no more." " Take heed that your hearts be not overcharged with surfeiting, and the cares of this life; " ever pointing to living Nature for illustrations of beauty and truth and utility: " Lay up for yourselves treasures in Heaven." " Take no thought for your life as to what ye shall eat and drink, or wherewithal ye shall be clothed ; behold the fowls of the air, and the lilies of the field ; the life is more than meat, (nutriment) and the body than rai- ment." " Seek first the kingdom of heaven, and all these things shall be added to you," &c. The princi- ples I have advocated in this work are, that life is man's universe, the tenure by which he holds himself and every thing in his possession. That if organic laws are obeyed, that life is cdnstantly increasing within the tissues of that organism, till it finally becomes perfectly matured into a glorious spiritual body, as immortal APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 197 in its nature as is the eternal God. And, hence, that a right exertion of vitality through its organism, is in- finitely more important to man than all other things. That a well developed, and symmetrical, healthful body is far more important than the quality of its invest- ment. That man's desires in all temporal things should be regulated by the vital laws of his being. That his happiness should consist in a right exertion of all his powers, and in thus increasing his fund of life into a glorious spiritual body, or in other words, " Laying up his treasure in heaven," by a right improvement of his powers on earth. In short, that the reign or kingdom of heaven consists in obeying all the organic laws of his nature, and thus maturing into immortality. These are all truths, forever established in the nature of things. God has so formed them, and thus they must be. These truths Christ taught to the world, and these truths I have endeavored, with humility and plainness, to expound. Nevertheless, they come in collision with some of the theoretic theology of the age. I was of late, in Convocation Place,— where wave at hand the shades of beauty over paths close pressed by passing feet, — and heard some excellent things. But among these, a sentiment that is neither true, nor beau- tiful, nor useful, only for mischief. It was essentially this : That the Redeemer having accomplished certain things for the world, and entered upon his glory, we could now come and lift up hands, although stained with sin, to God ! Such a doctrine taught not Christ, nor his Apostles. Their code was practical piety, clean hands and holy hearts ; and not theoretic ab- stractions. A man may lift up hands stained with sin 17 198 THE SCIENCE OF MAN to a false god and false christ, but not to the living God and living Christ. The Apostles taught that men were to be benefitted by the life of Christ. The religious teachers of the present age, are, many of them, in the main, honest, intellectual, well-meaning men,— those who sincerely desire to promote the spiritual welfare of the people, and are deserving of the confidence usually reposed in them. Yet some of them do drag into their discourses some most wretched, blundering absurdities, that tend only to evil. The above is a specimen, and that quite a common one. Nevertheless, their general moral precepts are excellent, and would be very salutary in promoting the spiritual welfare of the world — if they would also point out the means by an observance of which, both themselves and their hearers could reduce to full practice those excellent moral precepts. For instance, they hold forth the beauty and utility and duty of purity and spiritu- ality in heart and life ; while, perhaps, both them- selves and their hearers are subject to dietetic and consequent errors of life, that mainly, if not entirely preclude the exercise of those virtues. And thus, Tantalus-like, they are some of them in the waters of life, up to the chin, and yet cannot drink, and with the immortal fruits of the tree of life hanging over their heads, and ambrosia dropping from the drooping boughs — yet they cannot pluck or eat! Not that there is any moral impossibility to their partaking. The waters of the river of life, and the fruits of the tree of life are in rich profusion and extended freedom. But they are tied. Their voluntary habits hold them in constant servitude. These cords they might break, if they would. APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 199 If, in the dignity of those mental and moral powers, with which God has endowed them, they would rise, like Samson from false pleasure's lap, they might with ease, snap asunder those entangling cords, and stand forth, not shorn of their glory and strength, but in the full bloom of mental and moral manhood, and preach the glowing words of living truth, not to restless, drowsy hearers round, but those alert to catch the flowing words of life, and joy, and truth, and heaven. There are others, who, like true and rational men, measurably see and appreciate the important relation which God has established between the material and spiritual of human nature, and who nobly put their knowledge to practice, by yielding obedience to organic laws themselves, and endeavoring to persuade others to the same. These have the true celestial fire of truth, and effect much good to their charge and community, and to the world. And, yet, even these often bloom, like the rose of Sharon, amid surrounding thorns. The sharp, angular points of scholastic theology hem them in on every side. These angular points are a sort of mental crystallization that gathered in from the mists of the dark ages, and settled in about the beau ideal of Truth, as delivered to the world, by Christ and his Apostles. This crystallization is found, on analysis, to consist mainly of dark, repulsive shades, reflected from the dull laboratory of cloistered brains. And, yet, such is the force of mental crystallization, that these mere shades have become condensed into solid crystals of very sharp, angular points. Unfortunately these angular points have settled close around the beau ideal of Truth, like so many flaming swords around the tree 200 THE SCIENCE OF MAN of life, which, by their piercing points, drive mortals from tasting living fruits. And if one should take from Heaven's armory, the golden sledge-hammer of truth, and endeavor to break away these sharp angular points, that the mass of people might approach the tree of life, and pluck, and eat, and live, — why then, indeed, alarm is raised by fearful, blinded, doubting ones, that he, the daring one, does aim the blow at the tree of life itself! The mass of people thus are kept at distance quite. They fear such points. But still these honest, noble ones have thought that these points are somewhat needful, and that none should seek to solve a triangle into unity, and thus they wind and draw themselves through all these points and mysteries, and settle down with crusty gems drawn close around. They shine, and bloom, reflecting light around, and here and there they pluck a rose and toss it to the crowd. But hands that reach, get pricked ! and back are drawn in anguish keen. What! guard the tree of life ! For the sake of crystals formed from shades of sin ! O God ! forbid. Spirit of Truth ! bright mirror of the soul, Who looks in thee, sees truth reflected fair, Sees God himself, and Christ in glory there, And not in rolling clouds of midnight air, Or watching tombs in sombre silence deep, To hold communion strange with rising ghosts; To meet an earthly christ, with crown of gold, With musty roll of record-books on hand ; With many follies marked in black and white, And retinue of shining troop in full, To rally earth, and empty grave-yards of Their heavy freight, and call to sudden life A mass of shaking bones and quivering flesh, APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. And lodge a soul in each ; — and open books, And read accounts, and balance future fate ! And fire the world, and trumpets blow, and keep A jubilee on funeral of earth ! And back victorious march, like prince of earth ! Such christ as this, let worship those who will; Give us the living Christ and living God, Who ever present are, and fill the soul, And mould it into life eternal— full ; And records keep, of joy, and peace, and love ! Who judgment bring, in laws as lasting as His own immortal throne, and Heaven's base. Such gods as dull of memory become, May need a ledger to record accounts ! The living God ! — the Eternal Now needs none. A god of second rate might build a world, And changing then his mind, apply the torch, And see it melt in conflagration grand ! The living God, the same, forever still, Unravels not his work, in manner thus ! But hold, my careless Muse, the sage have found Such things in sacred record, all along The course of time, from cloistered Peter old, To Father Miller, of our modern age ! Each one reflects his features own, from what He reads ! Explosive ones explosion see In every thing around, above, below ! And wilt thou breathe such numbers to My mind, and roll them off at point of pen ? My brain is chrystallized, but not with " points " That guard from tree of life ! and diamond is My pen, and fears no quill, a feather'd one May use to cross my fearless track of truth. Alone I stand, and see the whirling storm Of prejudice, to gather thick and dark, And roll its clouds of dust to bury all ; And vengeance scowl on him who wished to bless. Alone I stand, where tower eagle cliffs Among the clouds, and see the mighty plain Below ! and lo ! an image huge and tall, 202 THE SCIENCE OF MAN Lifts up his golden head and silver arms, And breast, and brazen thighs, and iron legs, And clayey feet! and spreads his shadow wide O'er all the nations round, and holds the rod. He must be son to one that Daniel saw ! O God ! I have it now : here is a stone, That needs but starting, for a sweeping roll, To break that image all to powder fine, And scatter to the winds its crumbled dust, And plant the tree of life where once it stood. This stone is truth ! — all own a share who help To start, and roll. It slowly moves, it turns ! It rolls ! it bounds ! it whirls ! it leaps along The mountain side, like David's sling, in force, Fast breaking for the giant's heavy brow : Still gathers force, and onward firmly sweeps Along the dusty plain, as sent in mood, All opposition full to meet, and break Its way to image huge, and smite it to The earth. It jars, it trembles, heavy falls ! Joy to the earth ! that fearful iron rod No longer sways the nations with its scourge Of smarting sin, and heavy wo, and death. Now grows the tree of life, and spreads abroad Its branches, leaves, and flowers, and fruits, to all The nations of the earth, to heal them full, And bless, and save from every future ill. The seeds of truth, broad-cast, spring up again, And wave their verdure to the stirring breeze ; The golden harvest soon invites the firm And noble hands inured to healthful toil; A truthful band, whose hearts and blades all fear Repel, of tares that grow among the wheat. These tares of error, sown by hostile hands, When honest ones were hushed in night's repose, They gather into bundles from the grain, Collection huge, for bonfire full and grand ! And now the torch of truth, touched to the mass Of sin's combustibles ; and lo ! a blaze Sweeps thro' the whole, like light'ning from the clouds. APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 203 Consumed complete ! no vestige left from all I O Father Miller ! not so bad and dull At prophecy ! but like a Saul of old, When hunting asses, found a prophet's tongue, That told of conflagration grand, and things Deep hidden from the common sinful herd ! Right! right ! in time : a slight mistake in things To be consumed : not the fair earth, but sin On face of earth : like some bright rosy belle, Of features fair, but soiled, by falling in The mire, that only needed wash to make Her smile attractions new : so this fair earth Has gather'd mire of sin on her full brow, And features fair, and bosom deep, that heaves In anguish at the present plague, that rolls Her offspring from her arms fast to the shades. She calls for fire to burn pollution from Her lap, and sweep her surface from all stain. That fire is truth : it burns away the dross Of sin from people of the earth, and leaves An Eden where before were death and hell. " O death, where is thy sting? and grave where is Thy victory ?" The sting of death is sin ; And sin is violated law; and law Is will of God in things established firm, And lasting as his own immortal throne : ■ T is broad, and deep, and wide, thus binding all In union vast, and universal sway Of order, peace, and love, and truth, and heaven , Binds man in every thought, and word, and deed, And yet the largest freedom gives to those Who yield obedience with truthful hearts. Primeval paradise was lost by sin; Regained it is by ceasing from the same : The bowers of Eden wave their beauty still, Inviting all who will, to come and live. Our ancient Sacred Writings, as well as all sound physiological and psychological science, proclaim that all evil originated, and originates to the human race, 204 THE SCIENCE OF MAN from transgressing the laws of their being. Moses, and Homer, and Hesiod, and other ancient writers refer to a previous state of things on earth, poetically termed the " golden age," wherein the human race are repre- sented as dwelling in beautiful groves, and supplying their nutritive wants with fruit plucked from the droop- ing boughs, and reclining on the bosom of their mother earth, through the nocturnal shades, and rising to life and enjoyment on each successive morn. Moses de- scribes a single human pair in this condition, which may be considered as descriptive of the whole race, that existed in pairs and groups, all along those high equatorial regions which were man's original climate. In that state of things the tissues of the human body were as sound, healthful, and perhaps nearly as dura- ble, as those forming the trees composing the groves, beneath whose spreading shades they dwelt. Vital organism being thus perfect, vital action was also, and hence a regular increase of vital power through a long series of years. When that fund of vital power had become fully matured, thus forming a glorious spiritual body, for an existence independent of all materiality, the tissues of the organism being no longer replenished with nutrition, while vital action would still continue even and perfect on all those tissues, till at length that embodied vitality completely wears out those tissues, thus leaving itself a glorious spiritual body in a uni- verse of life. Thus Enoch, Moses, Elijah, Christ, and others, in ancient times left material existence. While Abraham, Tsaac, Jacob, and other ancient worthies, matured into similar spiritual bodies, but instead of completely using up their material organisms by vital APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 205 action, as did the others mentioned, left them fairly and honorably worn out, and were gathered, as to their spiritual bodies, into the same universe of life with the others ; like as a golden harvest ear is plucked from the stalk on which it matured itself, and leaves that stalk withered and fairly worn out in the service of the golden ear. This principle in psychological science, developing the existence of the internal or spiritual body, fully explains the resurrection of Christ, and accounts for the heroism of ancient Christains in meeting death from the hands of their persecutors. The human organism, when its tissues are retained in their proper condition for vital action, finally accumulate such a fund of vital power, or embodied vitality becomes so increased, as to render the destruction of the spiritual or " inner man," completely impossible. Christ, knowing the malignity of the leading ones among the Jewish nation, on account of his teaching the truth to the people, and knowing how that malignity would terminate, told them thus : " Destroy this temple, and in three days I will build it again." That is, kill this body if you will, within three days I will take it up again. This all came to pass. The falsely sanctimonious ones soon had him stretched on the cross. While there, his ma- terial organism was soon brought into such condition as not to be a fit residence for the inner or spiritual man. This last, therefore, leaves that habitation in possession of foes, and hanging on the cross. Divine Providence, however, so orders things, that the body should not be materially injured. " Not a bone was to be broken." At length, at the command of the some- 206 THE SCIENCE OF MAN what humane, though cowardly Roman Governor, that body was committed to the hands of friends. Its wounds were washed, all things adjusted, and deposited in a new tomb. This being at the close of the sixth day of the week, it remained through the seventh, till the beginning of the first (the midnight between our Saturday eve and Sunday morn) when that spirit form, or spiritual body re-entered its former habita- tion, repossessing all its tissues with the fullness of life, and former power of action, and egressing from the prison walls of the tomb, comes forth the bodily living Christ, and exhibits himself to his former disciples and friends. Thus Christ did what he foretold, — reani- mated his material body. But this was mainly for affording a tangible demonstration to his disciples, and through them to the world, of his continued personal existence. He was in every respect the same Christ, a glorious spiritual body, directly after his expiration on the cross, that he was directly after his ascension. And directly on the reassumption, or reanimation of his material body, he was the same bodily as he was be- fore his crucifixion, and was just as capable of a con- tinued bodily residence among them as he was before, as is proved by his eating and drinking among them as formerly. Record states, that having stayed thus bodily or materially invested among them, more or less, for forty days, he, while in their presence and con- versing with them, suddenly vanished from their sight. Yet, his material body did not, as is usually supposed, ascend into the air. But even, constant, full and per- fect vital action on its tissues, at length completely used up their substance, thus leaving the inner or APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 207 spiritual body entirely divested of materiality, which, consequently, precluded him at once from mortal sight. And hence he apparently ascended from the earth. The Greek word parousia, translated coming, means a being present ivith, and has no relation to the con- tingency whether the person is to come back to us, or we go to him. Christ often told his disciples that he would meet them again, and be with them. This assurance was repeated to them by two angelic beings that appeared to them at his departure. By the mode in which he departed from them, by the same mode was he to meet them again. That mode of departure was by a transition from a natural mode of existence to a spiritual. His mode of meeting them, was to be the same. That mode of meeting then, must be by transition from natural to spiritual existence, and hence must mean their passing to him, instead of his coming back to them. For this last would be a mode of pass- ing from spiritual existence to natural existence, which is not the established order of things: first natural, then spiritual, as Paul reasons in that much perverted chapter. The second coming of Christ, as taught in the New Testament, is a being with Christ the second time. So the Apostles taught, and so the ancient Christians believed. They were not so egregiously de- ceived in this matter as some of our modern theologians would have us believe. That " coming of the Lord at hand," so often spoken of, did in reality take place with them. That "being caught up to meet the Lord in the air," did truly come upon them as they succes- sively terminated their earthly existence, and entered on the purely vital or spiritual. " Christ being in the 208 THE SCIENCE OF MAN clouds of heaven with power and great glory," and all similar expressions refer exclusively to the bright glo- ries of his spiritual existence. And his second coming refers to his followers meeting him by passing into the same