Fresh air is as important as good water. The lungs of the human body are
all the time drawing in air and breathing out air. What we breathe out
carries away with it something from our bodies. Therefore it is
unhealthy to be in a room with many people, without doors or windows
open; for the people draw in all the fresh air, and what they breathe
out is more or less corrupted by having passed through their bodies. It
is very important to health to have plenty of pure fresh air to breathe.
No dirty things, or decaying substances, such as cabbage leaves or
mouldy vegetables, or pools of stagnant water, should be allowed to
remain anywhere near a dwelling. The pools should be filled up, and the
decaying things should be carried away from the house, heaped up and
covered with earth to make manure for the garden. If there is not room
enough to do that, they should be buried in the ground. Whole families
often have fevers from breathing the bad odors that rise from such
things. It is morally wrong to indulge in any habits that injure the
health or well-being of others. The bed, and the coverings of the bed,
should have fresh air let in upon them every day; otherwise, they retain
the fluids which are passing from the body all the time. In England,
children that worked in large manufactories became pale and sickly and
died off fast. When doctors inquired into it, they found that the poor
little creatures crept into the same bedclothes week after week, and
month after month, without having them washed or aired.
Occasional change in articles of food is healthy, as well as agreeable;
but it is injurious to eat a great variety of things at the same meal.
There are two good rules, so very simple that everybody, rich or poor,
can observe them: First, never indulge yourself in eating what you have
found by experience does not agree with you; secondly, when you have
eaten enough, do not continue to eat merely because the food tastes
good. It is foolish to derange the stomach for a long time to please the
palate for a short time.
If you have oppressed feelings in the head, or sour and bitter tastes in
the mouth, or a tendency to sickishness, take nothing but bread and
water for two or three days, and you will be very likely to save
yourself from a fever.
People might spare themselves many a toothache if they would rinse their
mouths after every meal, and every night, before going to bed, remove
every particle of food from between the teeth, and rinse them thoroughly
with water. New toothpicks should be made often, for the sake of
cleanliness.
Dirt was a necessity of Slavery; and that is one reason, among many
others, why freemen should hate it, and try to put it away from their
minds, their persons, and their habitations.
PRESIDENT LINCOLN'S PROCLAMATION OF
EMANCIPATION, JANUARY 1, 1863.
BY FRANCES E. W. HARPER.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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