THE USE AND ABUSE OF FOOD. 



FRANCIS BACON has laid it down as an axiom that experiment 

 is the foundation of all real progress in knowledge. " Man,' : 

 he said, " as the minister and interpreter of nature, does and 

 understands as much as his observations on the order of 

 nature permit him, and neither knows nor is capable of 

 more."* It would seem, then, as if there could be no 

 subject on which man should be better informed than on the 

 value of various articles of food, and the quantity in which 

 each should be used. On most branches of experimental 

 inquiry, a few men in each age perhaps but for a few ages 

 in succession have pursued for a longer or shorter portion 

 of their life, a system of experiment and observation. But 

 on the subject of food or diet all men in all ages have been 

 practical experimenters, and not for a few years only, but 

 during their entire life. One would expect, then, that no 

 questions could be more decisively settled than those which 

 relate to the use or the abuse of food. Every one ought to 

 know, it might be supposed, what kinds of food are good for 

 the health, in what quantity each should be taken, what 

 changes of diet tend to correct this or that kind of ill-health, 

 and how long each change should be continued. 



Unfortunately, as we know, this is far from being the 

 case. We all eat many things which are bad for us, and 

 omit to eat many things which would be good for us. We 



* Closely following in this respect his illustrious namesake Roger, 

 who writes, in the sixth chapter of liis Opus Majus, "Sine experieiitiA 

 nifiil wfficientcr sciri potest." 