state. To these, while remaining in their earthly bodies, he is veiled, as far as natural vision is concern- ed. But when they also become divested of material- ity, they find themselves at once in his presence, and that of the spiritual Universe. And he then appears to them as descending from heaven with all his mighty angels. Just as one standing in the darkness of night, sees nothing about him, till on a sudden creation of light, visible forms around seem to start at once into being. And yet these things all existed before, al- though, for want of being in a proper medium, we could not behold them. But as soon as a diffusion of light creates that medium, we behold things clearly. The martyr Stephen when about on the point of exit from the natural body said, " Behold, I see heaven opened, and Jesus standing," &,c. How beautiful an illustration of the doctrine before us, and how different from the gross perversion of that doctrine as held by some in our modern age ! In the year '42, when the fires of Millerism were scorching severely, and spreading wide lunatic shades through our nation, I advanced and advocated this view of the Second Coming of Christ, and of post-mortem Resurrection, as being the true Scripture doctrine, and thus endeavored measurably to resist the flowing tide of fanaticism, and prevent a general crusade about grave-yards and thunder-storms, and save our cotton fabrics from being prematurely manufactured into APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 209 shrouds and ascension robes. The Millerites, for whose special benefit I so earnestly labored, considered me one of those very false prophets spoken of by the Apostle Peter, that were to come in the last days, &c, and in most solemn terms of remonstrance assured me of getting a severe scorching before the close of '43, and of being one of the Devil's own children, &c. The religious epidemic, however, at length partially subsided, and more rational views are beginning to be generally entertained on these subjects. If we are to believe that Christ is coming on a visible cloud, then we must also believe that he will have a crown of gold on his head, and a great sickle in his hand ; and that Gabriel is to have a real trumpet to inflate, &c. It is not only against all true logic to be- lieve such things, but it is a full outrage on the ordin- ary use of language to construe Scripture thus. Moses, in an allegorical signification of the vital unity of husband and wife, represents the man (Adam) as be- ing put into deep sleep, and a *ib extracted from his side, from which was fashioned a woman. This beau- tiful truth of vital unity in organic duality, must be crudely ashed over by our sage literalists, who gravely endeavor to force us into the belief, that man was thus literally thrown into a kind of mesmeric sleep, and while in that state, a piece surgically sliced out of him, and moulded into a woman, like the goddess said to be formed from the brain of Jupiter! Such ideal crudities are hardly excusable in a common reader; how much less then, in some who read Hebrew, and almost dream in Greek and Latin ? But as I before said, fanciful distortions sometimes become very dear 18 210 THE SCIENCE OF MAN things to us. But if any choose to hug such ideal ab surdities themselves, let them have gentility enough not to force them into the embrace of others. Truth- ful minds generate true ideas, and feel repulsion to- wards embracing any but the true. And such minds as are bent on generating ideal illegitimates, are by common law of right, bound to their maintenance, and therefore should keep them in domestic restriction, lest they should annoy others. If one has a true idea, he should let it go abroad. It will be sure to take care of itself, and bring no discredit on its parentage, and eventually do much good to the world. It will shine for itself without any forcing. But when these ideal illegitimates are suffered to run at large, the feeble, noisy, witless things are forever getting into mischief, and causing much trouble to a whole neighborhood, and are always sure to blab their parentage to every one they meet. Unless, therefore, a man's soul is mar- ried to the truth, so as to generate truthful ideas, — he, for his own credit, and the good of the world, had bet- ter keep his ideal offspring closely at home, and pet the dear deformities in the retirements of his own bosom. Ancient Christians were heroic in encountering danger for doing good, because they felt within them- selves the full assurance of immortality. Their sober, temperate, chaste and holy lives were such as to accu- mulate within the tissues of their " earthly tabernacles" such a deep and permanent fund of vitality, that they feared nothing from their foes. What though their foes should destroy their earthly bodies, yet embodied vitality, or their spiritual bodies, could not be reached APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 211 by lions, tigers, sword or flame. It was like breaking an earthen bowl, after its contents had settled into one solid crystal. There was no alarming injury done; for the crystal can exist without the bowl on which it first depended for consolidation. Hence, the martyr could stand at the stake, and while the curling flames arose around him, his own spirit triumphed over that of the flames, like some beautiful bird in an ocean storm, holding itself in full freedom and safety amid the heav- ing billows. A true man nothing can injure. A false man injures himself, and thus throws himself into con- dition to be injured by every thing around him. " Do thyself no harm," and nothing else can. The fruit of that forbidden tree whose taste " Brought death and all our wo," sing truthful Muse : Man's happiness how first he lost, and fell To wretchedness so deep ! where deeper still He falls, till all the joys of life are gone ! Till earth, and all its pleasures pure become To him a chaos wild, repulsive, dark, Where horror deep and rayless bears full sway, And throws its shadows fearful on the soul, Thus wrapping all in shroud of heavy gloom. Till noble man, the rightful lord of earth, Becomes a slave ! a base ignoble slave ! Slave to himself and ev«y thing around ; A sport to all the elements of earth, That pass him round, a helpless, feeble thing, And push him off" the track of life at will, As being made for them to trifle with ; Till man, a wreck of what he was at first, Has gathered in his soul dark thoughts of God, And of himself, and every thing around. Himself he views a mystery deep that none Can read, and wraps himself in haughty mien, And scowls his pride on every thing around. His gastric god, and showy case make up 212 THE SCIENCE OF MAN His world ; with heavy Mammon for the rest: The elements around he views his foes, To blast him helpless from the earth and send Him to the shades ! The winds, he thinks bear freight Full charged with death, to shower disease and wo, At every curling breeze and sweeping blast ! He looks on Nature full of beauty, truth, And God, yet heeds it not. The bright sun pours A flood of light and glory round his path ; His eyes are closed! The waters, air, and earth Are full of melody; he hears it not! So blunt perception has become by sin. Why all this train of heavy evils long ? Adamio sin? or present sin ? or both ? If Adam sinned, he cursed himself, not us ; Unless by stamping us with wrong desires, Which lead us, too, to sin ; and then the curse We pluck ourselves, at option of our own. The day has come when he who sins must bear Himself the load, and tread the thorny path Alone, and brook the frowns of Universe, And bear repulsive stamp of sin on brow Of scowling hate, and wrathful pride, and scorn. Humility Divine must wear the palm Of victory, and noble truthful mien, And stand the day of deep and searching truth; The day that burns as oven, now has come ; All proud and haughty things as stubble be, Before devouring flame, both deep and wide, That rolls the chaff of sin in volumes thick Of blaze and smoke, from face of earth. The clouds clear way : and lo ! the sunshine, full Of truth, and life, and joy, and peace now fill Horizon, where were dark and heavy fogs Of sin, Egyptian plagues, that wasted earth, And made a charnel-house where Eden blooms. Ye friends of Truth, awake ! the time to act Is now ! the golden harvest waves and calls For hands to reap and gather lasting wealth. Man's departure from primitive truth, or as theolo- APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 213 gians would say, his fall from the Adamic state, was caused by a transgression of those laws of relation by which man's earthly being is closely interwoven with that of the material Universe about him. And that transgression was, doubtless, the partaking of some substance as food, which was not fitted or designed by his Creator for his use. The punishment that followed was not an arbitrary infliction for moral disobedience, considered apart from its necessary physical results. But the punishment came in this manner: The partaking of that wrong substance caused derangement in the physical nature, and through that, as a natural result, derangement in the moral nature — this last being in- variably modified in its condition by that of the former. God has established this relation in the nature of things, and thus it must be. And if scholastic theology chooses to mystify plain, scientific and Scriptural truths, it must draw the curtains of mist about its own shaded brow, and bless itself in its own obscurity. The world must and will have light and freedom. However, minds of noble, moral and intellectual bend, who have been, unfortunately, somewhat crystallized by those " angular points," will, doubtless, seize hold of some golden sledge hammer from Heaven's Armory, and entirely break away those sharp incrustations, and thus leave the rosy crystals of immortality to sparkle in their own celestial splendor, and beauty, and truth. These are Divinely chosen vessels for pouring the tide of salvation over the earth. They are messengers sent from the bright portals of immortality, to gather in a golden harvest from the earth, and scatter the seeds of future Edens all over the human world. 18* 214 THE SCIENCE OF MAN Whatever of total depravity pervades the human race, arises entirely from perverted voluntary habits of life. These habits, as far as they have been fixed upon us by hereditary transmission and wrong education, are, as far as we are concerned, an original tendency to sin. But as far as we cherish those voluntary habits, after we know their evil effects on our physical, mental, and moral nature, they become our own sin, and can- not in any manner free us from personal responsibility, by being referred to Adamic, Abrahamic, or any sub- sequent covenants to the human race. God in Christ revealed one sure and extensive covenant to man. And that covenant is conditioned thus, obey and live: " Cease to do evil, learn to do well." "Do unto others, as ye would that they should do unto youP '■'•Love God and thy neighbor, and treasure up eternal life." But says the abstract moralist or religionist, " These are all moral qualities, whereas you are con- stantly blending the physical, mental and moral into one code." Hold, my friend, I have not so blended them. God has, in the nature of things; and neither you nor I can alter what God has established. I do not wish a change; for I see that God has done all things well, and, hence, it is the very best for man's true welfare, that things should be constitutionally just what they are. It becomes us both, therefore, with humble and truthful minds, to endeavor to ascertain the constitutional nature of things, and especially that of humanity, that we may benefit ourselves and those around us. If a man drink a glass of brandy, will he be a moral man under its operation ? Will he be a dutiful son, APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 215 an affectionate brother, a kind husband, a tender father, or a good citizen ? All respond, No ! If he uses alcohol in any of its various forms, will it not, more or less, injure him according to the quantity used ? A hesitating Yes, yields the ground. If drink- ing two gills of strong fermented wine, or rather of poisonous mixtures, far worse than New England rum, will make a man a moral culprit, will not drinking one-sixteenth of two gills, or two-sixteenths, or one- eighth of one gill, make him one-eighth of a moral culprit ? Truth says, Yes. If a religious teacher, presiding over a church of two hundred members, call them about him for a supposed enjoined ceremony, and on an average, each drink one-eighth of a gill, allowing that the teacher drinks so little himself, as not to have it reckoned in the account— then all drink two hundred eighths, twenty-five gills, six one-fourth pints, three one-eighth quarts of wine. This renders each member one-eighth of a moral culprit. And these fractional culprits reduced to integrals, make twelve one-half moral culprits out of the whole collec- tion. Supposing this ceremony to be repeated four times a year, it makes then fifty moral culprits during the year. Supposing that religious teacher remains over his charge four years, he then has on hand two hundred moral culprits! Where is his church ? Does he not need recruits ? How long will it take such a band of religious teachers to convert the world to truth and righteousness ? I am gratified to know, however, that there are some honorable exceptions to this state of things in the reli- gious world. And that some, while they honestly and 216 THE SCIENCE OF MAN conscientiously submit to that ceremony, do it in such a manner as not to defile their tabernacles with fer- mented drinks. But the ceremony itself, as used in modern times, has no validity. There has been a complete misunderstanding on this subject, throughout Christendom. Let us consider its origin. Christ was nationally a Jew, and as such, conformed to many Jewish ceremonies, and among these, to that of the Feast of the Passover, commemorating their former de- liverance from Egyptian bondage. This became one of the stated festivals of the Jewish nation. These festivals came in as a part of their ordinary diet. That is, they did not, at these festivals, eat other meals, aside from these festivities, but partook of these, in substitution for their ordinary fare, and thus as meet- ing the ordinary nutritive wants, and were only made an occasion of calling to remembrance former things, and thus promoting the general gratitude of the nation. Christ, directly previous to his apprehension, met his disciples, as usual, not for establishing a new institu- tion or custom, but in conforming to an old one, or one already established. He knowing that it was the last time that he was to meet them at such a festival, says to them, " Do this in remembrance of me." That is, on future occasions, when ye shall meet at this stated festival, in partaking, remember me, your absent friend, until I shall again meet you in that bright spirit land, whither I am about to go, as though to prepare man- sions for your reception. Christ did not establish the custom, but merely told them, on future occasions, in conforming to that custom, to remember him, until they should all meet again in the bright spirit world. APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 217 Supposing that here, in our own New England, that ancient, venerable, yearly festival, called Thanksgiving Day, instead of having degenerated into its present abuse, as Gormandizing Day, remained in its puritanic style of a temperate, joyful, and grateful partaking of the bounties of a smiling Providence ; — and supposing that on such an occasion, a family group have gathered themselves under paternal roof, and that a much esteemed member of that group is about to take his de- parture for a long tour, and stay in the Eastern World. The mutual tears of social affection would gather. Kindred sympathies would flow full towards the one about to depart. At the next anniversary his seat would be vacant; the social circle broken by absence of a beloved one. How natural and truthful, that under such circumstances, the departing one should say, " In partaking of this festival on future occasions, remember me, until we meet again." But supposing these friends, instead of obeying this very truthful precept, by remembering him at the re- turn of each yearly festival, go and establish a thanks- giving day four times a year, and meet merely for that purpose ;—who does not see that the beauty, and order, and utility of the original precept, are merged and lost in its perverted frequency and exclusiveness ? This illustrates the case before us. Indeed, it fell into a similar perversion within forty or fifty years after Christ's ascension. Some, in the Corinthian Church, instead of observing it at such stated intervals as Christ did, in conformity to Jewish custom, had fallen into the habit of meeting expressly for that purpose, without regard to any regularity or dietetic propriety. 218 THE SCIENCE OF MAN Says Paul to them, " When ye come together, there- fore, into one place, this is not to eat the Lord's supper (the regular festival at which Christ requested to be especially remembered). What! have ye not houses to eat and to drink in ? or despise ye the Church of God, and shame them that have not ? What shall I say to you ? shall I praise you in this ? I praise you not." Then speaking of the stated occasion which gave rise to such an observance, he says, "For as often as ye eat this bread, and drink of this cup, ye do shew (put yourselves in remembrance of) the Lord's death, till he come, (till ye meet him in heaven.) Let a man examine himself, (order his conduct in accord- ance with its original observance,) and so let him eat of that bread and drink of that cup. For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily (in non-conformity to its original observance,) eateth and drinketh damnation to himself;" (especially when, in so doing, he uses alcohol, or some worse poison.) " For this cause, many are weak and sickly among you, and many sleep." When that custom was observed, as Christ and His disciples, and Jewish friends observed it, at stated times, and in accordance with their own national in- stitutes, partaking of their wholesome bread and pure wines of Judea, thus receiving with gratitude and true devotion, those temporal blessings, and receiving them as meeting their nutritive wants, it was all right, and in perfect harmony with the laws of man's tempo- ral being. But when people assembled merely or mainly for the purpose of eating or holding a festival, they fell into a gross abuse of the custom. And when, APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 219 as in modern times it is observed, as an abstract spirit- ual ceremony without any regard to, or in direct vio- lation of the physiological laws of the human body, it becomes a still greater perversion, than that which Paul so severely censured in the Corinthian Church, and is indeed an anti-christian ceremony, and detri- mental to true religion, and the social order and welfare of the human race. I entreat my ecclesiastic friends to consider that the living Christ must delight infinitely more, in being remembered by his followers, cultivating his own moral image, and their attaining the full stature of men and women in Christ, than in their drinking all the wines, that sunny France ever produced, or in eating all the finely sliced loaves, that our grain-grow- ing country ever furnished. The living Christ re- quires us to become completely conformed to his own moral image, and hence that of the Eternal God, and thus grow into immortality. And when we do this, we cannot forget Him, but see him constantly as in the bright mirror of a truthful soul. This trusting to external ordinances is all delusion, and a constant lull to sensual sleep. A true man, if he conforms to an external ordinance, that in no way conflicts with his own truthfulness, is not injured thereby. But still all true excellence lies in his own physical, mental, and moral manhood, which God has flowed into his soul in such rich abundance. His rule is, God first, and man next. If the requisitions of man do not conflict with those which God has established in human nature, then he will cheerfully submit to them ; other- wise