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The Royal Road to Health

C >> Chas. A. Tyrrell >> The Royal Road to Health



This etext was produced by Richard and Margie Druery
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WARNINGS AND DISCLAIMERS

Transcriber's Note: This tract on health, like many published last
century, is essentially an advertisement of a particular form of
treatment invented and sold by the author. While it is of interest
in historical terms, it should not be relied upon as medical advice.

This e-text "Royal Road To Health" is for historical and educational
purposes only. This antiquated information is not presented with the
intention of diagnosing or prescribing.

No responsibility, liability or warranty, express or implied, is
assumed by the author or any distributer of this book. Anyone can
distribute this book freely any way they want, as long as all this
information contained in this book remains like it is now. . . .
(no changes, additions, or deletions).





THE ROYAL ROAD TO HEALTH
OR THE SECRET OF
HEALTH WITHOUT DRUGS.

By Chas. A. Tyrrell




TO MY WIFE.

Whose Enthusiasm, and unflagging interest in all matters pertaining to
health is excelled by none, and who has been a faithful coworker in
building up the system treating disease by hygienic methods herein set
forth,

This book is affectionately dedicated.


Copyright 1907

By

Charles A. Tyrrell, M.D.


DESCRIPTION OF THE DIAGRAM

ILLUSTRATING THE

DIGESTIVE ORGANS OF MAN.


1. Esophagus or Gullet.
2. Cardiac end of Stomach.
3. Pyloric end of Stomach.
4. Duodenum.
5, 6. Convolutions of Small Intestine.
7. Caecum.
7* Vermiform appendage of Caecum, called the appendicula
vermiformis.
8. Ascending Colon.
9, 10. Transverse Colon.
11. Descending Colon.
12. Sigmoid Flexure, the last curve of the Colon before it
terminates in the Rectum.
13. Rectum, the terminal part of the Colon.
14. Anus, posterior opening of the alimentary canal, through which the
excrements are expelled.
15. Lobes of the Liver, raised and turned back.
16. Hepatic Duct, which carries the bile from the liver to the Cystic
and Common Bile Ducts.
17. Cystic Duct.
18. Gall Bladder.
19. Common Bile Duct.
20. Pancreas, the gland which secretes the pancreatic juice.
21. Pancreatic Duct, entering the Duodunum with the Common Bile Duct.




PREFACE

TO THE ONE HUNDREDTH EDITION.

In presenting to the public the one hundredth edition of this work, it
is a matter for profound gratification to be able to state that the
treatment described in its pages has steadily increased in public
favor since its introduction. Tens of thousands of grateful people
testify to its efficiency, not only as a remedial process, but better
still, as a preventive of disease. Truth must ever prevail, and this
treatment being based on natural law (which is unerring), must achieve
the desired result, which is the restoration and preservation of
health.

This edition has been completely revised and much of it rewritten,
and, while the essential principles remain unchanged, some slight
departures from previously expressed opinions may be noted; for in the
years that have elapsed since the first edition saw the light, some
notable advances have been made in rational therapeutics and
dietetics, and no one can afford to lag behind the car of Progress.

The arrangement of the book has been still farther altered, by adding
another part, making nine in all, each part being devoted to a special
phase of the general subject, thus simplifying it, and making its
principles easier of application. Quotations have been freely made
from articles written during the past three years by the author, in
his capacity as editor of "Health," and several new formulas for the
treatment of important diseases have been added to those that have
appeared in previous editions.

While painfully conscious that the critically disposed may find
something to condemn in its pages, the work is sent forth with the
fervent hope, that despite any defects it may possess it may, in the
future, as in the past, prove the means of restoring to suffering
thousands the possession of their natural and rightful heritage
health.

THE AUTHOR.




CONTENTS.

PART 1.

DRUGGING PROVED UNSCIENTIFIC.

Health is wealth. The truth about "Materia Medica." Medical
opinions on drugs they do not cure disease. Opinions of
British physicians. The most important medical discoveries
made by laymen. There is no "law of cure," only a condition.
Drugs do not act on the system, but are acted upon.

PART II.

THE TRUE CAUSE OF DISEASE.

Only one cause of disease. There is only one disease, but
many modifications. Digestion and assimilation explained.
Evil effects of the retention of waste. The horrors of
faecal impaction. How auto infection is accomplished. The
mysteries of the circulation. Disease shown to be the result
of imperfect elimination.

