The Healthy Life Part 32

To breathe correctly and sufficiently is to live more healthily. This dictum is incontrovertible, and it becomes my pleasant duty herein to demonstrate its truthfulness. And, after a careful perusal of the hundred exercises which the auth.o.r.ess has so clearly and succinctly described, I am still more convinced of the very great, one might almost say of the tremendous, importance of deep-breathing exercises.

What has struck me so forcibly in this little book is the fact that there is no undue enthusiasm evident; no embellishment of the subject; no extravagant claims for the system advocated; just a plain sane, sober and intelligent description of procedures of immense value to all who would either keep, or improve, their health. The auth.o.r.ess has, as it were, laid before the reader a feast of good things in the way of physical culture, and leaves it at that. She seems to have brought into purview a splendid variation of the exercises, and indeed every mode of breathing and exercise likely to be beneficial--to those in health as out of it.

Reverting for a moment to the supreme importance of the subject, I may say that it has of late years come home to me more than ever, and with greater insistency, that innumerable ills of to-day are due to faulty breathing and lack of correct physical exercises generally. I wonder how many of us could conscientiously say that we devote fifteen or twenty minutes regularly every day to the system? And yet such a great deal could be done for health in that time! No, we "haven't time," or we "oversleep ourselves so often," or we make some such other flimsy excuse; but of course we ought to "make time," we ought not to "oversleep ourselves." The fact is, rather, that most of us are too lazy to go through the exercises, even though we may know of their transcendent benefit. In the words of the poet: "Let us, then, be up and doing"--that is, up in time in the morning in order to be going through exercises such as described in this little volume.

It is within my personal knowledge, and must be within the personal knowledge of every actively engaged physician, that but very few of us yet have any idea, in spite of all the teaching and the advocacy of it, of really deep and scientific breathing. If the system could be made quite general and enforced upon us--especially when young or adolescent--we should not see, as we do now, _thousands_ walking about the streets whose nostrils are too narrow through insufficient breathing, whose lungs are not properly inflated as they inspire; and, as a consequence, who have neither the bloom nor the carriage of health.

Perhaps if I show here how vastly important it is for us to have our blood well oxygenated, it may be some sort of encouragement for Mrs Lazarus's readers to persevere with and _work into their lives_ the system she advocates and describes.

If we did not renew the oxygen in our lungs to a sufficient extent, we should die in a few minutes. We can do without food for many days; without water for less days, but only for a few minutes without oxygen. Anything which tends to increase the intake of this vitally important element, whether deeper breathing or exercises, will have a very p.r.o.nounced effect upon our general health. Now deep breathing is, _par excellence_, the way to bring about this desirable condition. It may interest the readers of this little book if I remind them that in the ordinary way the total capacity of the lungs is about 340 cubic inches; as a rule, the amount of air breathed amounts only to some 20 or 30 cubic inches, but this, by special effort, can be increased by some 110 cubic inches. Thus it is demonstrated how much more air we could take into the lungs by better and deeper breathing, thereby securing, sooner or later, a greater natural expansion of the lungs, with the result, of course, of improved health generally.

It would surprise most people if they tested their breathing capacity by the aid of the spirometer, to discover how inefficiently they did breathe; in other words, how much below the normal was the amount of air they were usually inspiring. Encouragement might also be found in the matter--incentive, that is, to learn how to breathe and exercise correctly and scientifically--if mention were here made categorically of the very profound influences upon certain physiological processes of our organisation which are brought about if we would but mend our ways in this respect. s.p.a.ce will only allow of a few such to be detailed.

1. The circulation is improved and equalised. This implies much more than appears on the surface: it means that the blood is made to flow from any congested internal organ (such as the liver, stomach, etc.) towards the peripheries--that is, the extremities and everywhere where there is the capillary system--the changing-place between the venous and the arterial blood; thus we at the same time warm our extremities and relieve internal congestion. In other words, "to bring the blood to the surface" in many conditions of ill-health is of paramount importance.

2. It will strengthen the action of the heart and lungs. For lack of proper breathing exercises the heart's walls get thin, the expansive power of the lungs' tissue gets less, and as a consequence, when any little extra strain is thrown upon either, permanent damage is often the result.

3. In any tendency to constipation, indigestion and similar conditions, such exercises are especially beneficial, and that both by flushing the system with more oxygen and by mechanically exerting pressure on the different organs--thus giving those latter what is actually a good ma.s.saging!

4. Indirectly, such exercises must of necessity be splendid for "nerves," as we thus get these supplied with a larger amount of purified blood, and of course this must result in better and heightened nerve and brain action.