he will cheerfully and manfully resist them, even 220 THE SCIENCE OF MAN though the sword, or fagot, or imprisonment await him. A true man or woman is afraid of nothing but sin. And rightly; for nothing but sin can essentially injure any one. As the ordinance usually termed the Lord's Supper, had its origin with Jewish national institutes, and was made requisite only on the generation coincident with the waning nationality of that people, it is evident that its extension to this modern age is as unrequisite as was the rite of circumcision to the Gentile converts to Christianity. The noble liberality of Apostolic minds plainly and fully declared that its observance, although admissible to the Jews, was to be entirely optional with the Gentile Christians. If, however, this ordi- nance of the Lord's Supper could be harmonized as to time, quality, and quantity of things used, with physio- logical rectitude, there could be no impropriety in still retaining it, as a visible commemorative of Christ's death and subsequent resurrection and ascension, and as social Christian communion. It should be observed as Christ and his disciples observed it, as a social festi- val meal, and not as an extra ceremonial touch at elements. Wholesome bread and pure unfermented wine, or pure soft water should be used, and as a substitute for a regular meal. If this use of it were made, it would be in harmony with the physiolo- gical and psychological laws of humanity, and hence in accordance with man's highest present and future welfare. The ordinance of baptism rests on a similar foundation. But as this does not usually conflict with human health, but is rather promotive thereof, I shall not here speak of it, any further than co recommend APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 221 daily baptisms in pure soft water, so as to keep the external surface entirely clean, and thereby promote purity and tranquillity of mind, which have great re- compense of reward. " Neatness is next to godliness," said some good adviser. The Greek word ecclesia, the ancient name for church, signifies any public collection, but as used by the ancient disciples of Christ, it signified an assem- blage of Christians. And hence, a household made up of believers, was called a church. If their names were enrolled in the book of life, that was sufficient to church-membership. In truth it was more of a moral organization, than a formal or verbally inscribed one. This should be the case now. All true Chris- tians belong to the same celestial church, whether visi- bly organized into a religious society or not. Moral rectitude is the only true standard of social worth, and should be the only one of membership to any religious society. But moral rectitude requires such a course of physical and mental action, as shall secure its own supremacy and excellence. If a man allows himself in habits, that tend constantly to disturb the moral equilibrium of his nature, he cannot be a strictly moral man. He may approximate to morality and religion, while there is and will be a constant deficiency, until his habits are completely reformed. If a man is censurable for drinking rum, brandy, wine, &c, because it disturbs the equilibrium of his moral nature, by perverting all his powers, and raising them into spasmodic action, and changing friendships to enmity, good feeling to malice, confidence to suspi- cion, love to hate, &c, then is he censurable also for 19 222 THE SCTENCE OF MAN using tobacco, opium, narcotic drinks, and heating condiments, &c, which tend also to constant derange- ment of the tissues of the organism, and hence, to a disturbance of the physical, mental, and moral powers. I am gratified to know, however, that the Clergy gen- erally have used their influence against that pernicious weed, and opium, and against alcohol in large quan- tities. But alas! that small quantity ecclesiastically sanctioned and used, has, I fear, more than neutralized all the good they might otherwise have accomplished. Alas ! for reformed inebriates at the communion table, a prelude to the brandy bar, and hence to the bar of moral justice, and often to that of civil justice. Behold how large a flame a little spark kindlethl Small things are large things. However, I am inclined to believe that this deplorable neglect of the clergy towards the real interests of their charge, has in most cases, arisen mainly from want of reflection of the evil ten- dency of such a state of things. For I believe that the clergy are, generally, honest, well-meaning men. But what can well-meaning achieve for the welfare of the human race, unless directed by sound science and practical wisdom, in such a channel as to effect real good to the world? Literature, unless it embrace the words of plain, practical truth, is of no avail in blessing the world. It may furnish amusement, ad- minister to personal vanity and exclusiveness, but it showers not down the celestial dews on the thirsty earth. Nevertheless, I feel much pleasure in knowing that some of the clergy have taken a noble stand against all these evils, and exert a very salutary influ- ence on human welfare. APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 223 Some at the head of our literary institutions, are lending their efforts for effecting real good, at a point where it is so much needed — with the young men of our nation. If young men and young women can be rightly influenced and reformed in these things, our nation is safe. These men, therefore, who manage our literary and scientific institutions, are at the very Thermopylae of our national safety and welfare. Oh ! may there be no treacherous Greek among them, to let in the Persian foe to our national ruin. But may they, with true Spartan hearts, and hands strongly nerved to noble deeds, resist the countless host of inrushing foes, and save our young republic from threatening ruin. These, when faithful to their trust, are our true patriots — our divine heroes, whose brows gather im- mortal wreaths. The most untiring and persevering efforts should be made, at all our literary institutions, to impress deeply on the minds of the young, the im- portance of knowing themselves. Indeed they are, without a knowledge of themselves, never prepared for full and successful efforts, in ascending that Hill of Science, whose towering top looks down serenely on the clouds and mists below, and whose temple of truth looks into heaven, and sees the throne of God, and bright, celestial fields, where bloom immortal flowers, and grow the living fruits and tree of life, and roll in placid swells the living waters, and walk the heavenly host, and Christ, and all the angelic throng, in holy pleasures of eternal life. True science and true religion are twin sisters -, both of celestial origin. For who, except God, has given us power to know ourselves and things around ? False 224 THE SCIENCE OF MAN or pretended lovers of each, often endeavor to put them at variance. But the two goddesses invariably repel such graceless suiters, and still continue to em- brace each other in true sisterly affection, and will not be separated. And lasting shame on those graceless, brainless, treacherous, sensual, blind, bigoted, pretended devotees to either, who attempt a divorcement of the two God-sent sisters. What ! has not God in the same nervous temple, built a throne for each, and one above for himself? Do not the intellectual and moral faculties all combine, and swell upward in one venera- tion ? What God hath joined together, let not false men put asunder. True men will not wish or attempt such unrighteous divorcement. But some false reli- gionists, Jehu-like, would let a nation drive to destruc- tion, before they would permit a healthful thought to reach human minds, unless it had first become bap- tized into those angular points that gathered about truth, in the dark ages. Men of true religion and true science are always at harmony with each other and the true interest of the human race. The man who, in deep and true devo- tion, turns the ancient pages of inspiration, and wor- ships God in spirit and truth, in the silent retirement of his own soul, is the very one, who, when he goes forth into the fields of Nature, to gather true science, turns her living leaves with the purest devotion and the greatest success. Pretended teachers of religion, who can see no beauties in true science, do, in reality, see none in the words of revealed truth, but reflect their own men- tal deformity on every thing they read or see. What APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 225 h revelation ? and what is science ? The first is truth revealed to an ancient age, and flowed down to us through the dark ages. The second is truth revealed by scientific research, and investigation, and demon- stration, to our modern age. And all truth is from God, and harmonizes with itself, and is promotive of the temporal and eternal welfare of the human race. Every true man, or one who has truthfully exerted his faculties, by storing his mind with the principks of true religion and science, is divinely, and should be humanly commissioned to speak out the words of truth to others, in places of public convocation. There is no mystery in furnishing the wotld with true preachers, and bibles, and books for salvation, and freedom, and social order, and truth, and heaven ! All who have the mental and moral talents, and these rightly trained by proper exertion, are the men for blessing the world. And every religious teacher, who, with noble heart and truthful hand, labors to draw aside that curtain of mystery, that has been so long drawn about the sacred altar, and hold out its precious freight to the people, is a true man, whom God and the people will bless. Such an one will not forever ring the changes of dry scholastic theology on the tired ears of his audience;—but will fill out that string of bones with Nature's truths, and thus form to that skeleton, cartilages, ligaments, tendons, muscles, membranes, &c, and breathe into it the breath of life; and that theology will then become a living soul, and its exhibition to the world will make living souls, and true men, and true women, — and spread life, and 19* 226 THE SCIENCE OF MAN joy, and beauty throughout the earth, and eventually restore our ancient Eden to all the human race. Truth is unperverted existence. God is truth, being the fountain of all unperverted existence, and permissive of perverted, transient existence. A human being exists truthfully, when the vital laws of his organ- ism are mainly complied with, so much so as to secure a constant inflow of life from God, the great vital ocean, till that inflowing vitality accumulates within the tissues of the organism, to such an amount of con- centrated vital power, as to stamp that embodied vitality with God's own seal of immortality, and be- come, at length, gathered into a Universe of life, and is thus as immortal in its nature as is the eternal God. There is no power in heaven, or earth, that can de- stroy such a being. He is a portion of God's own im- mortalily, embodied and secured in a finite form. Divine Infinitude becomes thus individualized, while it still retains its own integral existence. And hence, say the Scriptures, "He alone hath immortality," and yet imparts individual immortality to an infinite number of finite beings, as in various places is promised to such as obey the truth. When a man or woman live tem- perately, orderly, and chastely, so as to retain the tis- sues of the organism in a right condition, for a constant inflow and accumulation of vitality thereto, this embo- died vitality becomes, at length, fully matured into an immortal or spiritual body ; in as natural an order, as does the fruit or grain become accreted and matured on the tree or stalk. There is no mystery in immortality, any more than there is in the growth of an apple or peach. The first applied to epidemics. 227 results as much from the action of natural causes, or established forces and modes of action, as do the last. And the immortalizing process, or what might illustra- tively be termed vital or invisible crystallization, may be, by a transgression of its established modes of ac- tion, retarded, injured, or arrested, as readily as may fructification, or grain-formation be injured or arrested by a transgression of the laws of vegetable life. One results as much from the action of natural laws, as the other. This beautiful theory of immortality is plainly taught in the New Testament, notwithstanding it has been so egregiously perverted and distorted since, by scholastic fancy and blind sensualism. Christ, in prov- ing the resurrection to the Sadducees, says, " Now that the dead are raised, even Moses showed at the bush, when he calls the Lord, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. For he is not a God of the dead, but of the living ; " that is, these individuals were then living, though several centuries after their residence on earth. But if you inquire of modern theology after immortality or the resurrection, it points you into a grave-yard to hunt for it, or to wait during a few unknown ages ! Who can wonder that Father Miller was for hurrying up the matter ? He was not half so inconsistent as were his opposers, who still held a theory having all the main features of his own. If immortality lay in the grave-yards, or in thunder storms or clouds, the ardent old gentleman was in for its speedy develop- ment. VVTho can blame him ? Immortality is man's richest and only permanent boon, and why should he not wish its securement ? I am inclined to believe, that if Father Miller had been possessed of half the 228 the science of man means of information, that some of our Hebraic Theo- logians have, he would have thrown his errors to the winds, and thus never have troubled the world with such fanaticism. So that Father Miller, with his limit- ed means of information, was not half so much to blame for his deceiving himself and others, as are our learned Divines, who have the means of knowing better, and still retain such a fallacious theory of the resurrection, as they usually hold forth to the people. This theory, as they hold and teach it, breaks up, at once, all natural connection between the natural body and the spiritual body, and leaves the delusive impres- sion on the mind, that it is of no importance to culti- vate the perfection of our bodily forms, inasmuch as the spiritual body is to be entirely a miraculous concre- tion from some emptied grave-yard, and hence the power of God will secure a glorious one to each cate- chised soul, whether his or her earthly body may have been retained in its proper condition or not. Sup- posing a man does violate every law of his physical being, and bring his body into one mass of heavy cor- ruption ; nevertheless, if his creed be correct, it will all come right. That grave-yard will, when at length dis- embowelled, roll out a sort of spirituo-material form for each believing soul! " Eat and drink, to-morrow you die." This poor earthly body may as well be loaded down with physical transgression as not, &c. Such is the direct tendency of that perverted mode of holding to a resurrection. It has no analogy in nature. The analogy of the chrysalis state, which is usually claimed for it, is entirely without foundation. For in ihe chrysalis state there is indwelling life through the APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 229 whole torpor state, till, finally, it swells into such acti- vity as to burst off the external covering, and come out a beautiful insect. Whereas, in the grave there is no sort of life whatever, by the action of which a spiritual body can be developed. And God exerts his power by established modes of action throughout the material Universe. The Divine will must also be proved, before this grave-yard transformation can be relied on. And that will has never been thus certified to mortals. Such a perverted theory of the resurrection, reminds me of a farmer taking his basket and cart and going about in his corn-field, not after golden harvest ears, but for gathering in the old corn stalks I pulling up each, root and branch, and loading them into his cart, and taking them carefully to his store-house. God does not gather in his harvest thus. He takes the golden ears, and leaves the stalks to fall back into their natu- ral soil. The stalks were very important as requisites for the earing process, but after those golden ears are produced, they are of no further use, only to be trans- muted back to their former dust. Just so, in relation to our natural bodies. They are very important as re- quisites, for the development of spritual bodies ; but then they fall back to their mother earth, while the spiritual bodies, developed therefrom, are gathered into a universe of life. Such a resurrection analogizes with nature and truth, and harmonizes with Scripture and rational hope ; whereas, the perverted theory does not with either. But scholastic Divinity has looked through spectacles so long, that its vision has become so short and perverted that it can scarcely behold the golden 230 THE SCIENCE OF MAN harvest ears, but mainly the old, withered stalks. And if they wish to gather such trash into their mental storehouse, they, of course, have the freedom of so do- ing. But I would caution them, lest such an accumu- lation of trashy material should, in some thunder storm of truth, draw the electric flash, and explode the whole mass to their local or temporary detriment. Such an event, however, would prove a great blessing to the world. And if the truthful flash would come near enough to their eyes to restore perfect vision, it would, indeed, be a great blessing to them personally. But scholastic glasses are usually very bad conductors to electric truth, and hence I fear it might not restore their sight. Though I should feel much sincere joy at such an event. " And as he (Christ) prayed, the fashion of his countenance was altered, and his raiment became white and glistening. And behold, there talked with him two men, who were Moses and Elias, who appeared in glory." Here again is a similar proof of the resurrec- tion, as that before quoted. Here were two men, (not distorted, shapeless, indefinable ghosts,) the very Moses and Elias that lived centuries before, and yet now appeared conversing with Christ, as real men, or glorious spiritual bodies. And yet the common theory tells us, that Moses, after waiting a few more centuries, is to come back and hunt up a clog of clay that he may have left on some of those mountains that overlook fair Palestine ! What a misfortune it will be to him, if he cannot find the identical dust deposited at his departure! left completely bodiless! alas, for his destitution. APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 231 It is very unfortunate that human beings should ever have been led to suppose the material universe to be the only substantial part of existence, and to consider the spiritual to be the visionary or trivial, and that they can scarcely conceive of an existence, only when lodged in materiality. The truth is this : the material is only the light sieve-work of creation. While the spiritual is the only substantial, deep, and permanent substance in being. As the body without the spirit is dead, so the material universe, without the spiritual, is dead. As a man's spirit is himself, so the spiritual universe is the universe, and the material universe is only a series of instruments, through which the spiritual acts. The theory of the resurrection I advocate, is the true and substantial one, while the common theory is the visionary, fallacious one. " But some man will say, How are the dead raised up, and with what body do they come? Thou fool, that which thou sowest is not quickened except it die. And (as to) that which thou sowest, thou sowest not that body that shall be, but (thou sowest the) bare grain, and God giveth it a body as it hath pleased him." Here the common theory is directly contra- dicted. It affirms by analogy, that the material body is not to be the future spiritual body. And the whole xv. chapter of I. Corinthians, argues most con- clusively a direct post-mortem resurrection. "And so it is written, The first man Adam (man in his first state) was made a living soul ; the last Adam (man in his last state) becomes a