Appendix 3 – Lectures on the Science of Human Life

Sylvester Graham

elasticity and strength and his animal vivacity, takes away his mental tranquility, subjects him to frequent depressions of mind and painful despondency, and increases his liability to insanity”

Score – Unverified

Why 36 – Excitation of the Stomach (What 47)

Exciting foods waste our vital powers. The only suitable foods to eat are those that barely excite enough for their digestion.

Page 298-734 – “By the stimulating properties of those substances which are designed for our daily food, our digestive organs,.... are excited to the performance of their functions; and in being thus excited, they always necessarily suffer an exhaustion of vital power and waste of substance commensurate with the degree and duration of the excitement.”

Page 354-886 – “But we have seen, that those proper alimentary substances whose stimulating power is barely sufficient to excite a full and healthy performance of the functions of digestive organs, in the appropriation of their nourishment to the system, are conductive to the vital welfare of the body in all respects ..... For every degree of stimulation power beyond this, there is a necessary increase in the vital exhaustion, without contributing in any measure to the welfare of the body.”

Score – Unverified

Why 37 – Sympathetic Nerves (What 47)

Through the sympathetic nervous system anything that affects the stomach will affect all other organs.

Page 77-231 – “Lying near the great ganglionic center, it (the stomach) receives a large supply of nerves directly from that source, and is thereby brought into the closest sympathetic union with the common center of organic life, and through it with all the organs and parts in its domain. By the arrangements and distribution of plexuses also, the stomach is brought into very direct relations with the heart, liver, lungs, and all other organs.”

Score – Unverified

Page 610-1543 – “All these points I have carefully examined (use of salt in Scripture), and from examination am the fully convinced that salt is not a necessary nor a proper article for dietetic use in man.”

Comment – Ellen White used the term “not eat largely of salt,” which is much more consistent with health needs than total exclusion of salt.

Score – Unverified

Why 38 – Salt (What 48)

Salt has no nutritional value, is indigestible, and causes irritation, debility and diseases of many organs.

Page 609-1542 – “The facts in regard to the dietetic use of salt then are these:

1.Salt is wholly innutritious

2.It is utterly indigestible

3.It acrid quality is offensive to the vital sensibilities of the organs.... is always attended with ...

irritation and vital expenditure, and followed by a corresponding degree of indirect debility and atony; and consequently it always and inevitably tends to produce chronic debility, preternatural irritability, and disease; the stomach, intestines, absorbents, veins, heart, arteries, and all other organs of the system, are always irritated, exhausted, and debilitated by its presence.”

Appendix 3 – Lectures on the Science of Human Life

Sylvester Graham

Page 610-1545 – “It is well known that sailors and others, when confined for a considerable time to salted food, become afflicted with scurvy,..... I have been strongly pressed to the conclusion that dietetic use of salt is largely concerned in the production of cancers and other glandular diseases of the human system; and I am entirely certain that exceedingly aggravates many chronic diseases of every kind; that it is directly conducive to scrofulous, pulmonary, and cutaneous affections, and disorders of the mucous membranes;”

Score – Unverified

What 49 – Herbal Teas

Herbal teas should be used with caution especially for children.

Page 618-1555 – ‘the infusion of teas made of pungent and exciting herbs should be used with great caution, and especially as drinks or medicine for children.’

Comment – Herbal teas are in the main safe to drink.

Score - Unverified

Page 505-1283 – “Flesh and fish that are both salted and smoked are (not good for health).” Comment – There is a risk of carcinogens in smoked foods, but they were vital means of preservation of food prior to refrigeration and canning. The same can be said about pickling.

Score – Minor

Why 39 – Smoked (What 50)

Salted or smoked foods are indigestible and irritating.

Page 505-1283 - "Flesh and fish that are both salted and smoked are yet more difficult of digestion, and more oppressive and irritating to the assimilating organs.”

Score – Unverified

Why 40 – Pickles (What 50) Pickles can cause delirium.

