It would seem a considerable departure from the study of menticulture
as advised in the author's book, "Menticulture," to jump at once to an
investigation of the physiology and psychology of nutrition of the
body and then over to the department of infant and child care and
education as pursued in the _fearthought_ and in the kindergarten; but
as a matter of fact, if study of the causation of human disabilities
and misfortunes is attempted at all, the quest leads naturally into
all the departments of human interest, and first into these primary
departments.
The object of this statement is to link up the different publications
of the writer into a chain of consistent suggestions intended to make
life a more simple and agreeable problem than many of us too
indifferent or otherwise inefficient and bad fellow-citizens make of
it.
It is not an altogether unselfish effort on the part of the author of
the A.B.C. Life Series to publish his findings. In the consideration
of his own mental and physical happiness it is impossible to leave out
environment, and all the units of humanity who inhabit the world are
part of his and of each other's environment.
It would be rank presumption for any person, even though gifted with
the means to circulate his suggestions as widely as possible, and
armed with the power to compel the reading of his publications, to
think that any suggestions of his could influence any considerable
number of his fellow-citizens of the world, or even of his own
immediate neighbourhood, to accept or follow his advice relative to
the management of their lives and of their communal and national
affairs; but while the general and complete good of humanity should be
aimed at in all publications, one's immediate neighbours and friends
come first, and the wave of influence spreads according to the
effectiveness of the ideas suggested in doing good; that is, in
altering the point of view and conduct of people so as to make them a
better sympathetic environment.
For instance, the children of your neighbours are likely to be the
playmates of your own children, and the children of degenerate parents
in the slum district of your city will possibly be the fellow-citizen
partners of your own family. Again, when it is known that right or
wrong nutrition of the body is the most important agent in forming
character, in establishing predisposition to temperance or
intemperance of living, including the desire for intoxicating
stimulants, it is revealed to one that right nutrition of the
community as a whole is an important factor in his own environment, as
is self-care in the case of his own nourishment.
The moment a student of every-day philosophy starts the study of
problems from the A.B.C. beginning of things, and to shape his study
according to an A.B.C. sequence, each cause of inharmony is at once
traced back to its first expression in himself and then to causes
influenced by his environments.
If we find that the largest influences for good or bad originate with
the right or wrong instruction of children during the home training or
kindergarten period of their development, and that a dollar expended
for education at that time is worth more for good than whole bancs of
courts and whole armies of police to correct the effect of bad
training and bad character later in life, it is quite logical to help
promote the spread of the kindergarten or the kindergarten idea to
include all of the children born into the world, and to furnish
mothers and kindergarten teachers with knowledge relative to the right
nutrition of their wards which they can themselves understand and can
teach effectively to children.
If we also find that the influence of the kindergarten upon the
parents of the infants is more potent than any other which can be
brought to bear upon them, we see clearly that the way to secure the
widest reform in the most thorough manner is to concentrate attention
upon the kindergarten phase of education, advocate its extension to
include even the last one of the children, beginning with the most
needy first, and extending the care outward from the centre of worst
neglect to finally reach the whole.
Experience in child saving so-called, and in child education on the
kindergarten principle, has taught the cheapest and the most
profitable way to insure an environment of good neighbours and
profit-earning citizens; and investigation into the problem of human
alimentation shows that a knowledge of the elements of an economic
nutrition is the first essential of a family or school training; and
also that this is most impressive when taught during the first ten
years of life.
One cannot completely succeed in the study of menticulture from its
A.B.C. beginning and in A.B.C. sequence without appreciation of the
interrelation of the physical and the mental, the personal and the
social, in attaining a complete mastery of the subject.
The author of the A.B.C. Life Series has pursued his study of the
philosophy of life in experiences which have covered a great variety
of occupations in many different parts of the world and among peoples
of many different nations and races. His first book, "Menticulture,"
dealt with purging the mind and habits of sundry weaknesses and
deterrents which have possession of people in general in some degree.
He recognised the depressing effect of anger and worry and other
phases of _fearthought_. In the book "Happiness," which followed next
in order, _fearthought_ was shown to be the unprofitable element of
forethought. The influence of environment on each individual was
revealed as an important factor of happiness, or the reverse, by means
of an accidental encounter with a neglected waif in the busy streets
of Chicago during a period of intense national excitement incident to
the war with Spain, and this led to the publication of "That Last
Waif; or, Social Quarantine." During the time that this last book was
being written, attention to the importance of right nutrition was
invited by personal disabilities, and the experiments described in
"Glutton or Epicure; or, Economic Nutrition" were begun and have
continued until now.
In the study of the latter, but most important factor in profitable
living, circumstances have greatly favoured the author, as related in
his latest book, "The A.B.-Z. of Our Own Nutrition."
The almost phenomenal circulation of "Menticulture" for a book of its
kind, and a somewhat smaller interest in the books on nutrition and
the appeal for better care of the waifs of society, showed that most
persons wished, like the author, to find a short cut to happiness by
means of indifference to environment, both internal and external,
while habitually sinning against the physiological dietetic
requirements of Nature. In smothering worry and guarding against anger
the psychic assistance of digestion was stimulated and some better
results were thereby obtained, but not the best attainable results.
Living is easy and life may be made constantly happy by beginning
right; and the right beginning is none other than the careful feeding
of the body. This done there is an enormous reserve of energy, a
naturally optimistic train of thought, a charitable attitude towards
everybody, and a loving appreciation of everything that God has made.
Morbidity of temperament will disappear from an organism that is
economically and rightly nourished, and death will cease to have any
terrors for such; and as _fear_ of death is the worst depressant
known, many of the _worries_ of existence take their everlasting
flight from the atmosphere of the rightly nourished.
The wide interest now prevalent in the subjects treated in The A.B.C.
Life Series is evidenced by the scientific, military, and lay
activity, in connection with the experiments at the Sheffield
Scientific School of Yale University and elsewhere, as related in the
"A.B.-Z. of Our Own Nutrition" and in "The New Glutton or Epicure" of
the series.
The general application is more fully shown, however, by the
indorsement of the great Battle Creek Sanitarium, which practically
studies all phases of the subject, from health conservation and child
saving to general missionary work in social reform.