quickening spirit (a purely spiritual being). Howbeit, that was not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural; and afterward that 232 THE SCIENCE OF MAN which is spiritual. The first man is of the earth, earthly ; the second man is the Lord from Heaven." Here the word translated Lord, is, in the original, kurios, which is an adjective, signifying strong or powerful, and qualifies the second man, or man in h;s second, last, or future state. Hence, divesting the text from scholastic perversion, it reads thus : Man in his first state, is of the earth, or earthly, (has an earthly body) ; man in his second state, is strong or powerful, (being a spiritual body). William Tindal, who, I be- lieve, first translated the New Testament into English, renders it essentially thus: " The first man is of the earth, earthy ; the second man is of heaven, heavenly :" which rendering, much better accords with the ori- ginal, than does our common version. Perhaps the humble Tindal had not so many visionary theories in his brain, to which to warp Scripture texts, as some of his successors had and have. Christ said, in relation to himself as in the spirit world, " All power in heaven and earth is given to me." His followers were to be like him, when they should have arrived at the same state. This is true of all who attain there. The hidden springs of material creation are all open to their power. Yet being all possessed of the will of God, as well as with a portion of his power and immortality, they never use their power only in accordance with Divine will. We read of one angel who slew the whole Assyrian host at one stroke of Divine power: what then could a host of such angels do, if directed ? But all act only in accordance with the will of God. Is there any thing in this that looks like shadowism or negative ex- istence ? Shall a spiritual body, possessing power APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 233 enough to stave a world to atoms or nonentity, be con- sidered just no body at all, because it has become di- vested of materiality, and thus let in to a full universe of power ? Eyes forever straining after shadows, but seldom see idealities. The whole material universe is but a shadow of the spiritual. Materialists are the visionary ones, and true spiritualists are the substan- tial ones. The first are as transient as a shadow; the last are as permanent as eternity. " For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle (our earthly body) were dissolved, we have (not shall have) a building of God, (a spiritual body) a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens! " Every passage in the Bible can be satis- factorily explained in accordance with this view, while there are several entirely unexplainable in accordance with the perverted theory. But I have not time here to treat these, but hold myself in readiness to explain any possible objection from the Scripture, or from any other source, that may be thought to conflict with the theory I advocate. I have treated of this subject thus briefly here, to make the following truths apparent. That a future state is but a continuation of the present, divested of materiality. And that the development of a perfect spiritual body depends directly upon a right or proper exertion of our powers, while invested in our present material bodies, in a manner as fixed in its re- sults, as that by which the development of a golden harvest ear depends on the perfection of the process of the growth and maturity of the blade or stalk on which it develops itself. And hence, that in order to secure man's highest future welfare, or perfection of being 20 234 THE SCIENCE OF MAN in a future state, it is requisite that the physiologi- cal laws of the human body should be known and obeyed during our earthly state. Neither Christ nor his Apostles ever taught the de- lusive doctrine, that a mere abstract belief in his death could confer spiritual salvation on any one. And those who teach that doctrine, are themselves responsible for the fatal mischief done thereby. Because the Jews were base enough to murder Christ, for his faithfulness to their true interests, — ergo, a whole world may run headlong into sin, and " lift up hands, although defiled with blood," and find perfect safety from the mere ab- stract fact of the Jews having been base enough to murder Christ! This is logic with a looseness ! most blind, fatal looseness ! Alas, for humanity ! any thing for an excuse to sin! It is a wonder that Herod did not think of washing off some of his sins, by taking off the head of John the Baptist! If the world could have been less fool-hardy and reckless towards its greatest benefactor, and received his teachings without slaying "The Great Teacher" for his benefaction in thus pointing out the way of eternal life, Christ would have saved them with equal freedom, and God would have been equally or more pleased, than by the coincident events. We are to be saved by faith in Christ; that is, by confidence in his words of truth. If we believe Christ, we take him at his word, and act in the manner he di- rects. And by thus acting, we grow into immortality, and are thus forever safe and happy. Christ died for (on account of) the sins of the world. That is, there was so much baseness and blindness, and total moral APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 235 depravity in the world, at the time of Christ's appear- ance among men, that they could not, or rather would not receive the boon, without slaying the benefactor. Every human being should remember the life of Christ with the greatest gratitude, and his death with the deepest humility, and his resurrection and ascension with the greatest joy and hope. And in our private or social addresses to our common Father, we should speak of Christ, as being the medium through whom all our blessings flow. For unless he had appeared on earth, and manifested in the flesh, the beau ideal of moral truth, we should still have been in moral dark- ness. For he alone first illustraled the beauty and per- fection of moral truth, and gave a full demonstration ot immortality. And hence it is through Christ that we derive all these rich blessings. And this is what we mean, or ought to mean, when we say in those addresses, " for Christ's sake,'' &c. But when we thank God for the gift of his Son Jesus Christ, it should be for his life, and not for his death. This last should be the cause of the deepest humility to every human being, to think himself or herself belonging to a race, that had ever been so deeply and totally depraved in moral action, as to murder its greatest benefactor. God gave the world a living Christ. The world, in its deep moral depravity, intended to give him back a dead Christ. But they were completely foiled in this thing. Christ proved to ihem that he could live in face of all their malice and hate, and take up a body again, that the world supposed they had completely destroyed, or reduced to such a state, that it must fall back into dust, by corruption, instead of being worn out by vital 236 THE SCIENCE OF MAN action. Christ, by taking up that body again, and wearing out its materiality by vital action, brought him self into the spiritual world again, as he was directly after his expiration on the Cross, and thus left to the world a full demonstration of his own continued per- sonal existence, or a full proof of his immortality. His spiritual body, or his own personality, was the same directly after his expiration on the Cross, that it was directly after his ascension. His taking up that mate- rial form and completely wearing out its materiality by vital action, was only for a demonstration to his dis- ciples, and through them to the whole world, of his future or continued existence as a spiritual body, in a universe of life and glory and happiness, and full supremacy over all opposing forces. When a man has faith in Christ, he will live truth- fully, as Christ taught both by precept and example. In so doing, he becomes a just man, and thus attains justification, and by continuing that just mode of life, he at length becomes, as it were, crystallized into the beau ideal of moral truth, or the perfect moral image of God, as revealed in the person of Jesus Christ. And this moral crystallization of his spiritual nature, is sanctification, or full redemption. Thus, by faith in Christ, we have justification, and sanctification, and full resurrection into everlasting life. There is no mystery in this work of salvation, to truthful minds. If a person chooses to run into a thick layer of dust, and roll up heavy clouds of dust all about him, he ought not to complain of mystery or obscurity, if the splendor and beauty of the Universe about him is par- tially or entirely precluded from his view. Those who APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 237 will kick up a dust, must expect to get their eyes full. But truthful hearts, and pure hands, and light-loving eyes will not run in the dust, and if they get where others have started dust, they get along out of it as soon as possible. Those who believe in and act as did Christ, drink constantly into the same spirit and immortality of which Christ drank, and hence, become co-heirs with him to eternal life. They reflect the same moral image that he did while on earth, and at length obtain a similar crown of immortality. There are three modes by which God has manifested himself to the world. First, as the great Author of material creation, as seen in the visible works of his hands. In this mode he manifests himself as the Father of all created things. Second, he has mani- fested himself to the world in the moral image re- flected though the person of Jesus Christ, as the Son of God. Third, he manifests himself to the world through the persons of all true Christians, as sons of God, possessing the same spirit or moral image with Jesus Christ, and hence, this manifestation is by the Spirit of truth. Hence, there is one God manifested to the world by three modes, as Father, Son, and Spirit. And these three are but three modes of ex- pression to the same God. " In him we live, and move, and have our being." " He upholds all things by the word of his power." All existence hangs on God's own infinitude of nature. To study God as the great and glorious Father of the Universe, we must open the living leaves of Na- ture around us, and read God in these visible and 20* 238 THE SCIENCE OF MAN tangible proofs of our Creator's power and goodness. To study God as revealed through his Son, we must read that book of books, the New Testament. Its every page reflects the beau ideal of Divine goodness, in the moral image of Jesus Christ. There divinity shines through humanity, and dispels the dark clouds which sin has gathered about the human soul, and lights it up with brilliant hopes and immortal joys. The doctrines of the New Testament, when rightly understood, are the beau ideal of moral truth, a trans- cript from the Eternal Mind. It needs no labored ar- guments to prove its divine authenticity; for every page bears on its face the stamp of divinity. And he who studies human nature deepest, finds and knows the New Testament to be the true philosophy of man, a transcript from mental tablets, reflecting light from the Eternal Mind. And he that speaks lightly of the New Testament, shows either deep moral depravity, or great moral blindness, or both, and knows nothing as he ought to know. But in order to know God as revealed through Jesus Christ, in ihe New Testament, it is requisite that we should have the same spirit or moral image with Christ. Unless we do profess this spirit, we can- not appreciate the beauty and worth of his written word, and thus that book, with all its golden treasures of knowledge and wisdom, becomes to us a dead let- ter, or as a sealed book. We must have the spirit of Christ, or we are nothing. But what is this holy Spirit of Truth ? Is it some mysterious agency, that darts into the mind and out of it, as a matter of chance, or its own arbitration ? By no means ! Its indwelling APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 239 with man is as much a result of established laws of moral action, as is the rising and setting of the sun of natural action. God, the Eternal Spirit, is spiritual infinitude, or the great vital or spiritual ocean, filling all space. God is vitality diffused everywhere. And yet this vitality or spirituality, is not possessed by man only, as it is gathered in from this vast vital ocean, and accumulated within the tissues of his organism. Then this vitality, as it gathers, exerts and recruits itself within the tissues of a healthful brain, becomes on its moral organs, moral power, and on the in- tellectual organs, mental power, and then, in subser- viency to these, it accumulates through the other tissues of the organism, thus giving physical power, all of which, combined in harmony and perfection, make a true man, having the moral image of the Eternal God—power and intelligence, under the con- trol of moral goodness. As the various organs composing the human frame are but one body, so the powers pervading those va- rious organs are but modifications in the modus oper- andi of the same power or spirit, from the same great spiritual ocean. To illustrate this. There is diffused throughout the atmosphere and things on the surface of the earth, an agency called electricity ; and yet no one is sensible of its presence, only as it, by the action of certain forms of matter on each other, becomes ac- cumulated, and passed on to a perfect conductor, where it manifests its presence to all who come within its influence. And thus it is with life or vitality. Although there is a vast universe of life all about us, yet that life or 240 THE SCIENCE OF MAN spirit is not ours, till it becomes gathered and accumu- lated within the tissues of the organism, and then we manifest that life to all around. And when we use this vital power under the control of love, in a manner as God uses his power, then that spirit within is the spirit of truth, or in scripture phrase, " God or Christ formed within us, the hope of glory," and the sure seal of immortality. But, says an objector, according to this doctrine, a wicked man has the spirit of God as well as the good man. A wicked man has a spirit from God, but not the spirit of God. That spirit of power, which a wicked man wastes in his wickedness, is given from God ; for all power in heaven and earth are his. A rich banker, who loans money to traders, gives similar coin to all. The wise trader takes his, and by a pru- dent use of the same, he gains more, and secures the perfect confidence of the banker, who will soon lend him any amount he may wish. The reckless trader takes his, and squanders it here and there, or lets it remain idle, and soon finds himself out of both money and credit, and in lasting poverty. God is the great vital banker of the universe. He loans out vi- tality to individual beings. If they use that vitality in accordance with his will, they at last grow into immor- tal wealth. If they act as did the foolish trader, they Boon find themselves in a similar condition. There is nothing mysterious either in the bestowal or operation of God's Spirit. It is all as plain to a truthful mind, as is the rising and setting of the sun. God has formed the human organism, as a temple for himself to dwell in. But that temple must be pure. APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 241 And its purity results from obedience to those laws of vital action, under which God has placed it. And hence, in the Mosaic dispensation, which was for bending the moral condition of the world into shape, for receiving the full and perfect light of true Chris- tianity, there were special directions or restrictions made as to their use of flesh, and for their purifications by water, A:c. If their perverted appetites must have flesh, it was to be only such kinds as would best meet their nutritive wants, and effect the least injury on their bodies, and thus on their moral natures. They were restricted from the use of swine's flesh, and that of all other unclean animals, and were to live sober and temperate lives, that God might dwell within them. I know that many, professing Christianity in our modern age, falsely luxuriate themselves in what they consider their Gentile freedom! by eating swine's flesh, and any thing they can take from ocean, earth or air. And if remonstrated with, for such im- propriety in thus treating what might be a temple of the living God, — behold they see, as in a trance, a large sheet with four corners tied together, and let down from heaven, in which are all manner of four- footed beasts and fowls, and creeping things. And then they hear the voice of perverted appetite from within, saying, " Rise, slay, and eat." And at it they move, and slay, and roast, and devour, till sometimes, like the ancient quail-eaters, it comes out of their very nos- trils, and induce consumptions, fevers, bowel com- plaints ; and every few years, a national siege of the cholera, (Cholas rheo, bowel and liver disorder, both being so blended in their functions, that a long derang- 242 THE SCIENCE OF MAN ment of the bowels, invariably leads to that of the two-fold function of the liver.) If beings possessing rationality in some things, are bound to be so irrational or blind on this, they are at freedom to treat them- selves to their flesh-eating, &c, and to all the evils induced thereby. " While man exclaims, « See all things for my use ;' ' See man for mine,' replies a pampered goose -. And just as short of reason he must fall, Who thinks all made for one, not one for all." The Spirit of the living God will have a pure temple to dwell in. It flees that condition of organism which engenders wrath, strife, malice, envy, &c. And such a condition is invariably induced by transgression of organic laws. A man may know the catechism or even the Bible entire, for verbatim rehearsal; yet if he pollutes his organic temple with swine's flesh, and poisonous drugs, and injurious drinks, &c, the Spirit of truth will not dwell with him. It may linger about awhile, waiting for organic purification, or re- form ; but this being hopeless, it will at length say, " Let us depart." And then, alas ! neither creeds nor ministerial prayers can avail. This is not Jewish su- perstition, but sound physiological and psychological science, and will not be gainsayed unless by fools or hypocrites. If a man wish the indwelling of the Spirit of truth, he must keep his temple in right condition, by con- forming his voluntary habits to the organic laws of the human body. If he does this, he will be constantly gathering vitality from the great vital ocean, and will thus grow into eternal life. This is the very doctrine APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 243 taught by our Saviour. The directions which he gave as to food and drink — " Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat or drink," &c, are essentially the same advocated in these pages. Those directions carried out in the climate natural to man, would amount to this: Man would there be as regularly sup- plied, by the spontaneous productions of the earth, as are the birds of the air, and he would be as free from care as they. He would find none of those extensive and complicated mixtures, which when used, break up all natural relation between the appetite and the nutritive wants of the body ; but would invariably find his food in the very best condition to meet those wants, as the ripe and wholesome fruits of the earth, and in perfect condition to satiate the appetite, with that little which the true wants of Nature require, thus leaving him to constant and perfect enjoyment of existence from its proper source — healthful vital action. I have advo- cated in these pages, that man out of his natural cli- mate, should, by his own industry, supply himself with such a quantity and quality of the wholesome produc- tions of the earth, as shall daily meet his nutritive wants, and thus retain his organism, in a healthful condition for vital action, and thus secure the same end as would be secured in man's natural climate, by the course marked out through the teaching of Christ in the New Testament. His exhortations were, "Take heed that your hearts be not overcharged