PART III.

RATIONAL HYGIENIC TREATMENT.

Nature cures, not the physician. The action of microbes. The
cathartic habit. The true action of cathartics explained,
and popular suppositions corrected. A correct solution of
the difficulty. "Flushing the colon" as an ancient practice.
Dr. Turner's post mortem experiences. Colon distortion
illustrated. Objections to the ordinary appliances danger in
using the long, flexible catheter. Invention of the "J. B.
L. Cascade," and description of it.

PART IV.

HOW TO USE IT.

The complete process of "flushing the colon" explained, step
by step, so that even a child might understand it.
Objections answered. Advice to users of the treatment.

PART V.

PRACTICAL HYGIENE.

Longevity man's natural heritage. The care of the body
absolute cleanliness rare. The function of water in the
human organism. Hot water the natural scavenger. The bath.
Description of the skin, and its function. Hints on bathing.
The wet sheet pack. Importance of fresh air. Interchange of
gases in the lungs. Ventilation. Prof. Willard Parker on
impure air. The function of the heart. The therapeutic value
of sunlight.

PART VI.

EXERCISE.

Motion is life. Effect of exercise on the fluids of the
body. How the tissues are nourished. Exercise for invalids.
Complete system of breathing exercises for developing the
lungs. Improved system of physical exercises, calling into
play every muscle of the body ensuring harmonious
development. Special nerve exercise. how to stand and how to
walk. All the above exercises plainly illustrated.

PART VII.

THE DIET QUESTION.

The replacement of waste. Appetite and hunger. The evils of
gluttony. Vegetarianism versus flesh eating. Diet, a
question of latitude. The cause of old age. Cretinism.
Danger of earthy matters in food substances. Fruits are
ideal foods. The true value of bread. Classification of the
ingredients of food substances. Table of proportions. Table
of digestive values. Vegetarianism discussed. A mixed diet
the most reasonable. How to eat. Liquids at meals. When to
eat. The no breakfast plan. The effects of alcohol, tea and
coffee. Improper habits of eating. The influence of mind
upon digestion. The advantages of regularity. Nature's
bookkeeping.

PART VIII.

TREATMENT OF DISEASE.

Complete formulas of treatment (with dietary rules) for over
fifty different diseases, including Consumption,
Appendicitis, Locomotor Ataxia, Paralysis, Dyspepsia,
Pneumonia, Diabetes Mellitus, Uterine troubles, etc. Also
all the principal ailments of children.

PART IX.

SOME HELPFUL SUGGESTIONS.

Disease is the result of the operation of natural law don't
dread it. Don't treat symptoms; treat the fundamental cause.
Pain is Nature's danger signal. Prevention is better than
cure. The elements of prevention. Importance of a knowledge
of physiology. The body, the vehicle of expression for the
mind. The strenuous life. Tear worse than wear. The
importance of reserve energy. The effect of the mind on the
body. The human body as a bank. The importance of a daily
balance. Cultivate cheerfulness. The habit of happiness. The
folly of squandering health. Medicine and surgery compared.
What children should be taught. The final word.


APPENDIX.

Instructions for massage. How to use the stomach bath by
three different methods. How to improvise the Turkish Bath
in your own home, without apparatus. How to use the wet
sheet pack. How to care for the "Cascade".




THE ROYAL ROAD TO HEALTH.



PART I.

DRUGGING PROVED UNSCIENTIFIC.

It is one of the most profound mysteries of our civilization, and has
been one of the most perplexing and discouraging phenomena of human
existence, that, while the world at large has maintained an ever
increasing "medical profession," whose members are popularly supposed
to be competent to deal with all the ills that flesh is heir to; still
there has always been a long list of what are termed "incurable
diseases." But the immense strides made, in recent years, in every
branch of modern science, has led the thinking public to consider such
a condition of things as an outrageous libel on the God of Nature, and
to question whether there can be such a thing as an incurable disease.

