Part 10

To those who have carefully and scientifically undergone or advised the fast, the cause of the symptoms that Dr. Kellogg and all of the rest of us recognize as indicating self-poisoning, is readily discovered to lie in the inability of the organs of elimination to promptly convey from the body the products of food supplied in excess of digestion. It is a conclusion that cannot be escaped that, when the refuse from broken-down tissue and from food ingested beyond the needs of the body is discharged into the intestines, and when means of removal are not at hand, re-absorption at once begins and continues until the canal is cleansed. Self-poisoning, autointoxication, ensues, and all of its symptoms were emphatically shown in the fast of seventeen days that Mr. Fletcher essayed. These results are also often observed when feeding is in progress, and in this connection I refer to an article written by Dr. Kellogg for _Good Health_ in the summer of 1908. In it he says, "The writer's observations, extending over a considerable number of years, have brought him to the conclusion that the cases which are benefited by fasting are practically without exception cases of autointoxication, generally cases of intestinal autointoxication, though perhaps also including some cases of metabolic autointoxication." It seems to me that the Doctor has not made it quite clear just why, if the fast is the certain producer of the condition, he recommends it for the cure of the condition. Perhaps "similia similibus" or "the hair of the dog theory" is implanted in the Doctor's ego.

As we review the situation, covering in origin thousands and thousands of years of wrong living, the facts are patent. The processes of digestion and assimilation as functions have long since lost natural expression. Drugs and heredity have created in them an inability to cope with their work without assistance, and have in many instances caused a positive cessation of normal action.

Dr. Kellogg would have us accept his dictum that the cause of loss of weight during the fast is to be found in the impoverished state of the blood, and in the fact that, food being denied, no up-building of tissue can occur. Can he explain in this manner the wasting of tissue in illness when food is regularly supplied? It should be readily understood that, in either instance, the process of elimination of decomposed excess food has at last become the predominant function of the diseased system. Fasting is the voluntary act that permits rapid accomplishment of the result; and disease itself is but Nature's attempt to cleanse and purify by means of elimination. The longer this thought is dwelt upon, and the more its details are verified by experiment, the stronger becomes the conviction that we are facing the truth of the matter.

When coated tongue, foul breath, and vertigo appear, whether feeding or fasting, hunger is absent. It must have disappeared many days before these signs became acute, although Nature's warnings did not fail of display. The sensation of hunger, the desire for food for the purpose of restoring cell life, is the human body's greatest natural safeguard. A sentinel of lower rank is the sense of taste, which, however, like other outposts, often becomes debauched and valueless. But hunger never can be turned from its protecting task, and it cannot be stimulated into action. Hunger is the one natural function that is incorruptible, for once abused it withdraws. Its deceptive counterpart, appetite, is the product of taste-stimulation, and, as Mr. Fletcher says, takes upon itself the guise of habit. Or, as expressed in the text of my book, "Appetite is craving; Hunger is desire. Craving is never satisfied; but Desire is relieved when Want is supplied. Eating without Hunger or pandering to Appetite at the expense of Digestion makes Disease inevitable."

Had real normal hunger been present when Mr. Fletcher broke his fast, the demand for food would have been so great and so insistent that no denial would have been tolerated. Mr. Fletcher states that he did not want food until he had tasted it,--a clear case of taste-stimulation or appetite. Even this was momentary and was but the expiring flame of taste relish left after seventeen days free from the progressive accumulation of excess food. Despite his care in the selection and the mastication of his food, Mr. Fletcher must still have continually eaten without hunger, and must, as a result, have stored within his system an unusual amount of material beyond the needs of his body. Had this not been true, he would not have exhibited the coated tongue, foul breath, and vertigo. Hunger would have been ever present, and it would have been impossible for him to fast.

My only comment upon the neglect of the enema that seems to have occurred in the conduct of Mr. Fletcher's fast is that it was a most vital error. The enema is absolutely necessary. The question of diet also need not be discussed, for experience shows that the feeding of the body is a matter of individual requirement. If normal physical balance be ever reached, fixed laws to govern the diet problem could be formulated. In its present state, argument resolves itself into mere utterances of individual opinion and prejudice.

Faithfully yours, LINDA BURFIELD HAZZARD.

+-------------------------------------------------+ |Transcriber's note: | | | |Obvious typographic errors have been corrected. | | | +-------------------------------------------------+