And all this--and much more which we have not s.p.a.ce enough to deal with--being so, it might now be well asked, who and what cla.s.s of individuals would benefit by these exercises. The list is a long one, and would include practically all growing children and adolescents--in order that adenoids, narrow chests, debility in general, malnutrition and a host of other abnormal states might be either cured or prevented. Innumerable adults would also benefit by such exercises: those who are in health, in order to keep so; those who are depressed mentally, or who are suffering from constipation, dyspepsia, anaemia, obesity, debility, etc.

Even those who are "getting on" in years could, with care and caution, go through such exercises to advantage, providing, that is, that their heart, lungs and blood vessels are fairly normal; it is only where there is serious organic disease such exercises must be withheld.

Thus we have a big field for such a system which Mrs Lazarus has described so fully in this little work of hers; it deserves wide recognition, and my final word to the reader is not only to keep the book as a "boon companion," but to encourage others to purchase it and to carry out its most excellent teachings.

J. STENSON HOOKER, M.D.

LETTERS OF A LAYMAN.

1.--DOCTORS AND HEALTH.

Medicine is a progressive science--and art, if we judge by the statistics given of the fall in the rate of mortality. Even this, however, must be carefully a.n.a.lysed, because a good deal of the fall of mortality is due to the great reduction in the birthrate which has taken place in the last twenty years. Still, after this has been allowed for, there is probably a balance in the doctors'

favour--something to the good of the science and art of medicine.

Doubtless the science is improved and the practical advice offered by medical men is better and more effectual than it used to be.

A layman, nevertheless, may be forgiven if, with all due deference, he is tempted to believe that many of the benefits attributed to medicine have been achieved through attention to sanitation--cleanliness and ventilation. Of course this is due to the work of science, which necessarily includes the members of the medical profession, but it is not due to medical science _qua_ medical science.

The terms 'sanitation' and 'sanitary' nearly always connote only ideas a.s.sociated with cleanliness, free ventilation, etc. They scarcely connote ideas of food management, or, if they do, it is only to the extent of inferring that food shall not be adulterated or of bad quality--and perhaps that there shall be enough of it.

Such questions as what food shall we eat, and how much; what are the real reasons for taking food into the body, whether it is to give strength and heat to the body or only to supply the body's waste, as Dr Rabagliati contends--these and other relevant questions are usually left to unorthodox members of the medical profession to declare upon.

They seem to be very important questions, but we do not find that they were discussed--or ever mentioned--at the thirty-fourth International Medical Congress, which completed its sittings several months ago.

Obviously, the practical questions of food supply are answered very differently, according as one _believes_ they must be answered one way or another, as, for instance, in Dr Rabagliati's or Dr Haig's way. But that they are questions not worthy of consideration by doctors in congress may be taken as an ominous sign.

It must not be forgotten that we owe many valuable discoveries of medical science to qualified members of the profession, just as discoveries of mechanical science are made by men working at their respective trades. We have sorrowfully to admit, however, that nearly all the great achievements upon which medicine plumes herself are in the direction of increasing the doctors' power over his patient, and seldom of giving his patient power over disease. It is also true that the advocacy by unorthodox members of the profession of simple and natural remedies often involves them in a charge of charlatanism, and subjects them to persecution by medical a.s.sociations.

If the medical profession were all that it is supposed to be, it might be good that the reformer should suffer in solitude while his experiments and methods were subjected to adequate tests and criticism. If the a.s.sociated physicians and surgeons jealously guarded the public from quackery while they impartially investigated every fresh discovery, the true reformer would welcome the protection afforded him from the "counter-currents of senseless clamour" within the doctors' own ranks, occasioned by party and vested interests.

It may be true that "loneliness tends to save the Seer from becoming a charlatan and to make of him a true Reformer." But it is not that peculiar loneliness of the Seer that the medical trade unions afford the reforming physician. That is inevitably and sufficiently accorded him by the "unwillingness of the ma.s.ses to enter into the thoughts of the Seers."[19] An ignorant and inert people will always follow a charlatan, because they like to do things which are mysterious and involve no trouble on their part.

[19] The reason "Why the Prophet should be lonely" is perfectly elaborated in a chapter under that t.i.tle in _Logic Taught by Love_, from which I have quoted.

The Seer among doctors is boycotted by his fellow medicos _after_ he and his co-workers have tested their experiments for themselves, weeded out what is false from what is true, and proved their methods to be right. Not only that, but too often it turns out that it is proper food selection, cleanliness, personal effort and restraint advocated by doctors as subst.i.tutes for serums and drugs, which excites the opprobrium of medical coteries. Whereas, the misguided Serum Specialist, who ought to be saved from himself, and from whom the public ought to be protected, is given full medical honours--and facilities to become that most dangerous type of charlatan, the licensed one.

