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The inexpert,—they who can not claim sufficient acquaintance with a givensubject to enable them to think freely (“free thinking” being altogetheranother matter),—find it sufficiently difficult to obtain an author’smeaning, when they are really desirous of so doing, and devote some timeand patience to the work in hand; it is impossible, often, to arrive atjust conclusions otherwise. The liability to error is increased many foldwhen the subject is not merely not popular, but is, in fact, un-popular.It is a prevalent custom to “skim over” a volume, and then praise orcondemn it, according to the reader’s preconceived notion.
Sick people searching for means whereby they may be made well, sometimesfall into this error, and for want of thoroughness in their reading of ahealth-book make blunders in carrying out the prescribed treatment. Insuch cases, not only do the patients themselves suffer, perhaps lose theirlives, or fail in some way, but their failures exert an influence tendingto throw a sound method into disrepute. In this way it often happens thatwhat is termed “dieting” is either overdone, half done, or not done at allin2the manner designed by the author; “exercise” is taken under wrongconditions, as, for example, in point of time in relation to meals, it isconducted spasmodically or, perhaps, carried to excess, and the organismthereby depleted instead of strengthened; if the prevailing habit ofover-wrapping the body is emphatically condemned, as is the case in thepresent volume, the reader, if a convert and designing to “go by thebook,” may conclude that he is expected to go shivering about inshirt-sleeves in all weathers; and the unfriendly critic is sure to make apoint—taking off the idea in a manner to send a chill along the spine ofan inquiring consumptive. In this way, too, has arisen the saying, asapplied to the supposed notion of food-reformers, “Whatever is good isbad, and whatever is bad is good.” Whatever it may be worth, therefore, Ipreface this volume with the simple request that the health-seeker, thecasual reader, and the critic, alike, shall examine it in a manner to getthe real mea