This section is from the book "Facts Worth Knowing", by Robert Kemp Philip. Also available from Amazon: Inquire Within for Anything You Want to Know.
Accustom yourself to the use of sponging with cold water every morning on first getting out of bed. It should be followed with a good deal of rubbing with a wet towel. It has considerable effect in giving tone to the skin, and maintaining a proper action in it, and thus proves a safeguard to the injurious influence of cold and sudden changes of temperature. Sir Astley Cooper said: "The methods by which I have preserved my own health are - temperance, early rising, and sponging the body every morning with cold water, immediately after getting out of bed; a practice which I have adopted for thirty years without ever eatching cold."
 
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