with surfeiting,"&c. And his practice was healing the bodies of the sick, that there might again be right vital action. Never- theless, some of his pretended followers, in our modern a^e, exhort essentially thus: " Take heed that your 244 THE SCIENCE OF MAN hearts be fully charged with creeds." " Your bodies are of but little account any how." " That grave- yard development will set all to rights again." " Your bodies are mere earthen vessels ; — the soul is all!" True! true, this last! But how shall that soul crys- tallize into immortality, if that earthen vessel holding it, is constantly disturbed, by habitually pouring in in- gredients that antagonize the crystallizing process. An earthen vessel, in itself considered, may be of trivial importance. But when that vessel, is made the recep- tacle of vitality, inflowed from the great vital ocean for moral crystallization, into immortality, then it be- comes a matter of immeasurable importance, to keep that earthen vessel in a right condition, till that trea- sure is secured. One year passed in sober, temperate, chaste and holy life, will flow more immortality into the soul, than all the spasmodic preaching and praying, that a gang of hypocrites ever got up. We want preaching and praying, but it must be of the right stamp, in order to secure any real good. Our religious organizations must be for the express purpose of promoting purity of heart and life in a community. Every religious teacher should fully investigate and understand the physiological and psy- chological laws of humanity, that he may truthfully point out to his audience the means by which those noble moral qualities, treated of in the New Testa- ment, may be attained. Sound science and true re- ligion should sit enthroned on the mercy seat, while above should sit the cherubim of divine love, oversha- dowing all with their golden wings. Christian Church should be a name good enough for any such organiza- APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 245 tion. With such organizations truthfully managed, and supplied with noble-hearted and well educated men, as teachers or preachers of the truth, our earth would soon bloom again, as one extended region of immortal fields and lasting Edens. It is deeply humiliating, that as a race, we, in our wanderings from moral truth, should ever have fallen into such ideas of Divine character, as to believe that God required the blood of his own Son to appease his wrath, and secure his favor to the human race. It is only a reflection from heathenism, and has no sign of truth. But says an objector, the Scriptures directly assert, that " without the shedding of blood, there was no remission of sin." But this is only asserting a fact that rose from the moral depravity of the world and not from any necessity of the thing. That, and kindred passages in the Scriptures amount essen- tially to this : Unless Christ had come into the world, there could be no remission (freedom) from sin. As he alone was the first to introduce to the world the beau ideal of moral truth, and point out to man the means of escape from his sins and their final results, and thus open the way to life and immortality. But such was the moral depravity of the world, that they could not receive him, without spilling his blood for his benefaction to them. But such a result being controllable by the power of Christ, so as to make the evil to himself but transient, while the good to be con- ferred by his life was to be permanent, he, in the spirit of God, made up his mind to the emergency, and carried on his public teaching, although knowing how it would result to himself and others. His doc- 21 246 THE SCIENCE OF MAN trines could not be introduced without causing the transient death of the introducer. And hence, "without the shedding of blood, there was no remission." Be- sides, his taking up that earthly body again, in the face of his foes, and wearing it out by vital action, and thus causing his final ascension, was to afford a perfect demonstration to the world, of the full efficiency of his teaching. So that while his foes meant it for an injury, he, in the power of God, controlled it to final good. But to suppose that God took any pleasure in the death of his Son, as a means of appeasement or reconciliation, is a most graceless sentiment, that better deserves an insertion in the writings of some Confucius, than in creeds pretended to be abstracts from divine truth. Gentile nations, previous to the introduction of Christianity, had become completely involved in the superstitious practice of sacrificing animals to their gods and deified heroes, and to the natural elements, for appeasing their supposed wrath, or securing their supposed favor ; and this general impression of divine appeasement and favor, having, as a matter of neces- sity, from the roughness and darkness of that age of the world—been admitted under certain restrictions to the Jewish nation, and for many centuries retained as a national custom — the Apostles of Christ, were obliged to seize upon a figure of speech, detracted from that universal custom, of using artificial means for divine appeasement, and thus represent Christ as the " Lamb of God," " a holy offering," " acceptable to God," " slain for the sins of the world," &c, and thus, by drawing their minds to Christ alone as their APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 247 only Saviour, break off their former absurdities, and gross and dangerous superstitions. It was on this same principle of action, that Paul, when at Athens, took his text for a very eloquent and truthful speech, from an inscription on one of their own altars, dedi- cated to the unknown God. Truthful minds gather truth from surrounding things, although greatly per- verted ; while false minds reflect falsity from every thing with which they come in contact, however pure those things may be. Externals are but one extended concave mirror. A mind pure, and elevated, and truthful, reflects its own features. A mind gross, de- based, and truthless, reflects also its own features ! A vengeful soul, that under severe provocation, would be satisfied only with the blood of the offender, gathers its own personal reflection from this concave mirror. But a man's own personality is the only standard by which he judges of other personalities ; and hence, every one is prone to think that God, and others are similar to himself in personal qualities. And hence, it came to pass, in ancient nations, that they looked upon their gods as vengeful, and requiring blood for appeasement, when offended. And hence, we read of their frequent and abundant sacrifices of animals and human beings. The ancient Greeks, with all their boasted refinement, could not leave the fatal Trojan siege, without shedding the blood of their most beautiful virgin, to appease the wrath of a fallen hero. And hence, too, in the Jewish nation, repeated offences brought repeated offerings, and forages caused their altars to smoke daily with the blood of fresh victims. And one chieftain was so scrupulously exact 248 THE SCIENCE OF MAN in paying his vows to one that he supposed to be the Lord, that he even slew his own daughter! Yet, when the true light began to shine, through the person of Christ, these things met the severest censure, and final abolition. But unfortunately for human welfare, on a falling away of that truthful system introduced by Christ, and spread abroad and confirmed by his Apostles — a state of things similar to that previous one, obtained again. A large portion of the world fell back again, into idol- atry and sacrificial superstition. A system falsely called Christianity, gained ascendency. Its essentials were creeds, and external forms, and ceremonies. Its modus propagandi were fire, sword, imprisonment, and complete servitude of all to ecclesiastic domination. The dark ages roll in, and involve all in moral chaos. If here and there one caught a glimpse of true light, its reflection on surrounding eyes was so extremely painful to their diseased retinas, that as a matter of expediency, the reflector soon felt the heavy crush of inquisitorial power, and thus heresy was summarily disposed of, and present quiet restored to the moral cha- os. But while " confusion worse confounded" reigned through the moral abyss, and held the heavy trident of midnight darkness over the world, the shrill notes of theoretic reform began to roll through the moral horizon. Luther, Melancthon, Wickliffe, Calvin, and a host of others, swell loud the notes of theoretic re- form. They proclaim loudly against the deep corrup- tions of the established church, and break away from the arms of the " mother of harlots," and like des- perate Samsons, heave against the mighty pillars of APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 249 the church. She trembles, reels, falls in deep con- vulsive ruins. But alas! these Samsons, in their long captivity to the harlot church, had lost or nearly lost their own eyes. And instead of touching the torch of truth to the dry combustible ruins of the mighty edifice they had so manfully pulled down, they begin to feel about on their hands and knees, for some of the shining rubbish, to gather in for their own use. "To the victors belong the spoils," said these strong, though blind Samsons. Luther gathered in such rubbish as suited his taste, and being somewhat of a transcendentalist, he drew in transubstantiation with the rest for building a new edifice. Melancthon being of a fine organism, and well developed brain, and having his eyes more than half blessed with vision, would not trouble himself in collecting any of the spoils, but felt his noble spirit mainly satiated, in having aided in heaving out the pillars to the huge edifice. Still he secretly longed to see the whole ruins involved in smoke and flame. And he intimated to his strong friend Luther, that he feared he was doing as king Saul of old did, in saving the spoils from the Amalek- ites. But Luther told him to keep quiet, and that they would sacrifice to the Lord from the spoils, and thus render all right! So Luther continued feeling about after the spoils, and being blind, he made as near as possible, such a selection as best suited his feeling fancy, and thus at length, made a mas- sive accumulation, and raised quite an ecclesiastical edifice. Calvin being of a very sanguine temperament, and of rather sharp, triangular features, plowed his blind 21* 250 THE SCIENCE OF MAN way through the fallen rubbish, till he got near the old altar, and scraping away the accumulated ashes, at length felt his fingers severely scorched in a bed of live cinders, and red hot coals of fire ! Quick drawing back his fingers, and blowing them to ease the pain, he muttered to himself, " This unlucky scorching shall yet avail me something." So he feels about, till he gets hold of the old fire-pan and silver tongs, and gathers it full of burning coals of fire. He then feels his way to one of the largest fallen pillars, where seating himself with his fire-pan of burning coals in one hand, and silver tongs in the other, he commences striking the pan with the tongs, as though he wished to settle a swarm of bees about him. The fire pan, from long use by the Mother Church, had its edges and corners in rather unjointed condition, and, hence, at every stroke from the silver tongs in the right hand, the live cinders and sparks would fly out from every edge and corner of the fire-pan in his left, and become scattered all about in frightful showers of falling fiery flakes. The crowd around become completely astonished and ter- rified at this new exhibition of ecclesiastic fire, which had been previously in the exclusive possession of the Mother Church. The blind sage thought it best to improve the occa- sion for gathering to himself a massive pile from the scattered ruins, before his friend Luther should have gathered all " the valuables " into his own possession, and thus monopolize all the glory of pulling down the huge edifice to himself. But having neither the pa- tience nor the slrength of his friend Luther, to feci about on his hands and knees, to draw in such articles APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 251 as might be to his fancy, he commences rattling out live cinders and sparks from his fire-pan, and tells the surrounding crowd to gather in for him such and such articles, as he deemed most worthy of being saved, and rolling out a shower of sparks towards them, said, " These are but a faw drops before a heavy shower," and at length, a long, fiery deluge about to be given to any who dare to disobey. The surrounding crowd, in deep terror, draw off their coats, and dive into the work in good earnest. The big drops roll from their dust-gathering brows, and full and constant toil swells out their strong muscles. They collect every thing the blind sage calls for, and arrange them carefully into a huge temple, that towers upward in almost ma- ternal dimensions. And the massive pile of the strong German Samson is soon thrown into the shade by his brother's huge temple. Nevertheless, the two Sam- sonian brothers, from their both having strained them- selves so severely, in pulling down the Mother Church, did not think it becoming to pitch an envious battle at each other's growing greatness, and therefore kept themselves in cold speaking terms of remote friend- ship towards each other. Besides, they considered this course rather politic, and even expedient. For the scattered fragments of the expired Mother were still quivering with the remains of lingering life, and one dose of " vegetable pills," or one sprinkle from one of those dollar bottles of life-restoring " Sarsaparillas," or that wide-spread sea and land saving "Cordial," or that " Matchless Sanative," or " Cod Liver Oil," or all- curing "Balsam,'' (be sure and get the genuine article,) and lo! the gathering flesh begins to crawl to the 252 THE SCIENCE OF MAN bones, and tie them all in order, bringing all the joints to their proper place, stringing them all with new sinews and fresh nerves, and then a little " Hyperion Fluid," will fling the curls of luxuriant beauty over the Mother of harlots, and lo ! she rises in her wanton strength, and dashes these unfilial daughters to nonen- tity, and soon monopolizes all to herself again ! Fear- ing such a result as this, the Samsonian brothers thought it expedient to establish a general confedera- tion among themselves, and keep up a distant friendship for mutual protection. Subsequently, however, these two large churches, built from the ruins of the old one, divide and subdi- vide, and ramify, till one would need the skill of a bo- tanist to classify them. Some arose that resembled the old Mother so nearly, it was said by some that she had indeed been raised from the dead, by the remedial means above mentioned, even after laying in her scat- tered condition for years ! Others said, it to be not her, but one like her. At length, one Nullifier (Cromwell) arose, and braced himself against this advancing Order, and shook his curly pate at its onward march, like a huge animal against a locomotive. He broke one of its horns, lost both of his, and got run over besides. Nevertheless, this Nullifier made quite a stir in the world ; and some marshalled under his banner, were in the main, rather substantial, well-meaning men, and many transferred themselves to Columbia's distant shores, and there felled forests and built houses, and es- tablished schools and churches, and colleges. These Nullifiers had many excellent traits. They were gene- rally temperate, bold, industrious, religious, and dis- APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 233 posed to promote literature, at least such as harmonized with their own views. They were generally orderly, well-meaning men and women, who endeavored to do their duty to God and each other. Their main failure was hereditary.— that of partial moral blindness. The Samsonian brothers were mostly blinded by their long captivity among the Philistines of the Apostate Church. And this partial blindness, as well as their great strength, was transmitted to their offspring. And hence Columbia's soil became settled by very robust, but short-sighted men. They had devout hearts and strong hands, but were so short-sighted that they could not see that any one had a right to think differently from themselves, and hence., like vessels at sea, without nocturnal lamps, would run into any craft that did not "square the yards" after their own fashion. And hence, they would, at times, "slip the cable" over those who did not conform, and wind the " marline " about broad-brims, and wall in, or swing up those who seemed affected with satanic agency, &c. And hence, their name Nullifiers, which means nobody but ourselves. Still, these Nullifiers, considering their hereditary short-sightedness, were rather excellent men, and did many praiseworthy things. Their offspring were, for a long time, very energetic, and their short- sightedness became gradually somewhat improved, and owing to the general advance of liberal sentiments, and social order, in the world, they did not run into Non- conformists, quile so severely as did their ancestors. They were similar to their fathers, in patronizing schools and colleges, and in promoting general intelligence ; but still were inclined to look cross-eyed to every one who 254 THE SCIENCE OF MAN did not look on the same side of the cross with them- selves. But, finally, by a long exertion of their visual organs, their moral sight became so much improved, that they generally conceded to every one the privilege of thinking and speaking for themselves, so long as each behaves himself in an orderly manner. In moral vision, therefore, the present generation of Nullifiers are far in advance of their ancestors. But in other things they are far behind them. In physical strength, bodily symmetry, and true devotion, they are far below their ancestors. The men are not usually robust and well proportioned, with full strength, and lofty brows, and manly features, as were their fathers. The women are not as well-formed, and healthful and rosy hued, and long lived, as were their mothers, or as they might be. There is here and there a gem of beauty left to attract, like a rosy peach amid surround- ing solitude, where gather gazing eyes, and eager reaching hands, till Absalom-like, some get hung among the branches ! If administering angels are such blessings as all believe them to be, why should they be so few ? And if healthful and well formed men are so desirable in a nation, why should they be so scarce? It would almost seem that the Nullifiers had turned against themselves, and that nullification was to be driven to an extermination of all excellent qualities from their own race ! If so, they are far more blame- worthy for practising self-nullification, than their an- cestors were for practising nullification on others. Nullifiers are world-wide famed for looking out for themselves, or their own interests. But, alas ! in this our modern age, they do not even take care of them- APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 255 selves, or their own interests. This self-nullification is almost unaccountable, and most fatal folly. I am much interested in the welfare of this order. I am a Nulli- fier, and the son of a Nullifier, and therefore should feel an interest in their prosperity. I have fully studied the subject of nullification, and wish my friends to hear what I have said, and have to say. Nullification, when carried on towards others, is im- politic, inexpedient, and very detrimental to our true welfare. But when turned against ourselves, it is ten- fold foolish and fatal. When we say nobody but our- selves, we are selfish; but when we, by our actions, say, not even ourselves, then we are self-destructive. Self-nullification is the first thing to be corrected. " Do thyself no harm," is the prescription lor this case. But to obey this, we must comply with that anterior one, "Know Thyself." When we obey this precept, we shall know what will, and what will not injure us. Our fathers nullified others, we nullify not only others, but ourselves also. I cannot too strongly recommend both that our foreign, and self-nullification be essential- ly altered, and both turned into the right channel, and then our nullification