It has been said, with considerable truth, that man is not by nature
a drinking animal. If present-day economic and climatic conditions
permitted, and man’s normal palate called for, a universal, daily
and abundant use of fresh fruits and vegetables, the necessity for
drinking, _per se_, would disappear, and this book would not need
to have been written. Modern civilized life, however, includes an
omnivorous diet, widespread adulteration of foodstuffs, a sparsely
cultivated countryside and a scarcity throughout the greater part of
the year of cheap, sound fruit and salad vegetables. Such factors have
produced a physical degeneracy in our midst, clear to all who have eyes
to see and perfectly obvious to anyone who is of necessity brought into
immediate daily contact with physical disease and ill health. This
degeneracy is revealed in bodies all more or less clogged with waste
and effete material, a condition clearly traceable to faulty diet and
unnatural environment.
A human body thus clogged needs liquid for cleansing purposes, and
that need expresses itself in thirst, since it is Nature’s voice.
Unfortunately, civilized man is in the habit of answering that cry for
liquid by imbibing beverages which not only do not cleanse, but which
in many instances sadly _aggravate the very conditions which created
the thirst_.
The aim of this book is to make known the vast array of cleansing,
curative, tonic and nutritive beverages which, at any given season of
the year, can be prepared from the materials supplied by a prodigal
Nature.
In the following pages, much light is thrown (in passing) upon the
working of the human body, the nature of disease, the process of
digestion, the rationale of Nature Cure methods, the principles of
sensible diet and the harmful nature of certain popular beverages and
commodities.
The chief indication of the need of liquid is thirst. This statement
needs qualifying. When thirst is caused by over-indulgence in
stimulating drinks, alcoholic or otherwise, the drinking of further
stimulants will not satisfy Nature, even if, for the moment, the
feeling is stilled. Moreover, when thirst is induced by the eating of
salted, over-seasoned, or adulterated and preserved foodstuffs, the
mere fact of freely drinking fluids of any kind will not correct the
sensation of thirst.
To permanently overcome thirst it is not only necessary to choose
a suitable beverage that is really cleansing and cooling, but also
to remove the cause of that unnatural thirst by abstaining from the
types of food and drink which produce it. Hence the urgent need, among
the public, of a better knowledge of food chemistry, of the simple
construction of the human body, and of the right kind of food reform,
which is inseparable from that study.
Every care has been taken to ensure accuracy. Most of the recipes have
been tested, and the subjects have been arranged alphabetically to
facilitate easy reference.
I have to thank Mr. E. J. Saxon for carefully revising the MS. of this
book and for preparing same for the press. His wide knowledge of the
subject has eminently fitted him to give me this assistance.
H. Valentine Knaggs, L.R.C.P., etc.
55a, Welbeck Street, W.
A