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The material from which I intend to draw brief data relating to the question I have raised is the three-volume work of M. Platen, which has been awarded fourteen gold medals, six medals of honour, three honorary crosses at various exhibitions, which has gone through 38 editions and has been sold abroad in hundreds of thousands of copies! A success of which the writings of a few scholars and professors can boast of, and which says something.

Platen begins his book with an explanation of the causes of diseases from which the entire civilized world suffers, and finds that "mankind is decaying and sick because it is subject to the influence of hundreds of diseases because it has almost completely recoiled from the natural way of life and lives a life completely contrary to the laws of nature." Among these causes are: fear of fresh air (compare our bedrooms, which are closed tightly at night, on all sides, so that not a single stream of cold air gets into them - many of the doctors even encourage this for fear of catching a cold in their patients), improper diet, impenetrable and irrational clothing, wrapping up in bed, improper distribution of movement and rest, wakefulness and sleep, and much more. All this requires a detailed consideration, to which Platen—and we with him—proceeds. He begins with an explanation of the question of nutrition and "what it should be and what it usually does not be."

What should we eat?* (Platen's subtitle. — Compiler's note.)

"Dear reader," teaches the sympathetic (I judge by the portrait) doctor, "if you belong to the middle class, if you are a craftsman or a worker, or if you are generally compelled, by force of circumstances, to limit your choice of food and drink and to observe a certain economy, then in most cases you will assert that you could be stronger and healthier, and work more vigorously, if, like rich people, he could eat a lot of good meat and drink a lot of beer and wine. This view is all the more deeply rooted in you because you yourself, which is quite possible, do not receive

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eat meat every day for dinner, or even be able to have it for the table only on holidays. Further, you may be obliged to do without wine altogether, you drink beer quite rarely, and in most cases you have recourse to brandy, in order to preserve your strength, as you think, and in the winter time it is sufficient to warm your body.

In this regard, you are terribly mistaken! The prominent belly of the wealthier people, their red, puffy, and heated faces, which reveal in them a severe state of flushing of blood, all serve as a good indicator of what kind of apparent health this is. In truth, appearances are deceiving, and behind this health and strength, which you envy when you look at well-to-do people, there are two sinister ghosts - "gout" and "blow".

... Thus, a luxurious lifestyle gives the first impetus to the development of the above sufferings. Unfortunately, however, many continue to drink and eat as if they had an indestructible stomach and a second health in reserve... Without exaggeration, it can be said that a good half of people struggle with their stomach. The appearance of most diseases can be attributed to digestive disorders. Gout, rheumatism, diseases of the bladder, liver, and kidneys, hypochondria, satiety with life, and many kinds of nervous sufferings owe their occurrence to the morbid condition of the digestive organs. Thinness, circulatory irregularities, and anemia develop as a result of our immoderation and stomach suffering.8

... The famous banker and millionaire Rothschild once came to Wörishofen, Bavaria, to the no less famous pastor Kneipp, who treated according to the natural method, and asked him to give him advice and help him in his serious illness. Rothschild gave Pastor Kneipp a detailed account of his way of life and how often and what he was accustomed to eating. He spoke at length about the mass of food he ate every day at four or five meals, and finally, after giving a picture of his illness, asked if Kneipp could now tell him what he was sick with, since the doctors made one or another diagnosis. 'Certainly,' said the venerable pastor, 'I can tell you with certainty what you are sick with: you suffer from the absence of a second stomach.'"

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«... Kneipp is a Catholic priest and at the same time a doctor who is a follower of the natural method of healing. He cured a lot of people, and the success of his treatment was sometimes downright miraculous, so that he gained fame both among doctors and among the public...

Pastor Kneipp was born on May 17, 1821... He was the son of a poor weaver, and he was to follow in his father's footsteps. An irresistible desire to become a priest prompted the young Kneipp to flee from the loom at the age of 21."

After many wanderings and deprivations, he lost his health, but in the end he achieved his goal: he received the rank of priest. Chance or Providence, whoever you like, prompted him to hydrotherapy. First of all, he saved himself from death (his physical strength was completely shattered from overwork, and he already began to suffer from chest pain, so that even the professors of medicine could not help him in any way), and then "founded and gradually developed a quite peculiar system of hydrotherapy", by means of which he cured countless other people. He set forth this system in the quickly famous work "My Hydrotherapy; means for curing diseases and preserving health." In a short time, Kneipp cured typhoid and smallpox patients who had lost their voice and even their sight and hearing. In short, he "cured all diseases, with the exception of organic sufferings, diseases inherited or acquired in early childhood, for example, epilepsy (falling)9, and some diseases leading to complete exhaustion, for example, dryness and the like.