Health is such an inestimable blessing, that the individual who shall
devise means to preserve it, or to restore it, when lost, is deserving
of all the thanks and honors that a grateful community can bestow.
Unfortunately, there are very few who estimate life at its true value,
until they are confronted with the grim destroyer, Death. No one can
fully appreciate the priceless blessings of health, until they feel
that it has slipped from their grasp. The oft quoted phrase, "Health
is Wealth," is truly a concrete expression of wisdom, for without the
former, the latter is well nigh an impossibility. But its interference
with the activities of life is one of the least evils of sickness, for
perfect health is the very salt and spice of life; without it,
existence is "weary, stale, flat and unprofitable."

But let none despair, for it is my purpose to show how those who enjoy
the blessing of robust health may preserve it indefinitely, and how
those who have lost it may regain it with access of vigor, and once
more feel that life is indeed worth living. In presenting a new system
of medication, it is necessary to attack the existing systems, and
hence, I am placed in a delicate position, for of all the problems
ever presented for the ingenuity of man to solve, undoubtedly the most
difficult is, how to present new facts so as not to offend old errors;
for individuals are very prone to regard arguments levelled against
their opinions as direct attacks upon their personality; and not a few
of them mistake their own deeply rooted prejudices for established
certainties.

I shall endeavor to show that the practice of administering drugs to
cure disease is a fallacy, and in so doing, I am bound to incur the
condemnation of my brother practitioners, who prescribe drugs, and the
druggists who vend them.

It may safely be asserted that the drug system of treating disease
would be destroyed if it were to be critically examined; in fact, to
defend it is provocative of unmistakable damage to it. If it is once
subjected to the analysis of calm reason its defects become palpable
to the meanest understanding.

There are three principal schools of medicine, each with a distinctive
title, but they are all one in essential principles. They may differ
in unimportant details; but in the main premises they are a unit. They
all believe in the principle of "curing one disease by producing
another." In other words, their practice is, to induce a drug disease
to cure a primary one, for this is exactly what is done when drugs are
administered, in pathological conditions as we shall prove later on by
testimony from authorities on medical practice.

The materia medica of the schools, to-day, includes upwards of two
thousand substances the number increasing daily and when viewed
dispassionately it presents what? A list of drugs, chemicals, dye-
stuffs, all subversive of organic structures. They are all
antagonistic to living matter: all produce disease when brought in
contact in any manner with the living domain as a matter of fact, all
are poisons. Now, what logical standing can a system have, that
employs, as remedies for diseases, those things that produce disease
in healthy persons? No advocate of the drug system has ever advanced a
reason that would bear one moment's scientific examination, why
poisonous substances should be administered to the sick, and no one
will ever be able to give a satisfactory explanation of the theory
that underlies the practice, for none exists. When once the public
fully grasps the true import of this glaring anomaly, the days of the
drug system will be numbered.

Physicians of ability and long experience, who have devoted their
lives to the relief of suffering humanity, both in this and other
countries, have declared after close observation, that they were fully
and thoroughly convinced that medicines do not cure patients, that
they do not assist Nature's process of cure, so much as they retard
it, and, that they are more hurtful than remedial in all diseases. A
still larger number have reached the same conclusion with regard to
certain complaints, such as scarlet fever, croup, pneumonia, cholera,
rheumatism, diphtheria, measles, small-pox, dysentery, and typhoid
fever, and that in every case where they have abandoned
all medicine, abjured all drugs and potions, their success has been
marvellously increased.

Professor B. F. Parker, of the New York Medical College, once said to
a medical class: "I have recently given no medicine in the treatment
of measles and scarlet fever, and I have had excellent success."

Dr. Snow, Health Officer of Providence, R. I., reported for the
information of his professional brethren, through the Boston Medical
and Surgical Journal that he had treated all the cases of small-pox,
which had prevailed endemically in that city, without a particle of
medicine, and that all of the cases some of which were very grave ones
recovered.

Dr. John Bell, Professor of Materia Medica in one of the Philadelphia
Colleges, and also in the Medical College of Baltimore, testified in a
work which he published ("Bell on Baths"), that he and others had
treated many cases of scarlet fever with bathing, and without
medicines of any kind, and without losing a patient.

Dr. Ames, of Montgomery, Alabama, some years since published in the
New Orleans Medical and Surgical Journal, his experience and
observation in the treatment of pneumonia. He had been led to notice
for many years, that patients who were treated with the ordinary
remedies--bleeding, mercury, and remedies--breeding certain
complications which always aggravated the malady, and rendered the
convalescence more lingering and recovery less complete. Such patients
were always liable to collapses and re-lapses; to "run into typhoid";
to sink suddenly, and die very unexpectedly.