will be of a glorious bend, and it will be our highest honor to have been Nullifiers. For nullification, like most other things, is right enough, if it only be rightly directed, and made to answer its own proper end. Man's organ of nullification should be rightly educated, and then it works admirably. There is no harm, but rather glory in destroying, if we only destroy the proper things to be destroyed. Self-nullification should be directed thus. Every habit of thought, word, or deed, that tends to injure 256 THE SCIENCE OF MAN oneself, should at once begin to be nullified. A pre- cipe should, at once, be filed in Heaven's Court, and an action of ejectment brought against that wrong habit. Let the vital laws of the human organism be fully known, that they may be obeyed. Let us cease to use whatever tends to injure our natures. Alcohol in all its forms, the "nauseous weed" in all its modes of use, narcotics, heating condiments, and flesh-eating, should be at once and forever laid aside. Their use comes in direct collision with our highest welfare and enjoyment, and greatly abbreviates the period of our earthly existence; and, hence, for our own self-inter- est, these should be forever discontinued. They rob the human race of health, strength, beauty, mental and moral power, and their use induces full self-servitude, which is by far the worst form of servitude, and the great prompter of all oppression towards others. For he whose heart beats with holy freedom, such as is secured by obedience to organic laws, can never find it within himself to oppress or wrong his neighbor. But feeling happy and free himself, he wishes to see all others so. And individual transgression of organic laws, among those composing our nation, is the great locomotive that keeps in motion that long train of na- tional evils under which our nation groans. Let us then first fully reform ourselves in all these tilings, and then induce others to strike for the same freedom throughout our nation, and then the shackles of oppression will no longer clank disgrace and woe to our growing republic. As nations and communities are composed of indi- APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 257 viduals, it is evident that all national or social reform depends directly on the reform of individuals, of which society is composed. And individual reform depends on individual action, and this depends on truthful vo- lition being fully carried out by each in his, or her own personal or voluntary habits of life. If these become fully conformed to the vital laws of the organism, that person at length becomes fully confirmed in the glory and lasting pleasure of unperverted existence, which is truth itself. And when persons have arrived at such a state of being, they become truth, and crystallize into lasting pleasure, and moral beauty, and immor- tality. Such a person reflects truthfulness around him in all his actions, and will fully do his duty in whatever social station he may find himself. And hence, the social state of man will be fully reformed when his in- dividual state is thus reformed, and this last is done when each individual truthfully takes hold, and reforms that individual universe, called himself or herself. How easy a thing to reform the world, if each one will do individual duty, by first thoroughly reforming him- self or herself! Many hands make much labor light. If we will each truthfully reform ourselves, the whole work is done! When this is done, all social wrongs will, at once, be corrected, and our nation, and world will be thus fully righted and saved. All avarice, the soul of all oppression, would at once fall, and the oppressed go free. For no heart, that beats in Nature's freedom, can ever oppress others, but desires full free- dom to all, and seeks the happiness of all, by such means as may lie within his power. If individuals are reformed, families, communities, and nations will be 22 258 THE SCIENCE OF MAN reformed, and thus, at length, the world regenerated entire, and heaven brought below, and hell completely annihilated, and social order and eternal truth reign through the earth. All national and social evils arise from individual evils, and these all arise from a disturbed condition of the moral nature, or the world of individual action possessed by each. And this perverted moral action arises from a wrong condition of the material organ- ism, and this last arises from wrongly perverted volun- tary habits of individuals, in non-conformity to the organic laws of their being. Individual reform in vo- luntary habits of life, then, is the basis of all true social reforms ; and society is regenerated, when all the indi- viduals composing that society, are thoroughly reformed in all their voluntary habits, and thus in moral action. Let us now as true Nullifiers, nullify our foes the worst. Sons of Columbia! we are slaves. The golden sun rises, shines, and sets, and looks on a na- tion of slaves. Slavery, like nullification, is of two kinds: slavery to another or foreign servitude, and slavery to self or self-servitude. The first is bad, the last seven-fold worse. The first is a fiery furnace, the last is that furnace seven-fold heated. The first threatens national prosperity, the last destroys indivi- dual prosperity and happiness. The first is an exter- nal expression of perdition, the last is the soul of perdition itself. Let us then nullify the soul of perdi- tion, and its external expression will die of itself, like a body without an indwelling spirit. Here, noble Sons of Thunder, is the place for us to begin. Self-freedom is the thing for which to strike. Let every one free APPLIED TO EPIDEMICS. 259 himself and then we are all free, a glorious nation of true patriots. Let every one govern well his own uni- verse, and the great work is done. Sons of Columbia ! arise and act, and bless yourselves and those around. We are, with all our imperfections, the chosen nation for reforming earth, and introducing heaven here. Arise, and act like true men. Columbia's banner yet shall wave " the stars " of truth without " the stripes" of sin. Her millions squandered now in martial strife and blood, shall yet be turned to noble deeds, in buying Spelling Books and Testaments, to send where bullets flew. Shall schools establish through our land, and colleges endow, for blessing, man with men. O may our banners float to ourselves, and all, the true glory of nations—health, beauty, life, joy, immortality, GOD AND LIBERTY ! APPENDIX. The first systematic, and truly scientific effort at diete- tic reform, made in our nation, was that of Mr. Sylvester Graham, whose public labors, I believe, mainly termi- nated with the publication of his Series of " Lectures on the Science of Human Life," about ten years since. That work, in all its practical bearings on human wel- fare, is a transcript from Living Nature, and ought to be stereotyped in the lasting gratitude of our nation and world. Its rigid induction of sound logic, and full de- monstration of principles, forever established in human nature, will not be tedious to minds toned by a practice of its precepts, to the full vigor and pleasure of truthful thought, and holy musing on the realities, instead of fic- tions of human existence. With Mr. Graham, till quite recently, I had no per- sonal acquaintance, nor have I ever heard any of his public oral efforts. But in my own investigations on the " Science of Man," from the living subject, I have coin- cidently, and with much pleasure, read his "Science of Human Life." And from its perusal, I feel full convic- tion of its having been pencilled from living Nature, and have endeavored to second its truthful bearing on the APPENDIX. 261 temporal welfare of the human race. The principles of human psychology, developed in the preceding pages, fully prove the important bearing of the principles of that work, on the future welfare of man. Graham is no visionary, nor trifler with human welfare. He saw his fellow-beings deluged with evils, —ascertained their cause, and rallied the forces of his own mental and moral universe to the noble conflict, for repelling the numerous, stubborn and inrushing foes to human welfare. "He came, he saw, he conquered." But still the mental Caesar had a traitorous senate to deal with. A Brutus, Cassius, and others, did much misrepresent his doctrines to the world. They act and speak to his discredit. The people were thus deceived, and could not fully under- stand and appreciate their Caesar, till his flowing robe met many an envious thrust. Had they slain him out- right, his wounds trumpet-tongued, would still ring through our nation and world. More than one Anthony would have made those fatal wounds to speak in thunder tones through the moral universe. As long as human hearts can beat in holy freedom, and minds can appreciate truth and the holy and substantial pleasures of being, arising from obedience to organic laws, so long will the name of our mental Caesar be held in grateful remem- brance by the human race. But Brutus and Cassius, and all the traitorous band, at length became mainly dis- persed, and Caesar still lives ; his wounds being mostly healed, and crystallized into so many monuments of true and immortal fame. Whenever I have heard Mr. Graham's principles spoken of with disrespect, by such as lay claim to intel- ligence and science, I have usually asked them whether they have ever read Mr. Graham's works? "No ! " they answer, " but here is one, and there is one, who has tried his system of living, and came near dying under 22* 262 APPENDIX. its operation, and would have died, unless they had re- nounced the visionary course! " As my observation has been somewhat extensive, in tracing out the fallacy and fatalism of these assertions, I deem it my duty here, briefly to reply to them. Some individuals, whose health has been almost totally ruined, have, as a last resort, fallen partially or mainly to the Graham System. These have usually adhered to it, till towed out of the port of immediate organic destruction, and then, instead of " tacking " straight for a prosperous and pleasant voyage to the bright and flowing fields of sound health, and increasing life, and immortality, they, reckless, spread their sails again to diseased appetite and perverted sensualism, and thus get blown directly back among the rocks and quicksands of perdition, and, thus, often get shipwrecked. And as the foundering bark lies surf-driven, and breaking on the rocks that bind the coast of perdition, it is pointed at from the shore, and called a wreck of Grahamism; whereas, it is a wreck of sensualism, that would not be corrected by Grahamism, and such as had been so long freighted with the leeks and onions, and flesh-pots of Egypt, that it soon turned back, as by its own attraction, to the land of servitude and death, and thus drives about on the red sea, till it can effect a landing somewhere in Pharaoh's dominions, and kiss their former chains, and rivet the shackles close for lasting bondage and final death. The beautiful clusters and living fruits of a terrestial Canaan, are snuffed at by nostrils that sneeze with quail-repletion, or something worse, and back they turn to gather fumes from the flesh- pots of Egypt, and thus despise the " goodly land," and repel the Spirit of Truth that proffers protection, and true and lasting pleasure. Again, other individuals pretend to adopt Grahamism, They leave off their meat, tea, coffee, &c , and yet per* APPENDIX. 263 severe in other errors, that nearly, or quite preclude all the benefit they might otherwise derive from having left off those pernicious things. Perhaps they procure some pernicious article of bread, or some of the miserable and health-destroying crackers of commerce, and turn monk outright, or act on the public only for boring them with mental abstractions. These are very detrimental to the cause of physiological reform. If a man cannot preach true Grahamism, by a serene brow and cheerful coun- tenance, and pleasurable and persuasive flow of physical, mental and moral power, he had better keep quiet, till he can, or he will be sure to aid Brutus more than Anthony, and the true welfare of our people and nation. True Grahamism says, live for pleasure, holy, truthful, substan- tial, lasting pleasure. Rome was made for freedom and happiness. And when our mental Caesar crossed the " rubicon " of public sentiment, his flowing banner waved the truthful motto, " Rome shall be free." Live for pleasure, is the true philosophy of life. Existence with- out enjoyment, is not worth having. But let that plea- sure be true, that it may be substantial and lasting. And let that enjoyment be rational, that it may lead to immor- tality. My nullifying pen is not, therefore, bent on boring the world with Grahamism, but only on this — that the world should cease to bore itself with anti- Grahamism. Take every thing according to its true value. "Prove all things, and hold fast that which is good." True Grahamism does not not repel investigation, but invites it, and wishes only not to be misrepresented to the world. Again, some shipwrecked minds, who know as little about true Grahamism, as a polar bear does about the laws of astronomy, plunge into what they consider diete- tic reform with a vengeance, and run into many strange things, and modes of action. And then all their absurdi- 264 APPENDIX. ties are bundled together, and baptized by a self-deceiv- ing world into the name of " Grahamism." Does Grahamism make such moral monstrosities in the world ? Or do the transgressions of the world first make them, and then curse Grahamism for not at once baptiz- ing them, and bringing them forth from the waters, in all the beauty of physical, mental and moral manhood ? Why, I ask, should all this " generation of vipers " be baptized in the name of Grahamism ? Did Graham make them? Or did he only, in the spirit of true philanthropy, endeavor to cure them, after the world had made them ? It is deplorable that the world will not reason a little more for their own good and credit in such matters. Graham, in the spirit of true philanthropy, went forth into the fields of Science, and plucked leaves from the tree of life, and scattered them abroad for healing the nations. The world, ever suspicious towards its best friends, take him, bound as to his brow with the wreaths of true Science, and lead him to the altar. Here, having softened somewhat from its ancient manner of treating benefactors, it did not sacrifice him, but loading him with the sins of those he had attempted to save, sent him thus freighted into the wilderness. But the presence of such an one, causes even the wilderness to bloom like the rose of Sharon. Previous to Mr. Graham's public efforts, the subject of physiology was beginning to excite some interest in Europe, from the efforts of Gall, Spurzheim, Combe, and others, in that department, termed Phrenology. These developed some interesting truths in relation to physio- logy of the brain, as a congeries of mental and moral organs. And yet, this department of physiological science was not rendered fully practical, or subservient to human welfare, till it came into the hands of our Ame- rican physiologists. Mr. Graham taught that not only APPENDIX. 265 the brain, with its nervous expansion over the organism, must be developed and exerted in harmony with the or- ganic laws of the body, but that the little brain or com- mon centre, and the many special and subordinate centres, with their cords, branches, &c, composing the nerves of organic life, must also be thus developed and exerted, together with the other tissues of the organism. This department of physiology has been mainly con- ducted in this our Western World, by the Fowlers, and others acting in concert with them. They harmonize with, and strongly advocate Mr. Graham's views in rela- tion to dietetic regimen. They show the relation of the brain, and its nervous expansion through the organism, to all the other tissues, and in this manner have rendered this science very " practical " in promoting human wel- fare. And yet some who claim to be very good men, seem to look at the efforts of Fowlers and others, who are laboring to bring this subject extensively before the public mind, with suspicion, indifference, or even repulsion. Yet the cause of such opposition is, in most cases, readily perceivable. The Fowlers, Boanerges-hke, come down upon the moral evils of the age, that result from a transgression of the physiological laws of the brain, and of the general organism. Their sin-scathing lightning singes close, over the cranium, and if there is a wrong development, that out-of-order organ gets forked. Moreover, Phrenology says, that sacred temple of the Spirit of truth must be kept pure, by obedience to organic laws, to secure divine residence. Whereas, the shrill voice of the Samsonian, triangular Sage, ringing still upon our ears, from the three o'clock cock-crowing of the sixteenth century, gays, Creeds must be kept right to se- cure salvation, and the practice may come in or not, just as happens. Self-science is the soul of all science. The human 266 APPENDIX. organism, with its external relations, is the grand temple of science. And the brain is the sanctum sanctorum of that temple. The science of the mental and moral powers, as developed through their nervous organs, is, in its connection with the physical powers and their organs, a universe of science, that in its re- lations to the external world, involves all other sci- ence. He that rightly knows himself, can rightly know every thing around him. The science of physiology in all its , branches, should be thoroughly taught at all our Seminaries. And men of true science and phi- lanthropy, who endeavor to enlighten the mass of peo- ple on Physiological Science, are turning their talents to a noble purpose, and will meet due reward. He that proclaims the truth abroad, cannot fail of recompense. In relation to a medicinal use of drugs, I am not alone in my nullifying position. Dr. Jennings, M. D., of Northern Ohio, has lately published a work, called " Medical Reform," which shows up the fallacy of the drugging process in truthful colors. His own extensive experience in treating patients without the use of drugs, and his thorough knowledge in that department, render his opinions worthy of much confidence. Mr. Hunt, of Northampton, has also published a pamphlet on this subject. His opportunities for seeing the evil results of the drugging system, have been exten- sive. Mr. H. has been for several years interested in the progress of physiological reform, and is highly favor- ed with a Companion of such intellectual and moral worth, and true social refinement, as to harmonize with his views. Their family, consisting of four children, are being brought up on the regimen recommended by Mr. Graham. They are but seldom indisposed, and then dietetic restriction, and attention to bathing, soon restore all to rights. Their pleasant, cheerful, sprightly coun- APPENDIX. 