Maintaining Health (Formerly Health and Efficiency)Alsaker, Rasmus Larssen
Science
Maintaining Health (Formerly Health and Efficiency)
Alsaker, Rasmus Larssen
Diet; Hygiene
In order to have good physical health under present conditions, it is
necessary to make some effort. The effort is not great enough to be
onerous and does not require much time. It is important to get health
knowledge, which the majority lacks today. This knowledge is most
excellent, but it does not benefit the individual unless it is applied.
We all wish to have health, but this is not enough. We must will to have
it. When we say that we cannot, it should generally be interpreted to
mean that we will not.
Some important subjects regarding which special knowledge should be
secured are: Food, drink, exercise, care of the skin, sleep, work and
play, breathing, clothing, and mental attitude.
These subjects, as well as others, have been quite extensively
discussed. It is impossible to give full information in tabloid form. It
is also impossible to read a book of this character once and get all the
information it contains. Those who are in earnest will study the
subject, instead of merely reading it.
Allow me to remind you that nearly all of our diseases are due to faulty
dietary habits. So it was in the time of Hippocrates, according to that
sage, and so it is today. It is a common statement that about 90 per
cent. of our physical ills come from improper diet, and this is the
truth. It follows from this that it is most important to know about
correct feeding habits, and put them in practice. Improper diet results
in faulty nutrition, after which physical and mental ills make their
appearance.
There are many systems of feeding, and nearly all of them will bring
good results if the most important prescription is followed, namely,
moderation. Simplicity leads to moderation.
Those who are reasonable about their food intake often serve as targets
for the shafts of ridicule launched at them by those who are ignorant of
the subject or too self-indulgent to exercise a little self-control.
Ridicule is one of the most deadly of weapons, but it never harms those
who have the hardihood of getting down to basic facts and classifying
things and ideas according to their true value. Why should we be guided
by the wit and sarcasm of indolent voluptuaries who daily desecrate
their bodies through ruinous indulgences?
There is no need of becoming harsh and austere, nor is it necessary to
fall into deadly habits of self-indulgence. Sometimes we can go with the
current with benefit, but at times it is also necessary to paddle
up-stream. Life demands a certain amount of hardihood from those who
would live in health, and this comes not from self-indulgence, but from
self-denial. It is necessary to do almost daily something that we are
not inclined to do.
It is well to remember that if the eating is correct, it is difficult to
become physically deranged, and consequently to become mentally
deranged. Allow me to repeat four short sentences which are helpful and
most important guides, sentences which ought to form a part of every
child's education:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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