He noticed particularly that patients who took calomel and antimony
were found, on post-mortem examinations, to have serious and even
fatal inflammation of the stomach and small intestines, attended with
great prostration, delirium, and other symptoms of drug poisoning.
These "complications" were nothing more or less than drug diseases.
And Dr. Ames found, on changing his plan of treatment to milder and
simpler remedies, that he lost no patients.

The late Professor Win. Tully, M.D., of Yale College, and of the
Vermont Academy of Medicine at Gastleton, Vt., informed his medical
class, that on one occasion the typhoid pneumonia was so fatal in some
places in the valley of the Connecticut River, that the people became
suspicious that the physicians were doing more harm than good; and in
their desperation they actually combined against the doctors and
refused to employ them at all; "after which," said Professor Tully,
"no deaths occurred." And I might add, as an historical incident of
some pertinency in this place, that regular physicians were once
banished from Rome, so fatal did their practice seem, so far as the
people could judge of it.

The great Magendie, of France, who long stood at the very head of
Physiology and Pathology in the French Academy which, by the way, has
claimed to be, and perhaps is, the most learned body of men in the
world performed this experiment. He divided the patients of one of the
large Paris hospitals into three classes. To one he prescribed the
common remedies of the books. To the second he administered only the
common simples of domestic practice. And to the third class he gave no
medicine at all. The result was, those who took less medicine did
better than those who took more, and those who took no medicine did
the best of all.

Magendie also divided his typhoid fever patients into two classes, to
one of whom he prescribed the ordinary remedies, and to the other no
medicines at all, relying wholly on such nursing and such attention to
Hygiene as the vital instincts demanded and common sense suggested. Of
the patients who were treated the usual way, he lost the usual
proportion, about one-fourth. And of those who took no medicine, he
lost none. And what opinion has Magendie left on record of the popular
healing art? He said to his medical class, "Gentlemen, medicine is a
great humbug."

In the face of such damaging testimony from prominent representatives
of the medical profession, it becomes exceedingly difficult to place
any reliance on the drug remedies prescribed by them.

The melancholy truth is, that drug medication has become an integral
part of our domestic economy. At no time in history has the
consumption of drugs even approximated the present rate. Enormous sums
of money are invested in manufacturing and distributing them, and the
physicians of the various schools, being educated to prescribe them, a
mutual bond of interest has grown up between doctor and druggist,
which is not at all surprising. The medical profession, as a whole is,
and ever has been eminently conservative, and this fact, in connection
with its traditional predilection for drugs causes its members to
resolutely set their faces against any remedial process that runs
counter to the theories they imbibed at college. They look askance
at all such things and regard them as dangerous experiments, and
assert that their dignity will not permit them to recognize any
irregular practice, or any form of quackery.

Dignity! When was dignity ever known to save a life? Most humanity
continue to suffer because the medical profession (blindly following
in the rut of custom) fail to see anything superior to the antiquated
system of treating disease by drugging, which many of its ablest
members condemn as unreliable?

It is with all schools of medicine as it is with each individual
practitioner of the healing art the less faith they have in medicine,
the more they have in Hygiene; hence those who prescribe little or no
medicine, are invariably and necessarily more attentive to Hygiene,
which always was, and ever will be, all that there is really good,
useful, or curative in medication. Such physicians are more careful to
supply the vital organism with whatever of air, light, temperature,
food, water, exercise or rest, etc., it needs in its struggle for
health, and to remove all vitiating influences all poisons,
impurities, or disturbing influences of any kind. This is hygienic
medication, the natural and rational method of cure, and the more
closely it is examined, the more strongly it will commend itself to
reason.

It is a lamentable fact that the preservation of health is not taught
in the medical schools, neither is it explained in their books, and
judging from general practice not much regard is attached to it in
their prescriptions. But when the inevitable typhoid or malaria
appears as an inevitable consequence of neglected precautions, the
physician can drug without mercy, and, as we contend, on most
illogical grounds.