267 tenances, and perfect quietude, and peacefulness and playfulness towards each other, present a happy contrast to that opposite state of things which so generally pre- vails in families, and furnish a full demonstration of the utility of Mr. Graham's views. Mr. Hunt's pamphlet is called "A Plea for the'Sick, or JYature against Poison;'1 and portions of it read thus : — " Whoever has lain upon a bed of sickness and en- dured the sufferings of a double conflict with disease and poison ; or, has seen the remains of a dear friend depos- ited in the cold grave, while the clods rattling upon the coffin sent despair through his soul, need not be told that life and health are matters of the highest moment; things too sacred to be trifled with, or neglected. As there are but few, in this age, who have not experienced the bitter sorrows above named, it is believed that no apology, or formal introduction is necessary in presenting for the consideration of the public, the following thoughts of one sympathizing with his afflicted brother man, and earnestly desiring to alleviate his sufferings and promote his health and happiness. " I have long considered the drugging system as one fraught with danger to the lives and health of mankind; a delusion, against which, the people have not been suffi- ciently warned; and with these views I am impelled to utter my feeble testimony by a sense of duty which I feel that I cannot disregard, without being recreant to hu- manity, and disobedient to the dictates of benevolence. I therefore present for consideration, a few thoughts on the " PREVENTION AND CURE OF DISEASE. "In the first place, I Jay down the following funda- mental principle, namely : All pain or disease is caused by transgressing the laws of our being; so that perfect con- formity to the designs of the Creator, would result in 268 APPENDIX. perfect freedom from pain. Health, then, is the general law, the intention of the Creator ; and wherever we find pain, there we hear the voice of God crying, Beware! " The condition on which health is secured, may be briefly stated to be ihe right or appropriate emploijment of all the organs and faculties of our being. The right use of our organs and faculties I deem to include among other things, perfect cleanliness of body and purity of mind; temperance and simplicity in a diet of wholesome vegetable food, particularly of ripe, juicy fruits; constant contact toith pure air; due exposure of the skin to the action of light. I consider light to be visible electricity, and think it exerts a very healthful and invigorating influence upon both body and mind. I believe also, that, a man can never attain his perfect stature, age, health and strength without free bathing in sunlight, as well as water and air. " From the principle above laid down as to the cause of disease, it of course follows, that, as in the spiritual, repentance is the remedy for sin; a repentance which in- cludes reformation; so in the animal kingdom, transgres- sions of natural laws must be cured by amendment of life. Yet not perceiving, or not approving this remedy, men have searched diligently and toiled hard to find out some other cure for their ills; but after all their searching and toiling, after all the inventions they have sought out, it forever remains true, that in order effectually to re- move their diseases, men must ' Go and sin no more;' ' Cease to do evil; learn to do well.1 " The human constitution has been so racked and shattered, so depraved and corrupted by the transgres- sions of men for thousands of years, that we have now but a faint idea of its capabilities, when in its original, undepraved state. The manner, however, in which it has been borne up under the wear and tear of so much APPENDIX. 269 depravity, shows plainly, that it possesses wonderful re- novating powers. Men generally, have too little faith in the healing powers of the human system. If they are sick, some poisonous or other substance must be taken; "some great thing" done for them; and when nature re- lieves them, the cure is attributed to the virtue of the me- dicine, or to the skill of the physician; while the Creator is robbed of his glory. Were men, when under the in- fluence of disease, willing to wait as long to get well without medicine, as they are with it, they would more generally recover; and that too, without inflicting inju- ries upon their bodies by poisonous drugs: for let it be remembered, that it can never be positively shown, that in any case of disease, where drugs were administered, and a cure effected, that nature would not have done bet- ter, if let alone; while every body knows, that disease can be, and is every day removed without medicine. We have positive evidence that, nature alone will cure, while no one can certainly prove that medicine does not produce more evil than good; or rather I may say, there is no positive proof that it does any good whatever. "The most that can be claimed for medicine is, that it removes obstacles to nature's operations. But can we not remove obstacles without resorting to the use of deadly poisons ? If we must do any thing, let us do that which will not inflict the very evils we wish to re- move. I have noted down, from " Materia Medica," some of the effects which the drugs now employed by physicians, are capable of producing in the human sys- tem ; and I wish the reader particularly to notice the following frightful catalogue of disorders which drugs will produce, and say, whether it is reasonable to sup- pose, that in order to induce kind and beneficent Nature to grant us health, she must thus be assailed with " fire- brands, arrows, and death." 23 270 APPENDIX. "A LIST OF MALADIES, which according to the testimony of physicians themselves, can be produced by drugs which are used as remedies ! — Cramps; Coldness of the limbs ; Asphyxia; Intermit- ting, feeble, and quick pulse ; Inflammation of the lungs, throat, and other organs; Pain and difficulty in swallow- ing; Hiccough; Laborious Breathing ; Swelling of the hands, face, &c. ; Diarrhoea ; Vomiting; Gangrene; Palsy; Shaking Palsy; Lockjaw; Irritation, corrosion and spasm of the stomach; Headache; Pulsations and tight- ness in the head; Colic; Pain in the limbs; Jaundice; Palpitation of the Heart; Tremors; Convulsions, local and general ; Nausea ; Lethargy ; Weakness of the Limbs; Loss of Sleep ; Fevers; Cold Sweats; Saliva- tion; Epileptic convulsions; Ulceration of the mouth, throat, intestines; Loosening of the Teeth; Eruptions of different kinds; Cough; Falling off of the Hair and Nails; Ague; Disinclination to exertion; Falling, flushed and livid countenance; Costiveness ; Foul Tongue; Loss of appetite and loathing of food ; Thirst ; Flatulence ; Extreme emaciation; Anxiety; Dropsy; Loss of Me- mory; Insensibility; Blindness; Fatuity; Wandering of the mind; Delirium and DEATH. " What an appalling array of diseases have we here, capable of being produced by the so-called remedies which men are every day taking to promote health! And I have not named them all. On examining the list of remedial agents as laid down in the medical books, it seems as though the earth had been ransacked to find every possi- ble poison that exists, under the strange and fatal delu- sion, that disease may be cured by life-destroying agents. Most of these substances are of the most dangerous na- ture; some of them so intensely poisonous, that a single drop, and even a part of a grain, will destroy life! In the " dark ages," certain persons, called alchemists, en- APPENDIX. 271 deavored to make gold, by a transmutation of the baser metals. But we have now, a more dangerous alchemy. The human stomach is made a crucible, into which every base and vile poison is thrust, vainly hoping there- by to produce that which is more precious than gold : namely health; but which can be obtained only in the more simple and easier way of obedience to the laws of our being. " I intended to present in this connection, a long list of the poisonous medicines, now in use, with a statement of the nature and effects of each ; but the limits which I have fixed for this little work, will prevent my doing so; besides, as I have given a copious list of evils they produce, it will not be necessary to go farther into de- tails. I will, however, present a few, which, if there were no others, ought to be enough to deter any one from coming under the influence of the drugging system. "And first, MERCURY, in the form of Calomel, (a very common medicine,) and in many other forms as Cor- rosive Sublimate, &c. is a most powerful deadly poison. Where it does not not kill outright, it acts with most insidious and blasting effect; gnawing and corrupting with a living death the fair tabernacle of the soul. Its apparent effects vary with the constitution of the victim ; but they are always evil. According to Bell's Materia Medica, two grains of calomel have caused salivation, ulceration of the throat, exfoliation of the lower jaw, and death. Fifteen grains of Blue Pills, taken in three doses, one every night, have excited fatal salivation. Three drachms of Mercurial Ointment, externally applied, have occasioned violent salivation and death in eight days. In persons exposed by their business, as miners and gild- ers, to the action of Mercury, it produces a species of shaking palsy and other diseases. 272 APPENDIX. " 2. ALCOHOL. This well known poison, from its weakest to its most concentrated state, is in very com- mon use, as a solvent, and otherwise, by the medical profession ; though some, I believe, have declared it un- necessary and recommended its abandonment. The sanction given by physicians to the use of this poison as a medicine, has no doubt done much to retard the pro- gress of the Temperance Reform. The effects of Alco- hol are too generally known to be stated here. " 3. ACONITE, a poisonous plant. Bell states, that when the root, or its tincture is swallowed, the most marked symptoms are numbness and tingling of the parts about the mouth and throat and of the extremities ; vom- iting, contracted pupil and failure of circulation. The heart appears to be weakened or paralyzed and a state approaching to asphyxia is produced; while Aconitina an alkaloid extracted from Aconite, is so poisonous that a twentieth part of a grain killed a sparrow, and one- fiftieth of a grain taken internally, by an elderly person, nearly proved fatal. "4. HEMLOCK. Conium maculatum. This is a poisonous plant, common in this country. According to the author above named, Conia, the active principle of Hemlock, is a deadly poison to every order of animals. It first palsies the voluntary muscles, then the respiratory muscles and the diaphragm, thus producing death by Asphyxia. Few poisons equal it in subtility and swift- ness. A drop put into the eye of a rabbit, killed it in nine minutes. Three drops in the same way killed a cat in a minute and a half. Two grains of conia neutralized by hydrochloric acid and injected into the femoral vein of a young dog produced almost instantaneous death The Extract of Hemlock, in over doses, (a common dose being only from one to three grains,) produces vertigo, APPENDIX. 273 wandering of the mind, dilation of the pupil, paralysis, and ultimately, the symptoms above mentioned as result- ing from conia. " With these I close; for space would fail me, to tell of Antimony, of Arsenic, of Prussic Acid, of Iodine, of Deadly Nightshade, of Opium, and the numerous other poisons which have made such terrible havoc of the lives and health of mankind. " And now, reader, Nature and Poison, Life and Death are set before you ; choose which you will fol- low." With such an array of the poisonous substances used by a considerable portion of the Medical Profession, can it be wondered at, that the dark hearses move so often through our streets, carrying their drugged contents to the tomb ? Can we wonder at the many fatal cases the doctors usually have on hand ? How such a system of empiricism ever came to be baptized into the name of Science, it is difficult to conjecture. It is high time that these flood-gates of depopulation and misery, should be closed, and that the Medical Profession should act in harmony with, instead of in direct opposition to Nature. Let them adopt a system of human pathology that is based on human nature, instead of on blind conjecture and total incertitude. The true and honest of that Pro- fession are not slow to take such a course. And as to the others, their fees must be mainly for absence, at least among those of Nature's Nobility. For one, who has seen and considered the many evils resulting from such a state of things, to keep silence would be moral treason of the highest kind. Where youth, beauty, strength and age, fall alike to the destroyer, there must be reform. Human life is too valuable to be trifled with, and often thrown away. There was one, of whom, if a brother's heart has a 23* 274 APPENDIX. right to feel, I may speak. The bloom of health her fea- tures wore, and beamed the joy of youthful hope. The flame of early life burned bright and clear. She entered life with cheering prospects. A few years passed. The bloom of health fades. The life-expression dies away from her features. The hectic flush, from surrounding paleness, indicates an approach of the destroyer. A few months, and she is no more. The sun in golden splendor, rises and sets, pouring, in his daily rounds, a flood of light and beauty all over the earth. The seasons roll on, scattering in their way a rich variety of blessings. Flowers bloom — fruits ripen — zephyrs blow — cooling breezes invigorate — sparkle the frosty gems, and fly, in sportive mood, the snowy flakes and wintry storms. The air, the earth, the waters, are full of floating melody. She heeds it not. The joys of life are no longer hers. She sleeps low in the dust. And if her remembrance, at times, starts the tear of lingering affection, she knows it not. Eternal silence reigns in her narrow mansion, and lasting night hovers about her low resting place. She might have been now in the prime and glory of womanhood. The joys of life might still have been hers. Misguided friends, and two or three M. D.'s had the mis- management of her. The first symptoms were those of a common cold. These increased into those of what is usually termed "quick consumption." The drugging system was brought into full and fatal operation. ° The case was soon pronounced incurable. All the craving of a diseased appetite, usually attending such cases, were complied with. The doctors shook their heads in wise incertitude, and said she cannot live; let her eat and drink for soon she must die. In compliance with this diploma- tic, fatal ignorance, she was freely fed, sometimes six or eight times per day, with buttered toast, fish, fowl, fat APPENDIX. 275 meat, &c. Nature struggled, reeled, fell! She was fed, drugged, driven out of the world ! At the time, I was at considerable distance from home. As soon as I was informed of her condition, I wrote, en- treating friends to cease drugging and promiscuous feed- ing, and in place, give attention to room ventilation, judicious bathing, proper diet, &c. But all to no effect. The die was cast ! For who could know any thing about the treatment of disease, except doctors and pill-ba^s ? Since that time, I have known of more desperate cases than hers, completely recovered by means, which I in vain recommended in her case. The desperation of cases the doctors so much complain of, arises from wrong treatment, instead of inefficacy in Nature's curative power. Who can see what I have seen, and feel what I have felt from such a state of things, and not speak out ! If I should keep silent, I should prove a traitor to the dearest interests of humanity. "I have an idea," said a heavy, luxuriant, English Nobleman to his sensitive wife. " 'Tis a wonder," said she, " You are seldom troubled with such things! " The same may be truly said of certain diplomatic ones. If, at times, they have an idea creeping through their en- shrouded minds, it is, in lurid glare, reflected there, from the fatal formulas of Death's Recipe Book, or Blind Man's Repository. Some doctors, however, are not as dull, as they are dishonest, in dealing out to others what they would by no means take themselves, under similar circumstances. Said a certain physician, in a Western town, one who had accumulated a large property by medical practice,— " I have a severe headache." " Why do you not take some medicine for it ? " said a bystander. " /take me- dicine," said the Doctor, "I have not taken an ounce of medicine for twenty years ! J never take medicine." 276 APPENDIX. But said the other, " How do you get well when you are sick ? " " I go without eating two or three days, and Nature cures me." " Beware ! " said a brother physi- cian at hand, — " beware, how you let out the secrets ! of our profession." A Southern medical student, with whom I was seve- ral months associated, in attending a course of anatomi- cal reading and instruction, under diplomatic direction, said to me one day, "When I have obtained my diploma, I am going to such a region, (a very sickly section of country,) and in a few years I can amass an immense property: " (wishing no longer to draw so heavily on the old gentleman's purse.) But, said I to him, do you be- lieve the principles of medical practice correct, and their application beneficial to human welfare? " Principles cor- rect, and practice useful!" said he, "why, no! I be- lieve the whole a d----n—d humbug ! but the people will be humbugged, and I may as well do it as any body else !" Advising him to renounce such reckless and dangerous principles of moral action, I remarked, — pointing to our text book on anatomy, — the perusal of that work has afforded me much pleasure, but it has thrown me at eternal war with that work, (Materia Medi- ca,) by showing me that the wonderful tissues, composing the human body, can have no possible affinity, or patho- logical relation to such external substances, as are treat- ed of in the Materia Medica, and, therefore, moral honesty forever precludes me from an application of such pretended remedies. Their operation, according to our best Medical Authorities, is entirely uncertnin. And, hence, their results must ever prove fallacious, and often fatal. The Southener listened to my remarks with some degree of attention, though he considered me quite too scrupulous for successful action in a world so bent on de- lusion. Said he, " If a man wishes wealth and notoriety, APPENDIX. 277 he must use empiricism. And I would as soon use Thom- sonian as Diplomatic, were it popular as the regular practice, and were it not so freighted with nondescripts and old grannies." There is as much science in one as the other, and this much in favor of the Thomsonian, that a patient is not so readily steamed or peppered out of the world, an drugged out. An organic hell kindled up by cayenne pepper, is not often so immediately fatal, as one kindled by mineral drugs. The fires of the cayenne hell, flare up in furious blaze, like a flame sweeping through a mass of dry combustibles, and then subside. While the fires of the mineral hell burn deep and dull and lurid, and roll up, in dark thick volumes, their sul- phurean fumes, as from a " lake of fire and brimstone " that burneth without cessation, filling the whole organic horizon with heavy, dismal clouds of suffocating smoke, and red-hot cinders, as from the bottomless pit of perdi- tion, and deluging the organic universe with full swarms of locusts and scorpions, that devour, sting, bite, and destroy every thing in their course, blighting, withering, cursing the whole organism, and leaving all a wreck of ruins! This last, however, is the most popular way of descending to the shades, and popularity is every thing in our world ! Nevertheless, as life may have attractions to some, I will plainly and truthfully speak, that all may avoid poi- sons, and live. But when " the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain to be delivered " from this worse than Egyptian bondage, it is true that all the friends of truth and humanity, should act in concert, for nullifying this science of death, and in its place, substitute the science of life for curing the sick. While we long to see no more drugging out of life, we wish a plain, practical mode of co-operating with Nature in her curative work. Na- ture's organic life must perform the cure, while the means 27S APPENDIX. used are to be such as harmonize with the action of organic life. All disease is caused by imperfect vital conduction in the tissues of the organism. By the presence of unvitalized material, these tissues are brought into such condition, as to be imperfect conductors of vitality. As an indica- tion of such imperfect vital conduction, in any of the tissues or parts of the organism, pain is there felt, that the danger to which the organism is exposed, may be known to its possessor. The object of the remedial pro- cess, is to restore the tissues of the organism to their right condition, for perfect vital conduction. To remove disease and thus cure the patient, we must, first, shut down the gate of organic transgression, and thus turn off the inflowing current of disease. Second, we must co-operate with Nature, in repairing the mischief already done to the organism by previous transgression. The first is done by ceasing at once from all improper diet, and exposure to ex- ternal violent exertion. The second is effected by pure air, cleanliness, and proper exercise. These are Nature's Materia Medico. Pure Air is the natural element for all human organ- isms. There are two surfaces, which Nature has mar- ried to the air, for constant embrace, in the production of animal heat and elimination. Every human organism has two respiratory surfaces, the skin and lungs. If air be divorced from the external skin, respiration is thrown at once to the internal, or pulmonary mucous membrane. If it be divorced from the internal skin, the person dies at once. Or if either surface be long held from atmos- pheric embrace, the respiratory function is soon broken down, and death is induced. The skin and lungs then must be retained in a healthful condition, or health and life must soon be lost. The lungs can be retained in per- APPENDIX. 