The Natural Cure of Consumption, Constipation, Bright's Disease, Neuralgia Part 13

There should be little or no liquid to turn off.]

6. TIRED FROM INACTION: TOO MUCH "REST."

The person who works to-day and gets tired, perhaps almost exhausted, feels sure from former experiences that he will rise next morning well able to work again; and providing he does not overdraw the account continually, the more he does the more he can do. It is upon this principle that our athletes acquire and maintain condition.

But the consumptive, the delicate person, who, as is the case generally, has grown weaker and weaker from doing less and less (and this is in accordance with natural law), becomes at last "tired" in such a manner, that without an entire change--a right about face--there is no such thing as getting rested this side the grave. This exhaustion from indolence must be changed for the tiredness resulting from physical exertion, or there is no hope of "cure." Friends must learn the error of their ways; they must cease the eternal discouragement of the loved one; there must be no more of the incessant, "Now, Jenny, sit right down--you will get too tired"; "There, now, let me do that--you know how little it takes to tire you"; "You are crazy to think of going outdoors such a day as this," etc., etc.

(see page 85). However kindly meant all this is, it is, in practice, "hitting a man when he is down"; while the usual encouragement to eat (digestion or no digestion)--to eat (appet.i.te or no appet.i.te--the inaction often forbidding all desire for food) is, to use a sporting phrase, a companion "slugger" that finally knocks the weakling off the stage. This is what produces the phlegm as fast as the poor victim can cough it up.

Because he has nothing to do--because he does nothing--but ponder over his condition, eat, manufacture phlegm and "raise" it, he lowers himself more and more, until he gets to the bottom. He has "raised" about everything; only the frame, the skeleton, is left to bury (see pp. 72, 78, 92, 97, 104).

A FEW OF THE MANY NOTES FROM READERS OF THE FIRST EDITION OF "NATURAL CURE."

J. RUSS, Jr., Haverhill, Ma.s.s., says: "Dr. Page's explanation of the 'colds' question is alone worth the price of a hundred copies of the book--it is, in fact, invaluable, going to the very root of the cause of sickness."

Mrs. W. O. THOMPSON, 71 Irving Place, Brooklyn, N. Y., says: "I wish every friend I have could read it, and, only that hygienists never harbor ill-feeling, that my enemies might not chance to find it. I owe much to the truths made clear in 'Natural Cure'; more, indeed, than to all the health literature I have ever read (and I had read much, because I had much need); and it is certain that my sister-in-law owes her life and present robust health to the professional attendance of its author."

FROM A TEACHER.

Mrs. S. S. GAGE, teacher in the Adelphi Academy, Brooklyn, N. Y., says: "My friend, Mrs. Thompson, recommended this book ('Natural Cure') to me.

Thanks to her and 'the book,' my old headaches trouble me no more; I am cured of catarrh and partial deafness, and, in fact, am better in every way. I never could accomplish so much and with so little fatigue; and I am sure that all my intellectual work is of better quality than it ever was before."

FROM A HUSBAND.

D. THOMPSON, Lee, N. H., says: "Through following the advice in 'Natural Cure' my headaches, which have tortured me at frequent intervals for forty years, return no more. Formerly I could not work for three days at a time, now I work right along. For this, as well as for the restoration of my wife to health, after we had given her up as fatally sick, I have to thank Dr. Page and 'The Natural Cure.'"

FROM THE WIFE.

Mrs. S. E. D. THOMPSON, Lee, N. H., says: "I can not well express my grat.i.tude for the benefit I have received from this book and the author's personal counsel. Condemned to die, I am now well. It is truly wonderful how the power of resting is increased under the influence of the regimen prescribed. I have distributed many copies of this book, and have known of _a life-long asthmatic cured, biliousness removed, perennial hay fever banished_ for good, and other wonderful changes produced, by means of the regimen formulated in 'Natural Cure.' A friend remarked: 'It is full of encouragement for those who wish to live in clean bodies.' Another said: 'It has proved to me that I have been committing slow suicide.' Our minister says: 'I have modified my diet and feel like a new man.'"

To this Mrs. Thompson adds, for the author's first book, "HOW TO FEED THE BABY": "I have known of a number of babes changed from colicky, fretful children to happy well ones, making them a delight to their parents, by following its advice."

WILLIAM C. LANGLEY, Newport, R. I., says: "While all would be benefited from reading it, I would especially commend it to those who, from inherited feebleness, or who, like myself, had declined deeply, feel the need of making the most of their limited powers. I may add, that this work bears evidence that the author has had wide range and extensive reading, together with a natural fitness for physiological and hygienic research, keen perception of natural law and tact in its application."

SOLOMON ALEXANDER, No. 252 East Fifty-second Street, New York, says: "I have been greatly benefited by Dr. Page's treatment for inflammatory rheumatism and Bright's disease, and am now steadily improving under his direction." July 27, 1883. (Now well, November, 1883.)

Mrs. Dr. DENSMORE, 130 West 44th Street, New York, says: "You can judge of my opinion of 'Natural Cure' when I tell you that I am buying it of the publishers by the dozen to distribute among my patients."

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY for September, 1883, says: "The author gives several remarkable examples of wonderful cures which he knows of having been effected by following the principles he lays down--principles which may be followed with profit, and the following of which may relieve many cases regarded as desperate; and he has given the public a most valuable manual of hygiene."

THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY for August, 1883, says: "An effort at impressing common-sense views of preserving and restoring health."

_Several hundreds_ of most flattering notices from secular and religious journals, on file at the publishers' office, indicate how this work is being received by the public.

SPECIAL NOTE.

It is evident from the nature of the press notices of "The Natural Cure,"

that the prefatorial request has been very generally complied with, and that not only have critics managed to obtain an understanding of the author's position as regards the only certain means for physical improvement from low conditions, but they are disposed to sustain him in that position. Here and there one, however, as was to be expected, from ignorance of natural law, from personal preferences or notions, from faith in the old way (which has so long been on trial and so signally failed), has failed to comprehend the matter. Diving into the middle of the book, selecting some chapter or paragraph which forbids a consumptive or any frail patient, while _doing_ nothing, to eat like a woodchopper or a railroad hand, and especially warns such from eating worse kinds of food than the man of mighty strength who might, through the influence of active outdoor pursuits, get rid of considerable coffee, pie, cakes, pickles, etc., and (providing his diet included plenty of coa.r.s.e food) even thrive in spite of a good deal of such material (for we know that many indoor loafers, even, are too tough to be speedily killed by such a diet)--carping critics, we mean to say, selecting some special paragraph have held the advice up as "too radical in theory." But no person of sound mind can read this book _through_ with even a fair degree of care, and not learn that its chief aim is to teach people who are now starving, or who are at best poorly nutrified, and, next to these, the well ones who mean to keep on the safe side, the way to live in order to be well nourished and free from the pains, aches, and sicknesses which cover the land with wrecks of human beings--dying--who might better _live_ in clean, sound, and easy bodies.