Spurgeon’s weight is fifty, if not seventy-five pounds greater than is normal for him, considering fully his natural _physique_, and the use he makes of his muscular system. He may be in the habit of restricting his appetite; he may eat much less than most of his associates, and even be esteemed a small eater and very abstemious; nevertheless his form is gross, and he has the gout——two unimpeachable witnesses to the truth of my position. [Footnote 70: “Live on sixpence a day and earn it,” was the “favorite prescription” of a famous London physician.] “We can not doubt,” says Dr. Oswald, “that the highest degree of health could only be attained by strict conformity to Haller’s[71] rule, _i.e._, by subsisting exclusively on the pure and unchanged products of Nature. This view is indorsed (indirectly) in the writings of Drs. Alcott, Bernard, Schlemmer, Hall, and Dio Lewis, and directly by Schrodt, Jules Virey, and others. In the tropics such a mode of life would not imply anything like asceticism: a meal of milk and three or four kinds of sweet fruits, fresh dates, bananas, and grapes, would not clash with the still higher rule, that eating, like every other natural function, should be a pleasure and not a penance. Heat destroys the delicate flavor of many fruits, and makes others indigestible by coagulating their albumen. But,” continues this authority,——and I am not disposed to dispute the soundness of the position, speaking generally (as, indeed, Dr. Oswald, himself, was speaking),——“in the frigid latitudes, where we have to dry and garner many vegetable products in order to survive the unproductive season, the process of cooking [some classes of] our food has advantages which fully outweigh such objections.” To the very rational assumption that, “few men with post-diluvian teeth would agree with Dr. Schlemmer that hard grain is preferable to bread,” I would reply, that for people who could not or would not grind their own grist, as do our most robust animals——well nourished, but hard-working draught or road horses——the whole-wheat meal, freshly and coarsely ground, with a light dressing of rich milk,[72] or, more wholesome still, eaten with nuts and thoroughly masticated, is more delicious than bread, even if made from the same quality of Graham. If the Graham be taken dry, with a few raisins at each mouthful, it would require a fine taste to distinguish between this and the walnuts and raisins so generally acceptable to epicures. If the milk dressing is used, it should simply be poured over the (unsifted) Graham, and not made into a batter. With a dish of Graham as described, and such fruit as can usually be obtained all the year round, either fresh or (in winter) dried, as apples, raisins, dates, figs,[73] prunes (the last, like dried apples, peaches, etc., soaked not overmuch, but until tender), one may make a meal sufficiently delicious, and at the same time absolutely pure——if the _milk_ is derived from a healthy creature.