Fruit-Cures

Unquestionably an exclusive diet for a period of three to seven days and upwards has a marked and distinct effect upon the metabolism or tissue change of the human body. The "grape cure" has become famous throughout the world, diseases of all kinds having been cured, or relieved, by the use of grapes, as an exclusive diet, used for a period of four to six weeks. One of the very best means of reducing flesh is through the use of an exclusive fruit diet, which produces a rapid loss of flesh without discomfort. Fruit fills the stomach and stays the craving for food, yet it furnishes very little nutritive material. In these reduction cures, one, or more, of the regular meals of the day may be exclusively of fruit. Where an exclusive fruit diet is followed, fruit may be taken three or four times a day, owing to its ready and rapid absorption by the system.

Fruit-Cures are used with marked success in chronic kidney or Bright's disease, liver diseases, rheumatic and gouty ailments, chronic constipation, and many other diseased conditions. The free acids of fruits are especially valuable in assisting the digestive process, and where there is a tendency to a bilious or gouty diathesis.

Juicy fruits are best eaten at the end of a meal, otherwise they interfere with the mastication of the other food stuffs, inviting a tendency to wash down the food, in the same manner as is performed by water, tea or other fluids.

It must be noticed that fruits and coarse vegetables are not a good combination, and should not be eaten together. Fruits may be eaten at any time during the meal : before, during, or after, but not between meals;

Constipation

No other article of diet is of such pronounced value in the treatment of constipation as fruits. For this purpose fruit must be eatenfreely, preferably in the form of a fruit breakfast, best taken without admixture of any other food. Stewed prunes, sour apples, blueberries, peaches and tamarinds are the fruits best adapted for this purpose. It is needless to say that grape seeds do not produce appendicitis; so that the seeds of grapes may be swallowed with impunity with the fruit in so far as appendicitis is concerned. This must not be construed as countenancing the swallowing of grape seeds; quite the reverse. Grape seeds and all other material which cannot be reduced to the state of a liquid or semi-liquid condition by mastication are best discarded as so much refuse or rubbish, of which the system has to dispose. This applies to the skin and seeds of fruit, the outer coating and woody fibre of vegetables, and to all other insoluble and waste material, whether it be cereal, fruit, vegetable, or any other product not furnishing nutriment to the body. The seeds of raisins, also, are best rejected, as they cannot be swallowed whole as is the case with grapes, and crushing of the seeds allows their astringent principles entrance into the system, which is not desirable. The less refuse material one swallows, the better it will be. Constipation, as has been explained elsewhere, is a common result of overeating. The method of cure is, obviously, not to overeat.