BOOK I THE NATURE OF DISEASE

Before it is possible for us to proceed to a consideration of ''fasting as a cure for disease," it will
be necessary for us to consider the primary question: What is disease?

If, in our perplexity and quest for knowledge, we turn to the medical profession for our answer to
this question, we find that they very frankly confess that, in the vast majority of cases, practically
nothing is known of the nature—the real essence of—disease. We shall learn that its nature is
still unfathomable and mysterious, and that next to nothing is known either of disease (its
essence), its true causation or effective cure.

Hear, e.g., the word of Austin Flint, M.D., LL.D.,

''The definition of disease is confessedly difficult. It is easier to define it by negation, to say what
it is not, than to give a positive definition; that is, a definition based either on the nature or
essence of the thing defined, or on its distinctive attributes. Disease is an absence or deficiency
of health, but this is only to transfer the difficulty, for the question at once arises, how is health to
be defined? And to define health is not less difficult than to define disease."

Says another author:

"... the most distinguished doctors, who are also scientific men, have found it to be invariably the
case, that the more they saw of disease, the less they believed in the efficacy of the drugs they
had been using for years, and the more they believed in the natural forces of the body, and the
more inclined were they to be content with playing a waiting game, instead of forcing their Great
Partner's hand."

And if medical science of to-day does not know what is the nature of disease, how can it be
successfully treated? How can we expect to treat and cure diseases the nature of which are
entirely unknown to us? Would this not lead us to think that much—indeed, we might say the
vast majority of—medical treatment to-day is purely empirical,

I shall endeavor to show that what little the medical profession is supposed to know of the
nature of disease is totally wrong ; that their theories of the origin and nature of disease are
erroneous ah initio, and that every new discovery made, which they have considered an
unmixed blessing and a sign of progress, has, in reality, only led them further and further from
the truth, and away from an understanding of the real cause and cure of disease.

To begin with, then, I must state that there are, broadly speaking, two and only two schools of
healing in the world; the hygienic, on the one hand, and every other school, sect or system, on
the other. No matter what the physician may be —allopath, homeopath, osteopath, eclectic,
faith-curist, mindcurist. Christian Scientist, or what not, he is not a hygienist, in that he does not
know the real cause and cure of disease. The theory, or the philosophy of disease which the
hygienist defends is totally opposed to all other medical systems, being directly opposite to them
in theory.

I shall state, in as clear and precise a manner as possible, the fundamental differences between
these two schools, as to the nature of disease—how caused, how cured.
I cannot do better than to quote, in full, the very excellent resume of these differences as stated
by Emmet Dcnsmore, M.D., in his work entitled '^ How Nature Cures."

''An examination of the methods of operation of orthodox old school medicine shows that these
physicians, although able, learned, earnest, and scientific, have been utterly misled as to the
nature of disease. They have considered disease as an organized enemy and positive force,
which has taken up a position within the body and is carrying on a warfare with the vital powers,
and the legion of heroic remedies (so-called) which the orthodox physicians have prescribed
and are prescribing for suffering invalids are the shot and shell hurled at the invisible enemy, in
the hope of dislodging and expelling it."

The hygienist, on the other hand, regards disease as a ''curative action on the part of the ruling
(vital) force." (p. 7.) ''AH disease and all manifestations of disease are friendly efforts and
curative actions made by the organism in its efforts to restore the conditions of health.

"The law of cure may be defined as an unfailing tendency on the part of the organism toward
health, and since disease, as above defined, is but the expression and result of a disturbance of
the conditions natural to life, the only useful office of the physician is to restore those conditions,
and there will be seen to follow, as a result of the law of cure, the disappearance of disease and
the establishment of health." (p. 8.)

"There are two methods of treating dyspeptics; one aims to cure the disease; the other
endeavors to cure the patient. All drug medical systems profess to cure the disease, and they
can do it, whatever becomes of the patient. The hygienic medical system is based on the
fundamental premise that disease should not be cured, but that its causes should be removed,
to the end that the patient may recover health. All drug systems teach that disease is an entity
or substance; a something at war with vitality which should be suppressed, opposed, counter-
reacted subdued, expelled, killed, or cured; hence it is opposed with all of the missiles of the
drug shop. The hygienic system teaches that disease is a remedial effort, a struggle of the vital
powers to purify the system and recover the normal state. This effort should be aided, directed
and regulated, if need be, but never suppressed. And this can always be better accomplished
without medicines than with them."

Again, Doctor Densmore, in showing that the true healing power lies within the organism, in
opposition to the idea that it lies outside the body, in some bottle or substance, says (''How
Nature Cures." pp. 5-6):

''These everyday occurrences (healing bones, etc.) are as familiar to the laymen as to the
physician, but the strange part of it is the fact that almost no one—laymen or physician—seems
to understand that these and like processes of nature are all the healing force there is. It does
not matter what the trouble may be—a sliver in the flesh, or a lodgment within the organism of
the poison germs of typhoid fever—no medicine is required or will benefit; all that is needed is
that the conditions demanded by nature be supplied, and the same mysterious force which we
call 'life,' which builds a bone-ring support whenever and wherever it is needed, and at once
places a most admirable protection in the shape of a scab wherever there is an abrasion of the
skin, will prove itself as well able successfully to handle an attack of typhoid fever as a broken
bone, or an abrased skin."
"There are, aside from accidents—mechanical injuries—but two sources of disease in the world,
viz., poisons or impurities taken into the system from without, and effete or waste matters
retained. In either case the result is obstruction. These extraneous particles are the causes of
disease, and, aside from mental impressions and bodily injuries, the only causes. . . .

