FLETCHERIZING AS A TEMPERANCE EXPEDIENT
Tramp Reform--A Remarkable Man--How to Enjoy Wine--Fletcherism
as a Cure for Morbid Cravings--A Trial of Fletcherism and its
Results--Fletcherism as First Aid
Now we come to a phase of the merits of Fletcherism which has already
furnished an abundance of evidence to its credit. In my first
experiment, not yet under academic supervision, with no laboratory
measurements wherewith to describe the results in chemical terms, I
was dealing with a company of ordinary tramps picked up in the streets
of Chicago. They simply ate what they chose to order from the bill of
fare of a cheap restaurant, but were told to chew everything for all
it was worth, which they made no objection to doing. Time was of no
value to them, and they really discovered new delights of gustatory
pleasure which they had not known before. Tramps are generally
persons of resourcefulness and have a cultivated appreciation. Their
resourcefulness consists chiefly of being able to live without working,
and their appreciation is made keen by the lottery of chance in seeking
to get something for which they give nothing.
My tramps were beery and bleery as tramps generally are, but not so
dirty; for I paid for baths, washing, and in some instances furnished
clothing. Besides supplying these luxuries, I gave them occasionally a
big silver dollar which they called a "cart wheel."
It was surprising to see these degenerates freshen up in appearance and
lose their blotchiness and greasiness of facial appearance. I knew how
to talk to them to get their confidence, and they looked on me as just
another "freak" like themselves, but with some kind of a money "pull."
There were fat and thin among them, and it was a matter of surprise
that after a little some of the thin got stouter and the fat fell off
in weight at the same time. One of them was a belligerent socialist and
the author of a well-known book which had quite a vogue in the earlier
history of present-day socialism.
Up to the time I began my own experiment, I had been a social drinker
of alcohol in all forms to the full extent of "gentlemanly decency,"
with occasional slips when near the outer edge that made me ashamed of
myself after I got sober again. I am now more ashamed than ever when
I am reminded of my early foolishness, but since my experiences are
being turned to good account I forgive myself. Not only were social
occasions an excuse, but I often ordered the social occasions to serve
as an excuse. I had never resorted to snake-bites to give legitimate
excuses, but I so crowded my resources in this direction that at one
time I held the "record," for the community in which I lived, for what
was called "hollowness of legs and steadiness of head," and so much was
this "strength of character" valued in that community in America, that
one was supposed to take pride in holding the record.
The result of my own pursuit of thorough tasting of my food had been
that my own ponderosity of front weight fell off, and at the same time
I had no desire for wine or beer. It was all a surprise to me, but it
was not an amazing surprise until one day one of my tramp guests came
to me and said: "Boss, this eatin' game is great; think of me with a
dollar in my pocket and not wantin' beer."
In a short time I forgot that I had ever liked wine or beer. It never
occurred to me to order it except for a guest, and then I took it with
him, or, rather them, for there were usually several or many at my
eating parties, but in the Fletcherian manner which is so eminently
Epicurean that a few sips went as far as a half-bottle used to do.
Here is an important point in profitable economics that any one can
demonstrate for himself at once and not rely on my sayso, or that of
any one else. Later on I will tell how to do it. The secret is worth
its weight in gold as an Epicurean prize as well as a money-saver. I
have to tell, a little further on, of a very large experiment which
came as a surprise also. It was in a section of country, and among a
class of people, where to escape from the toils of the drink demon is
nothing short of a miracle.
A REMARKABLE MAN
But before I relate this climaxic experience I will once more refer
to one of the most remarkable men I have had the pleasure of meeting.
His case covers more sides of healthy variety than that of almost any
one, but he has even a better showing in some respects than any. He
is an M.D.; a Ph.D.; an Sc.D.; an A.M.; and a P.H.D.; which last is
the "stiffest exam." of them all. He is a champion athlete; the father
of an all-round college champion; and as graceful a gymnast as any
one ever saw do the "Giant Swing" on the horizontal bar. He is also a
grandfather and now past fifty.
This was his experience in 1902 or 1903, in connection with my being
called to New Haven to submit to examination under the supervision
of Professor Chittenden. It is Dr. Anderson to whom I refer, and he
permits my stating his experience as often as I like for the good it
will do. My expression of appreciation of his academic and athletic
accomplishments is all my own and not authorized.
When I was turned over to Dr. Anderson for physical examination in the
Yale gymnasium, my fitness was surprising to him as he has stated in
his reports. He was also ripe for the reasonableness of my revelations.
He seemed to me to be in the "pink of condition" himself, and he was
so, as "pink" was judged at the time, for a man of his age.
