Overeating Produces Ptomaines

The condition under which ptomaines form is when the proteid foods are used in excess as occurs in overeating. This process probably takes place in the colon, and results as an inability upon the part of the system to expel the rotting and fermenting mass, and is associated in some way with the development of microbes. The retention within the system of a decomposing mass of food gives rise to many poisonous symptoms, which of necessity must occur with the development of ptomaines. Just what the decomposition products of nuts, peas, beans, lentils, and other of the vegetable proteids would give rise to is at present a matter of experiment, but reasoning from analogy their decomposition products would probably be of the same character as the decomposition products of the animal proteids. Anyone who has ever "surfeited" on nuts cannot have failed to notice that the one characteristic of their being taken in excess is what is termed the "rotten fermentation." In addition to this there are the subjective symptoms of eructations and nausea; vomiting and diarrhoea may also follow. The all-importance of this question "Overeating" will appeal to the reader after reading the above explanation.

Now if the system of an individual living a strictly natural life, with food properly adapted to his wants, and in exactly the right quantity, with pure air and no adverse mental conditions interfering, is constantly manufacturing poisons to the limit of his excretory powers, it will readily be understood if there be one cause more than another likely to cause a disturbance of this balance it will be something taken in excess, an extra amount of food: in short, overeating. As has been explained, the function of food in overeating is perverted, the proteids being converted into mal-assimilation or poisonous products: ptomaines being produced. Overeating of the other food products, fruits, vegetables, and cereals, is also accompanied by mal-assimilation products, but they are of a much less poisonous character than the decomposition products of the proteids.

The proteid foods, the principal but not the only ones being meats, eggs, nuts, milk, cream, cheese, peas, beans, and lentils should never be taken in excess at any time. Not only this, but at no time should food of any other character be taken in excess of the requirements of the body.

Food Should Never Be Taken In Excess

Nature builds up and tears down within the body according to her requirements, in her nutritive processes - oxidising or deoxidising as the case may be - always doing her best for the economy. The outcome of our disregard and violation of her laws can end in but the one general word, Disease, which differs from health only in the fact that in health the body is doing its work under favorable conditions. In disease the work of the body is being carried forward under unfavorable conditions.

The practical lesson to be learned from all these examples of perverted nutrition is that if food which in itself is entirely harmless, becomes under certain conditions when taken into the system, a poison, or in any other way acts detrimentally to the system, it behooves us to pay attention to the conditions under which this arises - that is overeating. Unquestionably overeating and drinking is the most dangerous factor in our lives.

"One-fourth of what we eat keeps us : the other three-fourths keep the doctors." Doctors know this to be the case. It has been well said that

"Gluttony kills more than the sword."

Meal Plan

"I sing the sweets I know, the charms I feel, My morning incense and my evening meal."

IT has become an almost universal custom in civilised life to appropriate certain fixed times in the day for taking food. Not only does this practice appear to be well suited to our physical organisation, and therefore most consistent with health, but it is obviously a necessary condition of life as it exists at the present day.

One Meal Plan

During the zenith of Roman and Grecian civilization it was an established rule that no man should eat until he had leisure to digest, that is at the end of the day's work. For several hundred years the one meal plan was the established rule among the civilized nations living along the shores of the Mediterranean. Dinner in the form of a mid-day lunch was unknown, and for breakfast a bunch of grapes, a fig, or a crust of bread were sufficient to stay the stomach.

The evening feast was a kind of domestic festival, the reward of the day's toil: music and amusement of various descriptions following.

The one meal plan was adapted to the conditions existing years ago, but an abstemiousness of this character would now be considered by the average American one of starvation. Just as the foregoing would be an extreme in one way, so the methods in vogue amongst Germans and English of to-day may be considered just as extreme in the opposite direction.

Whatever plan may be outlined as the one adapted for an individual, it must of necessity be adapted to meet certain demands and circumstances over which he has no control. One's habits in eating must be determined largely by his occupation.

For brain workers and those following sedentary occupations, one meal a day is not such a hardship as it might appear. It is the one certain way to get up an appetite amongst those who complain of a lack in this respect. The one meal a day plan would not do for those engaging in heavy manual work.