GOUT. 215 



it is unknown among the savage peoples even at the 

 present day ; but so soon as he entered upon the 

 civilised state, became a chief or a king, and lounged 

 in idleness while others performed that labour which 

 must be done by or for every creature, if the creature 

 is to exist, then this disease appeared ; and as civilisa- 

 tion spread, and the. non- working class increased, so did 

 gout. In fact, so soon as man began to eat too much 

 and labour too little, gout attacked him. It is above 

 all other diseases the scourge of the opulent and idle. 

 The vegetarians those hopeless faddists have 

 asserted that gout, in common with every other ill 

 that flesh is heir to, is the direct result of animal food. 

 So long, they say, as man remained a vegetarian, gout 

 was unknown. To this we would reply : Yes, and for 

 ages after he had ceased to be a vegetarian. It was 

 only when man became indolent and lazy, on discover- 

 ing that he could, by exercising his ingenuity, procure 

 more than enough of the best of the wherewithal to 

 sustain life without physical exertion, that the disease 

 appeared. The North American Indians and many 

 other peoples of whom we know were largely, if not 

 entirely flesh-eaters, yet gout among such peoples was 

 unknown. And why ? Simply because the very 

 active life they lived in the open air used up all the 

 food stuff taken, and accumulation was impossible. 

 The organs were never overloaded, or, if they were, it 

 was only on occasions which alternated with periods 

 of healthful want, consequently disease from that cause 

 was absent. 



