OBESITY 



OBJECT 



567 



the fortieth year that the tendency to an inordinate 

 accumulation of fat begins to show itself. After 

 that time, in the case ot men the pleasures of the 

 table are usually more attractive than in earlier 

 life, and much less muscular exercise is taken ; 

 while in women the cessation of the power of 

 child-bearing induces changes which tend remark- 

 ably to the deposition of fat. The extent to which 

 fat may accumulate in the human body is enor- 

 mous. Daniel Lambert (1769-1809) weighed 739 

 Ih. ; his exact height is not recorded, but, accord- 

 ing to the investigations of the late Dr Hutchinson 

 (the inventor of the spirometer), the normal weight 

 of a man 6 feet high should not exceed 178 Ib. 

 Dr Elliotson has recorded the case of a female 

 child, a year old, who weighed 60 Ib. 



The predisposing causes of obesity are a peculiar 

 habit of body, hereditarily transmitted ; inactivity ; 

 sedentary occupations, \-c. ; while the more im- 

 mediate or exciting causes are a rich diet, includ- 

 ing fatty matters, and matters convertible in the 

 body into fats, such as saccharine and starchy 

 foods, and the partaking of such a diet to a greater 

 extent than is necessary for balancing the daily 

 waste of the tissues. ' Fat meats, butter, oily 

 vegetable substances, milk, saccharine and farin- 

 aceous substances are the most fattening articles 

 of food ; whilst malt liquors, particularly rich and 

 sweet ale, are, of all beverages, the most conducive 

 in promoting obesity. The fattening effect of figs 

 and grapes, and of the sugar-cane, upon the natives 

 of the countries where these are abundant, is well 

 known. In various countries in Africa and the 

 East, where oliesity is much admired in females, 

 warm baths, indolence, and living upon saccharine 

 and farinaceous articles, upon dates, the nuts from 

 which palm-oil is obtained, and upon various oily 

 seeds are the means usually employed to produce 

 this effect' (Copland's Dictionary). The know- 

 ledge of the means of inducing obesity affords us 

 the best clue to the rational treatment of this affec- 

 tion. It is a popular lielief that the administration 

 of acids vinegar, for example, or one of the mineral 

 acids will check the deposition of fat; but if the 

 desired effect is produced it is only at the cost of 

 serious injury to the digestive, and often to the 

 urinary organs. The employment of soap and 

 alkalies, as advocated a century ago by Flemyng, 

 i- !>- objectionable than that of acids, but the 

 jirnlunged use even of these is usually prejudicial. 

 The efficacy of one of our commonest seaweeds, 

 sea- wrack (Fucus vesiculosiit), in this affection has 

 also been strongly advocated. It is prescribed in 

 the form of an extract, and its value is probably 

 dependent on the iodine contained in it. 



A very interesting Letter on Corpulence, pub- 

 lished in ISftJ by Mr William Ranting (1797-1878), 

 in which he records the effect of diet in his own 

 cas*>, after all medicinal treatment had failed, is 

 well worthy of the attention of those who are 

 suffering from the affection of which this article 

 n-aN. The following are the leading points in 

 his case. He was sixty six years of age, about 5 

 feet 5 inches in stature (and therefore, according 

 t<> Dr Hutchinson 's calculations, ought to have 

 weighed about 142 Ib. ), and in August 1862 

 w.-ighcd 202 lit. 'Few men,' he ol>serves, 'have 

 led a more active life ... so that my corpulence 

 and sulisequent ol>esity were not through neglect 

 of necessary Wlily activity, nor from excessive 

 eating, drinking, or self-indulgence of any kind, 

 except that I partook of the simple aliments of 

 bread, milk, Imtter, beer, sugar, and potatoes, more 

 freely than my aged nature required. ... I could 

 not stoop to tie my shoe, nor attend to the little 

 ollici-< humanity requires without considerable pain 

 and difficulty ; I have been compelled to go down- 

 stairs slowly backwards, to save the jar of increased 



weight upon the ankle and knee joints, and been 

 obliged to puff and blow with every slight 

 exertion. ' 



By the advice of a medical friend he adopted the 

 following plan of diet : ' For breakfast I take four 

 or live ounces of beef, mutton, kidneys, broiled 

 lish, bacon, or cold meat of any kind except pork ; 

 a large cup of tea (without milk or sugar), a little 

 biscuit, or one ounce of dry toast. For dinner, five 

 or six ounces of any fish except salmon, any meat 

 except pork, any vegetable except potato, one 

 ounce of diy toast, fruit out of a pudding, any 

 kind of ]M>ultry or game, and two or three glasses 

 of good claret, sherry, or Madeira : champagne, 

 port, or beer forbidden. For tea, two or three 

 ounces of fruit, a rusk or two, and a cup of tea 

 without milk or sugar. For supper, three or four 

 ounces of meat or fish, similar to dinner, with a 

 glass or two of claret ' ( p. 18 ). 'I breakfast between 

 eight and nine o'clock, dine l)etween one and two, 

 take my slight tea meal between five and six, and 

 sup at nine (p. 40). Under this treatment he lost 

 in little more than a year (between the 26th of 

 August 1862 and the 12th of September 1863) 46 

 Ib. of his bodily weight, while his girth round the 

 waist was reduced 121 inches. He reported him- 

 self as restored to health, as able to walk up and 

 down st.iirs like other men ; to stoop with ease and 

 freedom ; and safely to leave off knee-l>aiiihr_> -. 

 which he had necessarily worn for twenty years 

 past. He made his own case widely known by the 

 circulation of his pamphlet (which has passed 

 through several editions), and 'numerous reports 

 sent with thanks by strangers as well as friends' 

 show that ' the system is a great success ; ' and 

 that it is so \\e do not doubt, for it is based on 

 sound physiological principles. Other more or less 

 similar systems have since been recommended ; 

 one, with two successful cases, is recorded in the 

 Edinburgh Meilical Journal for December 1890. 

 Such a radical change of diet, however, should not 

 be adopted without medical advice, as in some 

 cases it might cause disturbance of digestion or 

 excretion, and lead to new dangers to health. See 

 (under Fast) FASTING (Vol. IV. p. 559), TRAINING. 



Obi. See OB, and OB. 



Object, and its correlative, SUBJECT, are terms 

 used in a perplexing multiplicity of senses, the 

 same author, philosophical or semi-philosophical, 

 being frequently inconsistent in the meaning 

 attached by him to the words. Thus, it may be 

 said that while ordinarily the subject is the knowing 

 mind, the object is that which is known, thought, 

 felt, seen, imagined the psychological correspond- 

 ing fairly with the grammatical usage. At another 

 time the subject is the ego, while the object is the 

 non-ego, the external world, with an implication 

 that the objective has a firmer, surer ground, if 

 not wholly independent of the subjective, then at 

 least less liable to vary or fluctuate. On the other 

 hand, if the noumenon, the subject, is the truly real, 

 the phenomenal object is comparatively an acci- 

 dent. Yet again, that which is the law of the 

 consciousness, which is prior to experience, is by 

 some regarded as more indefeasible and objective 

 than the fleeting elements of conscious experience. 

 For some, objective is that which is common to all 

 minds (and to the absolute mind) at all times, and 

 the subjective that which is peculiar to my mind 

 or any given mind at any given time. Thus the 

 essence of the subjective becomes the most objec- 

 tive thing in existence ; really objective truth is 

 that which from the nature of the case is prior to 

 and independent of experience. It is needless to 

 point out that, when the subject thinks of itself, 

 the subject may be said to become its own object. 

 In general, however, that is objective which deals 



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