279 fectly healthful action, only by exclusion of all improper diet, and by habitual embrace of a pure atmosphere. Cleanliness relates to the external surface. This must be retained free from all impurities, or cutaneous incrustations, which preclude its embrace with a pure at- mosphere. To effect this, the use of pure soft water becomes requisite. Nature's mode of furnishing us with this pure element, is that of showering. When she gathers over us her " wet sheets," she does not let them all fall at once, and thus drench us "through and through " as by a full deluge; — but she commences with true motherly care to wring those sheets, and thus, in- stead of letting down an ocean at once, she patters it down, in rolling drops, chasing each other in playful mood, and striving each for an early dash ! Shower Bathing with pure soft water, is Nature's own baptismal font, for purifying the external surface. It does not divorce the air from the external surface, like full immersion, but immediately slides along off, leaving the surface to be wiped perfectly clean, for full atmos- pheric embrace. Next to this, in propriety and utility, is the sponge bath, or external application of water by a sponge, towel or hand, and then immediate use of a dry towel for wiping and friction. Where a shower bath cannot be had for daily use, this is a very good substitute, to be used each morning, or as circumstances may require. A bowl of soft water, and a little good soap, and a coarse towel, are far more efficacious means of restoring and promoting health than many may suppose. They will lay these pretended, far-fetched remedies all on the back ground. Vaporized, Tepid, and Cold Baths may be requi- site, when, by long neglect, the skin has become almost 280 APPENDIX. completely incrusted over with impurities, so as nearly to preclude its contact with the atmosphere. When a sudden attack of acute disease has thus been induced, immersion in a tepid bath may be requisite to remove, as soon as possible, that cutaneous incrustation. And several immersions, in regular succession, may be needed. To those breaking off from a long use of to- bacco, several repetitions of a vaporized bath may be expedient, in throwing off the deep impurities, with which the tissues of the organism have become impreg- nated by a use of the noxious weed. Cold Bathing, or full immersion in cold water, should be used only by the robust, or in case of sudden attacks of severe fevers, where there is considerable constitutional power still on hand. In feeble health, it should rarely, if ever be re- sorted to. Full immersion in water, precludes the skin from atmospheric embrace, except that small portion of air contained in water. And as the external surface of the human organism, is not, like that of a fish, fitted to gather in, and use that small portion of oxygen in the water, it is hazardous, and sometimes fatal to remain a long time in the water. And, hence, the heavy or labored breathing one feels on first immersion in cold water. It drives respiration almost entirely from the external skin, to the internal, or that of the lungs, thus bringing these into double exertion. And if this is done soon after a full meal, or when the blood-vessels of the or- ganism are over-distended by full and loose diet, it some- times proves immediately fatal. It requires great cau- tion and discretion to use full immersion in cold water, without detriment and danger. And I am persuaded, that the shower bath for daily use is far preferable. Voluntary exercise should be taken as much as possible in the open air. It should be such as to give free motion to the whole organism, and at the same time, not be appendix. 281 carried so far as to induce exhaustion of the vital power. Such exertion should be rendered as cheerful and agree- able as possible, and proper exercise cannot be other- wise, after the flow of health is again induced. For action is vitality's own appropriate sphere within the or- ganism. Organic vitality rules for action, and maturing into immortality. And whoever opposes correct organic action fights against Nature and his own interests. Na- ture loves to act, and she will act with pleasure to organic beings, if they do not obstruct her healthful action. In cases of acute diseases or epidemics, manual fric- tion over the surface, should in no case be omitted; And where the patient is confined to bed, it should be one of right materials, (no feathers nor filth,) and it should be so arranged that the position of the patient, through the day, should be as elevated as may be endured without exhaustion, so as to have the body approximate to that of an upright, or its natural position through the day, that the patient may sleep better at night. The room should be ventilated in such a manner as not to let a stream of cold air directly on the patient. But the air in the room must be kept pure. It would be much better that the room should be supplied with a fire-place instead of a stove. The patient should be kept free as possible from noise and disturbance. The common practice of letting in a host of visitors and friends into a sick room, is a most wretched way of showing friendship to the patient. It is a heavy task on well persons to endure the blab of pivot tongues, without being forced to its endurance in time of sickness, when vitality is at very low ebb, and demands repose for recruiting itself. One or two persons in good health, and with a full share of discretion and in- telligence, is all the company requisite for a sick person. Old grannies, and quacks should be entirely excluded, as 24 282 APPENDIX. well as the numerous calls, that wrongly directed friend- ship may make. A call back into full life and enjoy- ment, is all the call that Nature allows. All others are pernicious, and sometimes fatal to the patient. With due respect and much friendship towards the no- ble-hearted Priessnitz and his worthy followers, I think two things need modification, and that there should be a change of nomenclature, to render their system Nature's own curative mode, baptized into a correct name. That " hermetical envelopment" of the patient in wet blankets and close bandages, for four, five, or six hours, is anti- natural. It produces almost complete divorcement of the external surface from contact with the air. That God-ordered atmospheric embrace is for a while com- pletely broken off, and thus its respiration forced inward upon the lungs. Strong constitutions may endure the operation, and it is, without doubt, attended with far less danger than the old mineral treatment. Still it is objec- tionable, and should be either discontinued or consider- ably modified, to harmonize it with the general propriety of the water-cure treatment. I doubt very much the propriety of producing such profuse perspiration, by artificial means. It may, like blood-letting, apparently afford present relief, from previous repletion. But its final result on a full recovery, I think, is doubtful. It seems that Priessnitz himself has considerably changed his mind, concerning the propriety of such severe sweat- ing. For it is said that where he formerly sweated fifty patients, he does not now sweat half-a-dozen. This por- tion of the water-cure treatment needs considerable mo- dification, if not disuse and substitution of some of the other modes of water-application to the organism. The other thing referred to, is that of injections or clysters. In their place should be substituted, external abdominal pressure. This may be effected by the hand, appendix. 283 or handle of a flesh-brush, or any hard, smooth substance passed with even, or uniform pressure, over the abdo- men. Or if the patient is not too feeble, he can exert himself, by a medium balance on a jumping pole, in some gymnasium, and thus secure the requisite action of the bowels. Action thus caused by external pressure, is far more natural and health-tending, than that caused by a rude invasion of the organic precincts, by reversed action. And I am knowing to several cases where the most stubborn constipation has been thus removed, and the bowels brought into full and regular action. Every water-cure establishment, where location will admit, should be supplied with a gymnasium, for full exertion to such patients as may have strength enough to engage in gymnastic exertion. Each should also be supplied with a well-selected library of physiological works, that the patients, during their stay at such establishment, may fill up their leisure moments, in acquiring a general knowledge of the laws of life and health. As to the name, I think that instead of calling it the water-cure, it should be called the life-cure. For accord- ing to Dr. Shew and others, who have ably advocated, and successfully practised hydropathy in our country, water is only one of the several means that come into the course of treatment. Proper diet, pure air, and ex- ercise must come in with the water application, in order to insure recovery. This co-operation of means is sound Pathological Science. But why should it be named after water rather than any other means ? Why not call it air-cure, or diet-cure, or exercise-cure ? Or in profuse nomenclature, join them all? But how is the cure effect- ed after all ? Is it by one, or two, or all of these means combined ? Does not organic vitality or life sit within on the throne of its tissues, and effect the cure, when by the use of these means, the way is prepared for life to 284 APPENDIX, act on "those diseased tissues ? Which cures then — vi- tality, or these means used externally by vitality, for aiding her own internal curative process ? It is life acting within organic tissues, that effects the cure, while these are only means co-operative with that process. Should the curative agent, or the curative means used by that agent, give name to the cure ? 1 earnestly hope that our American hydropathists, will improve and render hydropathy as " practical" on human welfare, as have our American physiologists made Phre- nological Science. The tension of American minds should invariably be directed fully to utility, in universal improvement of our nation and race. We ought not to divide among ourselves on minor points, or our own pe- culiar views, but with noble liberality and philanthropy of soul, to break forth into the flowing fields of true sci- ence, and ascertain what truth is, and then bend our theories and practice accordingly. Then we shall all be truly great, and bless the world with well directed efforts. Hydropathy, as it is, must be regarded by every un- prejudiced and intelligent mind, as a God-send to suffer- ing humanity, to relieve it from the horrors of drugging. And when it becomes fully trimmed by American minds, and moulded in every respect according to the prin- ciples of true Pathological Science, it is Nature's own approved co-operative means, for effecting wonderful cures to the human race. But that Nature may not be robbed of her curative glory, its name should be changed from water-cure to that of life-cure. BRIEF VOCABULARY. Aneurism,—Bursting a blood-vessel by over-distension or violent action. Apoplexy,—Suspension of the accretive and decretive functions, mainly through the organism, thus causing sudden deprivation of all sensation and voluntary motion, and often instantaneous death. Caused by repletion in the blood-vessels, or by the presence of foreign or anti- organic material in the blood. Excessive use of narco- tic and alcoholic drinks, with general neglect of exercise is almost sure to induce, sooner or later, a fit of of apo- plexy, a few attacks of which, a person but seldom sur- vives. The means to be used, for the recovery of one from such a fit, are brisk and careful manual friction, over the surface and limbs. The means of prevention are plain, abstemious and regular diet, proper exercise, bathing, &c. Asthma,—Difficulty of breathing. Caused by too great pressure of blood on the mucous membrane of the lungs. Remedy, dietetic restriction, bathing, &c. Ague,—Absence of animal heat, and usually succeeds febrile action. See Lecture III. Congestion,—Partial apoplexy, or suspension of the accretive and decretive function in the tissues of parti- cular organs or parts, as the lungs, brain, or other organ. Caused and prevented in a manner as is Apo- plexy. 286 BRIEF VOOABl'l.ARY. Consumption,—Wasting of the lungs, and through them, of all the structures. Scrofulous concretion, or ulceration, gradually takes place in the pulmonary structure, thus partially precluding the mucous mem- brane from its respiratory function, and that of fully vi- talizing the chyme, and hence there is produced but imperfect vital calorification, and elimination of worn-out materials in Ihe dark blood, and very imperfect arterial blood formed, and thus all the structures of the body become wasted away, and the whole organism becomes extremely emaciated, and deprived of strength. Unless this process is arrested, it invariably ends in death. Con- sumption is caused by improper quality and quantity of food, perverted sensualism, neglect of cleanliness, and wrong habits generally. It may invariably be cured, if taken before extensive and heavy ulceration prevails, and brought under right treatment for arresting its pro- gress. That right treatment is this, a plain, regular, abstemious, farinaceous diet, with pure, soft water for drink, and daily bathing in soft water, proper exercise, and due regulation of all the passions. Such a course of treatment, with an entire disuse of all kinds of medi- cine, is an infallible remedy for the consumption. Bronchitis,—Inflammation and soreness of the throat, often very much obstructing the power of speech. Cur- ed by restriction to a plain, abstemious, farinaceous diet, daily bathing, and keeping the neck in free contact with pure air, and proper exercise. Cough,—Convulsive action of the lungs, caused by the presence of unvitalized material, brought to the mu- cous membrane of the lungs, where exuding through its minute pores, it comes in contact with the air, and ex- cites the lungs to convulsive action, for effecting its ejectment from the organism. To attempt to cure the cough, while that phlegmatic concretion remains on the BRIEF VOCABULARY. 287 mucous membrane of the lungs, is dangerous, and often fatal folly. It is the only way Nature has for throwing off that morbid concretion of the lungs, and thus saving the patient from immediate organic destruction. The only proper way for removing a cough, is to receive into the organism, only such a quality and quantity of food as can readily be reduced to the tissues of the organism, and thus, that morbid concretion will be soon arrested, having no material from which to form itself. Colds and coughs can invariably be cured by fasting, bathing, exercise, &.c. Convulsions, — Spasmodic muscular contractions. See latter part of Lecture III. Cancer, — Morbid concretion, or virulent sore among the organic tissues. Caused by impurities and excess of blood. Cured and avoided, by such regimen as will se- cure healthful blood, or such as is of the right quality and quantity. Colic, Cholera Morbus and Cholera, —See Lec- ture II. Diarrho3;a, —Frequent flux of the bowels, caused by an accumulation of unvitalized material along the ali- mentary canal. Dysentery, — Violent diarrhoea, when the discharges are mainly blood. For mode of treatment, see Lecture II. Dyspepsia, — Bad digestion. Cured by dietetic re- striction, and due regulation of all the passions. Diabetes, —An excessive discharge of urine. Delirium Tremens, — Tremulous muscular spasms, accompanied by frightful distortions of the imagination. Caused by excessive use of alcoholic drinks. Cured by total abstinence from alcoholic drinks, and a proper die- tetic regimen. Dropsy, — Watery collections in and about the tissues 288 BRIEF VOCABULARY. of the organism. Caused by excess in eating and drink- ing, and neglect of exercise. Cured by reform. Epilepsy, — Convulsions of the whole or part of the organism, with a loss of sensation. Caused by excessive indulgence in perverted sensualism. To be treated and prevented as apoplexy. Fever, — An accumulation of animal heat within the tissues of the organism. See Lecture III. Gout,—Diseased fulness of the tissues, causing pe- riodic pains, and great lameness in the muscles of the body, and loss of strength. Caused by excessive eating and drinking, and perverted sensualism and laziness. Cured by regular and abstemious diet, and due regula- tion of the passions, and bathing and energetic exercise. Hemorrhoids,—The piles, or painful swellings of the tissues of the rectum. Caused by irregular habits, and cured by proper regimen, in diet, bathing, and ex- ercise. Inflammation,— Partial fever, or fever in the tissues of particular organs or parts. Gravel, — Concretion of small hard substances in the kidneys and bladder. Caused by improper diet. Cured by a thorough dietetic reform. Jaundice, — Diseased condition, and sallow com- plexion of the tissues of the organism. Caused by a partial or temporary suspension of the bilious secretion of the liver. King's Evil, —A kind of scrofula. Leprosy, — A painful disease, attended by a concre- tion of white scales along the external surface. Common in warm climates. Lethargy,—Morbid drowsiness. Cured by abste- miousness and exercise. Liver Complaint, — A diseased condition of the tis- sues of the liver, thus deranging the whole organism. BRIEF VOCABULARY. 289 Caused by disobedience to organic laws, and cured by dietetic reform, and avoided bv conformity to organir laws. . J b Lunacy,—Diseased condition of the brain, causing thereby derangement of the mental and moral powers. Caused by loose living, and perverted sensualism, and more especially by solitary indulgence. Morbid Action, —Diseased action. Normal Action, — Healthful action. Ossification, — Bony formation, or a changing of soft tissues to hard. Cured and avoided by correct regimen in diet, bathing, exercise, &c. Palpitation,—Hurried and irregular action of the heart, arteries, and veins. Caused by repletion of the blood-vessels, or sudden and severe exertion. Cured by regularity in all the habits of life. Pneumonia, — Inflammation and rapid consumption of the lungs. Pleurisy, — Inflammation of the pleura or lining mem- brane of the thorax. Cured by bathing, pure air, and dietetic restriction. Rheumatism, — Imperfect organization from too rapid succession in the accretion and decretion of animal solids Cured by fasting, bathing, and proper exercise. Rickets, — Growing out of shape, common to child- ren. Cured by immersing them in cold water every morning, and restriction in their diet Rupture, — Breaking up of the contmuousnes?* of or- ganic tissues, either by external violence or internal dis- ease, Suffocation, — Choking by external pressure or in- ternal obstruction in the windpipe, thus precluding the air from the mucous membrane of the lungs, Tympany, —A dry, windy dropsy. Vf.rtigo, — Giddiness, or whirling sensation in the 25 290 BRIEF VOCABULARY. brain. Cured by shower-bathing and correct dietetic regimen. St. Vitus' Dance, — Tremulous, spasmodic action of the muscles. Caused by perverted and solitary indulg- ence, and full, heating diet. Cured by dietetic restric- tion and bathing, and complete reform from debasement. Most, or all diseases are curable, if the proper means are used, and these means are such as co-operate with, and prepare the way for Nature's vitality, to act health- fully within the tissues of the organism. The object of all pathological treatment, is to restore the tissues of the organism to their right condition for healthful vital ac- tion. And when that state is attained, the way to avoid all future disease, is to obey that truthful direction : — "Go AND SIN NO MORE."