REGISTERED AT STATIONERS' HALL, LONDON, ENGLAND. _All Rights Reserved._ TO GEORGE S. KEITH, M.D., LL.D., F.R.C.P.E., SCOTLAND, A. RABAGLIATI, M.A., M.D., F.R.C.P., EDINBURGH, AND ALEXANDER HAIG, M.A., M.D., OXON., F.R.C.P., LONDON, ENGLAND, WHO HAVE COMMENDED THE WRITINGS OF THE AUTHOR IN THEIR OWN PUBLISHED WORKS, THIS BOOK IS GRATEFULLY DEDICATED. PREFACE. This volume is a history, or a story, of an evolution in the professional care of the sick. It begins in inexperience and in a haze of medical superstition, and ends with a faith that Nature is the all in all in the cure of disease. The hygiene unfolded is both original and revolutionary: its practicality is of the largest, and its physiology beyond any possible question. The reader is assured in advance that every line of this volume has been written with conviction at white heat, that enforced food in sickness and the drug that corrodes are professional barbarisms unworthy of the times in which we live. E. H. DEWEY. MEADVILLE, PA., U. S. A., _November, 1900_. CONTENTS. THE NO-BREAKFAST PLAN. I. PAGE Introduction--Army experiences in the Civil War--Early years in general practice--Difficulties encountered--Medicinal treatment found wanting as a means to superior professional success 13 II. A case of typhoid fever that revolutionized the Author's faith and practice--A cure without drugs, without food--Resulting studies of Nature in disease--Illustrative cases--A crucial experience in a case of diphtheria in the Author's family 26 III. A study of the brain from a new point of view--Some new physiology evolved illustrated by severe cases of acute disease 34 IV. The error of enforced food in cases of severe injuries and diseases illustrated by several striking examples 42 V. An apostrophe to physicians 56 VI. The origin of the No-breakfast Plan--Personal experience of the Author as a dyspeptic--His first experience without a breakfast--Physiological questions considered--A new theory of the origin and development of disease and its cure--The spread of the No-breakfast Plan--Interesting cases 60 VII. Digestive conditions--Taste relish--Hunger relish--The moral science involved in digestion as a new study--Cheer as a digestive power--Its contagiousness--The need of higher life in the home as a matter of better health--Cheer as a duty 81 VIII.