Dr. Anderson tried more careful mastication than usual, and paid more
attention to the thorough enjoyment of his food with the same pleasant
results that come to everybody when making the trial, no matter how
moderate and temperate they have been before. It is equivalent to
putting a little keener edge on appetite than usual. Children and even
fine ladies will perk up a little when they are conscious of being
noticed, and the human senses are human in more ways than one.
Dr. Anderson was pleased with the revelation as a pleasure promoter,
but did not notice that he was forgetting to take his daily
prescription of stimulant. He was a medical man, past forty, beginning
to slack up a little in his elasticity and strength. He was reaching
that age when even the most temperate and careful begin to be a little
lenient with themselves. His doctor friends were in the habit of
prescribing a little stimulant to counter-balance this expected decline
in energy and he took their advice. It was the medical fad of the
period.
At first, Dr. Anderson ordered for himself one small drink of good
medicinal whisky a day, and the effect was as expected. By and bye,
however, a little more was needed, and this increasing demand continued
its insistence until three drinks were no more efficacious than one had
been at first. When I was introduced to him he had begun on his fourth
drink daily, and yet burned it up in his exercise without feeling it
much.
A couple of weeks after he began to check up my test by personal
experience, which is the only scientific way, he all at once
remembered, one day, that he had forgotten to take his whisky, and yet
he was fitter than usual. I had not mentioned my own experience in this
regard to him, I believe, as when we were together he kept me busy with
the exercises of the 'Varsity crew, and I had little chance to give
him accounts of my full experience. Besides, it did not occur to me
that it would interest him who seemed to be moderation and temperance
personified. And so he was, according to the scientific estimate of
the time, but Nature has another standard of temperance, and under her
strict guidance very little but good spring water is needed or desired.
HOW TO ENJOY WINE
To illustrate this and also suggest a way of letting Mother Nature
prove that I represent her correctly in this important matter, I will
give an account of an actual happening.
I was lecturing in Buffalo, New York, in America, and was invited to
address the members of the sumptuous Buffalo Club. I dwelt especially
on Fletcherizing as a means of getting the good and the best out of
food and drink, and yet for little cost, and at the close of the
lecture a dozen or more of the audience asked me to demonstrate my
point as above. I was happy to do this, and called for a pint of the
choicest still wine, with cordial glasses. The request caused a smile
among some of my hosts who were proud of being "one bottle" consumers.
When the wine came I poured out half a cordial glass as the portion
I selected for myself and recommended the same prescription for the
others, as a "starter." Then I breathed and sipped my delicious
grape-juice, as I had learned to do from the professional wine-tasters
on the Rhine, in Germany, and in the Burgundy region, in France. The
others did the same, and seemed to get unusual satisfaction from both
the _bouquet_ and the taste.
What happens is this: You sense the wine by means of the olfactories
as you would breathe in the odour of a delicately perfumed flower.
Taste is excited and becomes jealous of Smell. You give Taste a taste.
Something more subtle than taste; a sort of aroma, so to speak, spreads
over the head. You feel the taste of the delicacy up around the
temples, and the sensation is delightful in the extreme, fading slowly
away but leaving a lovely memory impression.
Then you take another sip, and the sensation is about the same, and
so on for a sip or two more, when the supremest delicacy of the wine
ceases to express itself. Two or three sips more, and the wine no
longer tastes good. Carried further, in this appetite-respecting
manner, there will be a desire to spit out the sips, and there is no
temptation to drink them.
Professional wine-tasters are supposed never to _drink_ wine. After
tasting it they spit out the remnant from which the taste has been
exhausted. Tea tasters and beer tasters and special food tasters do the
same in order to preserve their keen taste discrimination.
There is just as definite Swallowing Sense and Expectorating Sense
as there is Taste Sense. There is just as strong Appetite Sense for
proteid, when the body is short of it, as there is thirst-demand for
water for the rehydration of the body. The Senses have sense!
Returning to the Buffalo Club experiment in demonstrating Epicurean
Temperance: The half-bottle of wine gave more satisfaction to the dozen
or more members of the Club who participated in the experiment than any
of them knew was possible.
FLETCHERISM AS A CURE FOR MORBID CRAVINGS
It is not necessary to supply expensive wine for the complete
satisfaction of the most delicate epicureanism if Fletcherizing is
employed as an habitual cream-separating means. The cream of common
wheat bread, and of anything that the normalized appetite favours, is
as satisfying when the body is in need of what it contains as are drops
of the most costly Johannisberger of the rarest vintages, and nothing
but water thoroughly quenches real thirst.
The "testimonials" of one sort and another, including letters and
verbal account, attesting to the effect of natural eating on abnormal
desires or cravings, number thousands. The reform has not been the
result of suggestion, although in some cases suggestion has assisted
the cure of intemperate yearnings. Not alone has craving for alcoholic
stimulant been abated, but in other ways morbidity has been corrected,
and I as well as some medical men I know, have received grateful
acknowledgment of the happiness secured by the natural sloughing off of
weaknesses or passions which had been a source of self-hatred. Think
what immunity from such baneful possibilities means to youth of both
sexes!