"What is this mysterious thing, disease? Simply the effort to remove obstructing material from
the organic domain, and to repair damages. Disease is a process of purification. It is remedial
action. It is a vital struggle to overcome obstructions and to keep the channels of the circulation
free. Should this struggle, this self-defensive action, this remedial effort, this purifying process,
this attempt at reparation, this war for the integrity of the living domain, this contest against the
enemies of the organic constitution, be repressed by bleeding, or suppressed with drugs,
intensified with stimulants and tonics, subdued with narcotics and antiphlogistics, confused with
bUsters and caustics, aggravated with alteratives, complicated and misdirected, changed,
subverted and perverted with drugs and poisons generally?"

Again, Doctor Trail says:

^
"Some authors tell us that medicines cure disease, and other authors tell us that the vis
rnedicatrix naturcB cures. They are both wrong. What is the vis medicatrix naturw f It is vital
struggle in self-defense; it is the process of purification; it is the disease itself! So far from the
disease and the vis medicatrix naturae being antagonistic entities, or forces at war with each
other, they are one and the same. And if this be the true solution of this problem, it is clear
enough that the whole plan of subduing or 'curing' disease with drugs is but a process of
subduing and killing the vitality. We see, now, the rationale and the truth of the remark of
Professor Clark: 'Every dose diminishes the vitality of the patient.'"

Says Miss Florence Nightingale:

'
"Shall we begin by taking it as general principle that all disease, at some period or other of its
course, is more or less a reparative process, not necessarily accompanied with suffering; an
effort of nature to remedy a process of poisoning or decay, which has taken place weeks,
months, sometimes years beforehand, unnoticed, the termination of the disease being then,
while the antecedent process is going on, determined?" "The same laws of health or of nursing,
for they are in reality the same, obtain among the well as among the sick. The breaking of them
produces only a less violent consequence among the former than among the latter—and this
sometimes, not always."

I cannot too strongly impress my reader with (he importance of grasj^ing and making part of his
mental viewpoint this fundamentally important distinction. It is upon its thorough understanding,
and an appreciation of its im|)lications that the hygienic system of medication is i)ase(l. A full
acceptance of this theory means such a comph^te and wholcside revision of our views of the
nature of disease, and of its cure.

And now let us turn back, in our argument, to the point emphasized some time ago, viz., that all
disease, as we know it, is a curative action on the part of the organism; a reconstructive
process; and that, what we know as "disease" is really the outward symptoms of this cleansing
process, going on within the organism. It is the process of cure itself—we but observing the
outward signs of such curative action. As Mr. Macfadden remarked:
"It is disease that saves life. It is disease that actually cures the body. By means of disease
poisons are eliminated, which might have caused death, had they been allowed to remain."

Now consider what this miplies. The ''orthodox" medical treatment consists in doctoring or
smoothing these symptoms, which are mistaken for the real disease, and, in fact, in attempting
to cure a curing process! Further, by checking or subduing or retarding these symptoms (by
drugs, etc.), they actually retard and hinder the process of cure, to just the extent to which they
are ''successful" in supposedly "curing" the disease; i.e., the more successful their palliative
treatment is, the more they have, in reality, hindered the true process of cure! Physician and
patient have alike mistaken the true disease, and assumed the outward symptoms of its cure to
be the disease itself. The real disease is the cause of these symptoms—not the symptoms
themselves ; it is that which lies behind the phenomena observed —the phenomena being really
the outward and visible signs of the general cleaning-up process proceeding within the
organism.

And now, what is it that lies behind these symptoms? What is the real cause of disease? To
this, I answer—It is the poisonous and effete matter which has collected within the organism

the accumulation of which we have been repeatedly warned of, by headache, lassitude,
(physical and mental) pain, unhealthy accumulation of fatty-tissue, etc.; and the elimination—the
getting rid of, this poisonous matter constitutes the series or "set" of symptoms mistaken for
disease, and treated as the disease itself.' To suppress these symptoms—which is the whole
aim, goal, and ambition of the medical fraternity—is to stop this elimination, to check the
system's remedial efforts, and to ''lock up" as Doctor Trail expressed it, ''the disease within the
organism." Or, as Dr. K. S. Guthrie said: "People die of disease not because the disease is fatal,
but because the system is not permitted to throw it off. . . ." The entire medical world having
utterly mistaken the true nature of disease— have thus directed their energies and skill to the
suppression of symptoms—rather than to the removal of cause, while the hygienic system of
cure is based solely upon the removal of the cause—the effete matter collected within the
organism regarding the symptoms as altogether insignificant, and, in fact, they temporarily
aggravate or increase the symptoms, purposely in some cases (making the disease "worse"
according to accepted theories), in order to affect thereby, a more rapid and true cure.

It will be noticed that, upon this theory, it would be quite impossible for any really healthy person
to be "attacked" by disease, since disease, as such, is not an entity, but the symptoms we see
are the result of long processes of accumulation, going on for—we do not know how long within
the system. Disease and death are never sudden, though they may appear to be so. The long-
continued line of causes have passed unnoticed.

Says Doctor Brouardel:

"I have shown that, in spite of an excellent outward appearance, sudden death is the
termination of very different diseases, which develop secretly, quite unknown to the patient and
those around him; such as certain affections of the kidneys, arteriosclerosis, diabetes, etc."

This idea was the cornerstone of Doctor Dewey's philosophy of disease—to be outlined in detail
presently—and he said:

" ... disease is never an attack, but always a summing up. . . . Disease is a curative condition of
bodily sins that, borne to the limit of endurance, must needs to be settled or death will come."
To this I reply, that we must depend upon our reason for the
answer. Drugs are given with the avowed object of removing
the symptoms (though this may be denied, it is a fact) and depends
upon the mistaken idea that the symptoms of the disease
are the disease itself;