Chapter VII - Physiology
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woman-hood, the fewer diseases appear, and less harm
woman-hood, the fewer diseases appear, and less harm
be derived from change of climate, unwholesome diet,
laying aside flannels, severe mental labor, sedentary
habits, heated rooms, and all the et cetera of physiolo-
gical rules based on man as a structural thing, whose
life is at the mercy of circumstance. The scriptural
warning against "knowledge" ought to be heeded, but
it is not; the stronger constitutions of our forefathers
compared with this age, should furnish a hint, but they
do not; the difficulty lies in our nameless theories; sin,
sickness, and death, all over the land, are the fruits of
the belief of Life and Intelligence in matter.
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The simple food our forefathers ate would not cure
The simple food our forefathers ate would not cure
dyspepsia to-day; with rules of health in the head and
the most digestible food in the stomach, there would be
dyspeptics; the effeminate constitutions of this period
will never grow robust until the science of being takes
the place of materia medica, physiology, etc. The ig-
norance of our forefathers of the knowledge that to-day
walks to and fro in the earth, made them more hardy
than our physiologists, and more honest than our poli-
ticians. We by no means deprecate learning, deep re-
search, original thought, history, observation, invention,
science and understanding; it is the scheming barbar-
isms of learning, the mere doctrine, theory, or nauseous
fiction, we deplore. Novels, remarkable only for exag-
gerated pictures of depravity, works on materia medica,
hygiene, or laws of health, remind you of Aesop's moun-
tain in labor with a mouse; introduce but a scandal
and humbug and you please society. What I wish to
know is, if this taste be not a fault of our systems of think-
ing and writing. All is mechanical; nature is suffocated;
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the core of mankind is not reached, and its coverings
the core of mankind is not reached, and its coverings
thickly inlaid with foreign devices. Let us be individ-
ually what we are; not swallowing camels for popular-
ity, or mincing at gnats in the shape of honest ideas,
because they come from the Soul of man. If knowl-
edge is power, it is not Wisdom, but blind force, whose
material origin is made known by losing in time, what
it gains in power.
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To eschew error would usher in a new era, pull-
To eschew error would usher in a new era, pull-
ing down the bars of sects, and the conventionalities
of knowledge, would build up spiritual foundations,
whereby we take God into our experiences, and become
healthy and harmonious, noble men and women, instead
of despairing invalids and matter-automata. The less
we have of personal sense, the more we have of Soul;
and the fewer laws material, the more longevity and
spiritual understanding. Learning all was vanity "in
the flesh," made Solomon a wise man, that before had
been the fool of sense.
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Ancient theories separated a personal Satan from
Ancient theories separated a personal Satan from
man by horns and hoofs; modern opinions compromise;
eschewing his satanic majesty in such proportions, they
retain a sinful and mortal man, the opposite of God's
idea, at war with his Maker, and swaying his own
destinies in defiance of Him, yet supposed to have God
dwelling in him! Whatever is sinful, sick, or dying,
is not man, but that which Paul described "without
hope, and without God in the world," and the psalmist
said, was "a sleep, and dream that is told." "He that
dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High shall
abide under the shadow of the Almighty." Relin-
quishing the belief of Intelligent matter, man abides in