Old proverbs are often the truest, and this may be affirmed of the adage that “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.”  Do not, if by care you can prevent it, allow your stomach to become disordered; but if, in spite of care, it is irritated, soothe instead of punishing it.  Manage it as you sometimes control a fretful child,—­by letting it severely alone.  A few hours’ fasting is an excellent remedy, and may continue until a feeling of faintness warns you that nature needs your assistance.  Then eat slowly a little light food, such as milk-toast or very hot beef-tea.  Quiet and diet work more wonders than quarts of medicine.

If your digestive organs are susceptible to disorder, be reasonably careful about what you eat, even though you consider yourself quite well.  What a stomach has once done in the line of misbehavior, a stomach may do again.  If a pitcher has in it a tiny flaw, it may crack when filled with boiling liquid.  If you know of some article of food which disagrees with you, let it alone.  If you are inclined to dyspepsia, eschew hot breads, pastry, fried or greasy food, nuts and many sweets.  Avoid becoming dependent upon any medicine to ward off indigestion, if by care in your diet you can accomplish the same purpose.  Many dyspeptics take an inordinate amount of bicarbonate of soda, an excellent corrective to acidity of the stomach when partaken of occasionally, and in small portions.  In some cases, large and frequent doses have produced a cancerous condition of the coating of the stomach, which has resulted in death.  It sounds ridiculous to speak of dependence upon soda-mint and pepsin tablets degenerating into an incurable habit, but there are some people to whom they are as necessary after each meal as were snuff and quids of tobacco to the old people seventy years ago.

Nature has provided a wonderful system of drains for carrying away the effete matter of the body.  The effect caused by the neglect of these is akin to that produced by the choking of the waste-pipes in a house.  If they become stopped, you send in haste for a plumber, that he may correct the trouble before it causes illness.  If this state of affairs is allowed to continue in the human body, the system takes up the poison which slowly but surely does its work.

Next to the special organs designed for this plan of sewerage, the skin takes the most active part in disposing of impurities in the blood.  The tiny pores are so many little doors through which the mischief may pass harmlessly away.  But these pores must be kept open, and the only way to accomplish this end is by the free use of soap and warm water.  This is such a homely remedy that it is sometimes sneered at and often overlooked.  Certain portions of the body, such as the face and hands, are frequently washed, while other parts which are covered by the clothing are neglected.  The entire body, especially in the creases where perspiration accumulates, should be sponged once a day, if one perspires freely.  While sponging is excellent, a plunge bath should be frequently indulged in, as it opens the pores and thoroughly cleanses the entire surface.