A TRIAL OF FLETCHERISM AND ITS RESULTS
The very large test of Fletcherism as a temperance expedient
hereinbefore referred to was entirely accidental. It occurred in a
community of students of a missionary college in Tennessee.
The institution is conducted under religious auspices, the sect
supporting it being that called "Seventh-Day Adventists." The buildings
are on a large farm, and most of the students earn their board and
tuition by doing farm work. Many subsist by what is called "boarding
themselves," that is: purchasing raw food and doing their own cooking.
To assist in this independence there is a commissary where everything
needed is bartered or sold.
One of the prominent persons in the Adventist denomination is Dr.
Kellog, Superintendent of the Battle Creek Sanatorium, who from the
beginning has been one of the most ardent advocates and teachers
of Fletcherism, and to whom is largely due the permanency of its
designation as "Fletcherism."
During a visit to the Tennessee institution, Dr. Kellog so successfully
preached the merits of natural eating, that all the students were
induced to give it a trial as a health and economic measure.
The trial was conducted under observation for six months, when an
accounting was made. During the six months the drafts on the commissary
had been a trifle less than half what they formerly had been, and at
the same time the community had been free from the usual "seasonable"
and bilious complaints or illnesses. No one had been cured of a craving
for alcohol, for the reason that all were teetotalers on principle,
but the sheer economy and healthfulness of the results obtained
were of prodigious importance to young persons "working their way
through college." The amount of the benefit can be imagined when it
is considered that they needed to work less on the farm to earn their
food because the food-bill was much reduced. The time saved from work
was available for study, and the increase of energy and immunity from
sickness added enormously to the average student ability.
One day there was brought to the institution on a stretcher a poor chap
of the neighbourhood, crazy with delirium tremens. In the infirmary of
the college emergency patients were received, as part of the missionary
training is medical.
The sorry dipsomaniac was sobered-up in the usual way and instructed
in the process of Fletcherizing. He took kindly to it, as all do who
have been dietetic sinners, and the result was the same as with the
beery and bleery tramp mentioned in the early part of this chapter. He
lost his "taste" for "booze" and continued the incident by becoming a
worker on the place and a sound temperance example.
Here is a revelation worth while to the missionary workers. Their
field of service was the mountain districts of their State and the
neighbouring State of North Carolina, which are famous for their
moonshine whisky stills. The whisky distilled in the mountains does
not pay any Internal Revenue tax if it can be avoided, and hence the
stills are hidden in deep forests and operated by the light of the
moon. The inhabitants of these lawless regions are the poorest of the
poor and call down the contempt of the negroes. They are called "poor
white trash," and moonshine whisky that will kill at fifty yards is
responsible for much of the poverty and trashiness. They are as good
marks for missionary sympathy as any "heathen" the world can produce
anywhere. I have been among them all and I assure you, these listless
and luckless inebriates of the poor white trash regions are the most
pitiable.
FLETCHERISM AS FIRST AID
As soon as the incident of the victim of delirium tremens had been
measured at its full significance, it dawned upon the missionaries
that Fletcherism was to be their most potent assistant in curing
the mountaineers of their vices and preparing them for religious
instruction. They were won over to the ideal of Dietetic Corpoculture
as "First Aid to the Injured" in establishing Temperance on a sound
basis.
Thus it was that the graduated missionaries introduced themselves
to their charges by building simple ovens of road-side stones in
rail-fence corners, as field surveyors might do, and invited those who
came along to feed with them.
There is never any trouble in securing guests at a feed anywhere,
and it is extremely easy among the poor to whom free food means less
work and more leisure. It is easy, too, to get the ears and attention
of guests at meals who would like to be invited again. It is also
easy to teach Fletcherizing to youthful dinner-guests, as Madame La
Marquise de Chamberay and I found out in connection with our East Side
investigation in New York.[O]
[O] This reference is to an unique experiment in New York, account
of which will sometime be published under the title of "Parties of
Politeness," a name suggested by the little guests themselves.
The result of this strategy on the part of the Tennessee missionaries
was reported to a meeting at the Battle Creek Sanatorium, and the
summary of the good attained up to that time was as follows: More than
a thousand persons were saving an average of $3.00 a month on the cost
of their sustenance, and were temperance converts through the sloughing
off of all desire for their moonshine product. Think of a saving from
sheer waste of $3,000 a month ($36,000 a year) to a community where
$1,000 is considered to be a princely fortune, and a saving of a
thousand human units from the scrap-heap of worse than death!