There are doubtless many abstract questions of health and disease which orthodox and unorthodox doctors alike are unable satisfactorily to settle. But if that be admitted, then it is certainly not in the public interest that serum treatments should be accepted as almost the last words in medical science. More anti-social still is it to attempt to justify the compulsory orders of Parliament that expensive sanatoria shall be built to cope with disease that might be more economically and more satisfactorily treated.

Is there not too little consideration given to theoretical issues underlying practical experience of disease? Is there not too great an anxiety to force remedies at the public expense before all the bearings of the different questions and their phases have been considered? All new methods savour too much of compulsion. They all require the provision of large armies of officials to carry them out.

It is interesting to note that the successors of the men who told us how grievously the Church has failed because she is established, should be so anxious to more firmly establish the medical priesthood.

Modern statecraft calls out to us: 'we will appoint officials to inquire into and decide upon what is to be done, but we will make no inquiries into the real nature of this disease and that: we will find out remedies which, in the form of serums to be injected into the blood, shall counteract the effects of disease: we will also appoint, at your expense, doctors to perform these operations: we will force the man whose family may have the misfortune to contract a disease, which the doctors have not told him how to prevent, to submit them to such treatment.' But nothing is said about the desirability of exercising government over oneself, one's body and one's mind! And nothing is _said_ either, but it is suggested, that, if one accepts meekly coercive treatment by official doctors, one may probably be able to ignore the laws of life and health without having to pay the penalty.

No sane and properly instructed citizens would be satisfied to have State officials compel them to do what they ought to do for themselves. It is because of this and because the suggestions and compulsions of modern medicine are in keeping with the prevailing philosophy that acc.u.mulates knowledge without wisdom, that we need such counteracting influences as are afforded by journals like _The Healthy Life._

LAYMAN.

A DOCTOR ON DOCTORS.

"I charge that whereas the first duty of a physician is to instruct the people in the laws of health and thus prevent disease, the tendency has ever been towards a conspiracy of mystery, humbug, and silence."

"I charge that the general tendency of the profession has been to depreciate the importance of personal and munic.i.p.al cleanliness, and to inculcate a reliance on drug medicines, vaccination, and other unscientific expedients."

ALEXANDER ROSS, M.D., F.R.S.

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MODERN GERM MANIA: A CASE IN POINT.

Under the sensational heading, _Doomed to Carry Germs: Woman Typhoid Victim for Life_, the following account appeared recently in _News of the World_:--

Almost unique in medical history is the case of a woman typhoid carrier, who, it is said, will carry the bacilli with her through life. The case is described by Dr Barbara Cunningham in a report of the Manchester Medical Officer of Health. In order that the woman shall cease to be a source of danger--as she has been keeping lodgers--the health authorities are giving her 7s. a week, and that, with her old-age pension of 5s., will be sufficient to keep her without lodgers. The case has aroused much interest in Manchester. The princ.i.p.al restrictions on the part of the Health Department are that she must not cook or wash for anyone. Anyone can, however, cook for her. In discussing the case Dr Martin, who for 25 years was Medical Officer of Health for Gorton, remarked that in some cases of typhoid carriers the infection ceased to exist for a time, but it was unusual for it to exist year after year. "The reason for the woman referred to carrying the typhoid bacilli with her through life is," he added, "because of a peculiarity of const.i.tution. There is no remedy to be found for it at present, and no means of freeing her from the germs, hence the reward offered by an American to anyone who can find a remedy for such cases. The germs themselves are proof against remedies, and they go on multiplying. The woman is incurable, and you cannot kill the germs without killing the woman. It is the first case, to my knowledge, where the health authorities have taken such measures to prevent a spread of the infection." The history of the affair is interesting. The woman's case had been reported to the authorities, and when her lodger became ill with typhus she was suspected, and was found to be giving off large numbers of typhoid bacilli. She was placed in Monsall Hospital for two months, during which time she was treated with gradually increasing doses of vaccine prepared in the Public Health Laboratory, York Place. When discharged, three separate tests were made as regards the typhoid bacilli. For one week after her discharge the organisms did not reappear, but during the second week a few colonies were grown, and in the third and fourth weeks the number increased. Shortly after that her lodger developed enteric fever.

This case is instructive, because it shows very clearly the utter futility of the modern method of treating infectious diseases by means of drugs and vaccines.

It is well known that the infecting agent or microbe found in cases of typhoid fever originates in man himself, that, in fact, it is essentially a man-made disorder. Dr Budd, who was the first to fully investigate this important subject, brought together the most convincing considerations to show this.