Who imagines for one instant, that quinine is a poison? Who is not
aware that arsenic is a deadly poison? And yet physicians and medical
journals calmly and gravely assert that arsenic is the better article
of the two, and recommend it as a substitute for quinine. Can any
intelligent person believe that a comparatively harmless tonic, and an
intense poison are perfect equivalents for each other?

It is stated on reliable authority, that during the civil war,
hundreds of sick soldiers implored the nurses to throw away their
medicine. They feared drugs worse than bullets, and not without
reason.

It is a curious fact that young physicians prescribe more medicine
than the older ones.

Said the venerable Professor Alexander H. Stevens M.D., of the New
York College of Physicians and Surgeons: "Young practitioners are a
most hopeful class of community. They are sure of success. They start
out in life with twenty remedies for every disease; and after an
experience of thirty years or less they find twenty diseases for every
remedy." And again: "The older physicians grow, the more skeptical
they become of the virtues of medicine, and the more they are disposed
to trust to the powers of Nature."

The effect of drugging a person, is to lock up the actual causes of
the disease in the system; thus producing permanent and worse
diseases. It is in accordance with common sense that they should be
expelled, not retained. What is known as disease, is nothing more or
less than the struggle of Nature, to cast out impurities, and this
remedial effort should be regulated, and assisted, not obstructed by
administering drugs, which only complicate the situation, by producing
more disease.

No man can fight two enemies better than one, and, to give drugs to a
system already struggling to regain its normal condition, is like
tying the hands of a man who is beset by enemies. The truth is, that
the real nature of disease is misapprehended by the popular schools of
medicine, and until broader views obtain a lodgment among them, it is
useless to hope for any alteration or improvement in the antiquated
system of drugging. "Who shall decide, when doctors disagree ?" is an
oft Quoted sentence, and, the following conflicting opinions from
prominent physicians show conclusively how little is actually known of
the action of drugs upon the human system, by those who administer
them right and left.

Says the "United States Dispensatory," "Medicines are those articles
which make sanative impressions on the body." This may be important
if, true. But, per contra, says Professor Martin Paine, M.D., of the
New York University Medical School, in his "Institutes of Medicine":
"Remedial agents are essentially morbific in their operations."

But again says Professor Paine: "Remedial agents operate in the same
manner as do the remote causes of disease." This seems to be a very
distinct announcement that remedies are themselves causes of disease.
And yet again: "In the administration of medicines we cure one disease
by producing another." This is both important and true.

Professor Paine quotes approvingly the famous professional adage, in
good technical Latin,

"Ubi virus, ibi vitus,"

which, being translated, means, "our strongest poisons are our best
remedies."

Says Professor Alonzo Clark, M.D., of the New York College of
Physicians and Surgeons: "All of our curative agents are poisons, and
as a consequence, every dose diminishes the patient's vitality."

Says Professor Joseph M. Smith, M.D., of the same school: "All
medicines which enter the circulation poison the blood in the same
manner as do the poisons that produce disease."

Says Professor St. John, of the New York Medical College : "All
medicines are poisonous."

Says Professor B. R. Peaslee, MD., of the same school: "The
administration of powerful medicines is the most fruitful cause of
derangements of the digestion."

Says Professor H. G. Cox, M.D., of the same school: "The fewer
remedies you employ in any disease, the better for your patients."

Says Professor E. H. Davis, M.D., of the New York Medical College:
"The modus operandi of medicines is still a very obscure subject. We
know that they operate, but exactly how they operate is entirely
unknown."

Says Professor J. W. Carson, M.D., of the New York University Medical
School: "We do not know whether our patients recover because we give
medicines, or because Nature cures them."

Says Professor E. S. Carr, of the same school: "All drugs are more or
less adulterated; and as not more than one physician in a hundred has
sufficient knowledge in chemistry to detect impurities, the physician
seldom knows just how much of a remedy he is prescribing."

The authors disagree in many things; but all concur in the fact that
medicines produce diseases; that their effects are wholly uncertain,
and that we know nothing whatever of their modus operandi.

But now comes in the testimony of the venerable Professor Joseph M.
Smith, M.D., who says: "Drugs do not cure diseases; disease is always
cured by the vis medicatrix naturae."

And Professor Clark further complicates the problem before us by
declaring that, "Physicians have hurried thousands to their graves who
would have recovered if left to Nature." And again: "In scarlet fever
you have nothing to do but to rely on the vis medicatrix naturae."

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