Page 437-1089 - “Another physician is called in, (to a patient laboring under violent delirium) who first sets about ascertaining the cause; this is done, an emetic is prescribed, and soon a large quantity of undigested beef and pickled cucumber is thrown from the stomach, and instantly the symptoms disappear, and the patient is restored to reason, and shortly to health.”

Score – Unverified

Page 290-717 – (There are health problems) “if the food is imperfectly masticated and too rapidly swallowed into the stomach,”

Score - Minor

Why 41 – Mastication (What 51)

Poorly masticated foods cause irritation of the stomach and lead to undigested foods being absorbed causing bowel disturbances, convulsions and even death.

Page 290-717 – “If the food is imperfectly masticated and too rapidly swallowed into the stomach, it becomes a serious cause of irritation to that organ... permitted to pass in a crude state into the intestinal tube, where it becomes a cause of serious and sometimes fatal disturbance, producing flatulence, colic, spasm, convulsions and even death”

Appendix 3 – Lectures on the Science of Human Life

Sylvester Graham

Page 585-1500 – “for all masses of unchewed food in the stomach very slowly digests, and always tends to worry and irritate that organ and disturb its function, and in many instances they produce very serious effects both on the physiological and psychological powers. Cramps, colic, convulsions, delirium, -etc., have frequently result from such causes.”

Page 585-1501 – “food should be slowly swallowed; for if it is too rapidly introduced into the stomach, it always oppresses and irritates that organ, impairs its functional powers, and serves to bring on dyspepsia and innumerable other evils.”

Score – Unverified

What 52 – Fruit and Vegetable Diet W 26 R 29 (A 105) C 29 (J 51) K 79

Fruit, vegetables and grain constitute the best diet.

Page 351-873 - “The fact, then, that a large proportion of the human family have .... subsisted .... on animal food, or on a mixed diet of vegetable and animal food, and apparently done as well as those on a vegetable diet, does not in any degree invalidate the evidence of comparative anatomy that man is naturally and purely a frugivorous animal.” (fruit eating)

Page 339-842 – “That record (Mosaic) explicitly asserts that the truly natural state man subsisted

.... wholly upon the fruit of trees and seeds of herbs, or upon fruits and farinaceous vegetables.” Page 489-1236 – “Man is naturally a frugivorous and granivorous , or a fruit and vegetable-eating animal.”

Page 496-1253 -"a pure and well-chosen vegetable diet, under a correct general ragimen, is in every respect most favorable to the physiological and psychological interests ... children"

Score – Significant

Why 42 – Vegetarians –1 (What 52)

Vegetarians have cooler skin and a slower pulse rate than meat eaters.

Page 360-909 – “And hence the well-known fact, that .... men who have been accustomed to a pure vegetable and water diet from infancy, the skin is uniformly much cooler, and the pulse is slower from ten to thirty beats in a minute, than to those who subsist on a mixed diet,”

Score - Unverified

Why 43 – Vegetarian – 2 (What 52)

Vegetarians will be healthier and better developed than meat eaters.

Page 391-986 - “But all other things being equal, it is entirely certain that, as a permanent fact extending from generation to generation, pure, well-chosen vegetable food will better sustain the human constitution in all its powers, and more healthfully and symmetrically develop the body, than a diet consisting of any portion of flesh-meal.”

Comment – Vegetarians tend to grow taller than meat eaters.

Score - Verified

Why 44 – Vegetarian – 3 (What 52)

Vegetarians are stronger and have better endurance than meat eaters.

Page 399-1012 – “Nevertheless, as a general law of the human constitution, it is entirely certain that, all other things being precisely equal, he who habitually subsides on a diet of pure and wellchosen vegetable food and pure water, will possess greater spontaneous muscular power than those who subside on animal food, or on a mixed diet, and he will still farther excel them in the ability to endure continual muscular effort; or he will be able to perform more labor a longer time, and with less exhaustion or weariness.”

Comment – A vegetarian diet does not aid strength, but does increase endurance.

Score – Verified