The Eugenic Marriage, Volume 2 (of 4): A Personal Guide to the New Science of Better Living and Better BabiesHague, W. Grant (William Grant)
Science
The Eugenic Marriage, Volume 2 (of 4): A Personal Guide to the New Science of Better Living and Better Babies
Hague, W. Grant (William Grant)
Eugenics; Hygiene; Marriage
Constipation has been responsible for the expenditure of millions of
dollars in advertising in the newspapers alone,--more, probably, than
has been spent in advertising remedies for all other diseases combined.
Do you suppose this money was a donation? Do you suppose these keen,
alert interpreters of the spirit of the times, the up-to-date business
men, were not and are not aware that constipation is the "universal
disease"?
Every drug store, in every civilized spot on earth, has its shelves
loaded down with constipation remedies; dinner pills, liver pills,
cathartic pills, tablets in all possible coatings and combinations,
mineral waters from a multitude of springs, aperient drinks by the
dozen, laxative teas and cordials, cathartic oils and emulsions. If the
demand for these articles should cease most of the drug stores would
close up.
Many millions of dollars have been made and are being made by various
men and concerns, who have devised ingenious mechanical agencies which
are supposed to cure, and in curing renew the lost health caused by
constipation. We have in mind in this connection, a man who conceived
the ingenious plan of putting the opening of an ordinary fountain
syringe in the middle instead of at the end and made a fortune out of
it. In this opening he places an upright nozzle, and instead of hanging
the bag up and allowing the water to run into the bowel, he has the
patient sit on the bag and thereby the water is forced into the bowel.
He has written a two-hundred page book on the advantages of this idea,
and his "literature" contains the names of famous men and women in all
walks of life who use his device. The name of one of the famous judges
of the Supreme Court of the United States was there; another was the
name of a popular operatic beauty who writes for the daily press little
essays on "How to be beautiful!" and "How to keep well!" He deserves his
success. He is an emancipator and has doubtless done a great deal of
good. His success demonstrates, beyond contradiction, the prevalence of
the malady under discussion, and it must be remembered that he is only
one of hundreds who garner from the same ample harvest.
If we could estimate in value the economic loss sustained by the race
because of the inefficiency of the victims of intestinal intoxication,
due to constipation, the sum would be colossal. Even then it would only
represent the direct economic deficiency--it would not express, nor
could any figure adequately represent, the indirect loss sustained by
the race because of the temperamental characteristics, which are the
products of intestinal poisoning, and which produce domestic tragedies
and economic failures.
Has this array of evidence any meaning, or does it just happen to be so?
We leave it to the reader; if it stimulates thought, or pricks a
conscience it will have done its duty.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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