ft]-
^ESCULAPIAN   TABLETS
NINETEENTH   CENTURY.
-f
                    PUBLISHED  BX

           SYLVESTER   GRAHAM,

PUBLIC  LECTDRER ON THE  SCIENCE OF HUMAN  LIFE.
  \r extensive and accurate acquaintance with the various kinds of alipent, anfftleir peculiar effects on the body,
• id a true knowledge of the roles of *iet, are principally necessary 10 form the physician, and qaalify h.m to pre-
scribe Tor the disaaseA For whosoever is unacquainted with the rules of preserving health, cannot be capable of
directing such as will be most proper to recover it.                                    ffippocrata.
  The most eminent among the ancient physiciaus, particularly cultivate* and improved the regime* of a proper
diet, as of the ntmost importance.                                                    Celmt.
  Let all persons be assured that by diligeally observing and practicing correct rule* of living, they may enjoy a
good sliaie of health, and seldom stand in need ofphysie or ofprtyiifians.                       Galen.
  The more you nourish a diseated body, beyond what is absolutely necessary t6 sustain k| the more you injure it.
                                                                         Hippocrates.
ii«
               PROVIDENCE:

POINTED BY  WE EDEN AND CORY.

                       1834.
$*\
 
ENTERED  ACCORDING  TO  ACT  OF  CONGRESS,  IN  THE YEAR ON K
          THOUSAND EIGHT  HUNDRED  AND  THrRTY-FOUR,

                     BY SYLVESTER GRAHAM,

IN THE CLERK'S OFFICE OF THE DISTRICT COURT OF THF. DISTRICT OF
                            RHODE-ISLAND. 
^SCULAPIAN   TABLETS.
  ',£scdlapian Tablets?' says the unlearned reader.  'What is the mean-
ing of iEsculapian Tablets ?'  I will tell you.  According to ancient mythology,
/Esculapius was a very ancient physician, who, after his death, received divine
honors, and temples were erected and dedicated to him, as the god of medicine.
In many places those who had been very sick, and recovered their health, went
into these temples and set up a pillar, or a table, on which they made a record
of their case : giving a particular description of their disease, its various symp-
toms, and the means and mode of their cure.  This was done for the benefit of
others who  were sick, that they might go  or send to the temple, to  ascertain
whether there was any disease recorded there like their own, and  learn how to
cure it.  It is said that Hippocrates, the Father of Medicine, drew a great deal
of his knowledge from these consecrated tables ; and he recommends physicians
not only to  observe carefully all symptoms,  but, as far as possible, to learn the
history of all cures which could be of use to them :  and says, "I am persuaded
that the whole art was first acquired in this manner."
  Herodotus  informs us, that "the Babylonians obliged themselves by an ex-
press law, to carry their sick into streets or places of public resort, and to in-
quire of all who passed by,  whether they ever had, or saw any such distemper
as the sick person labored under, and what was done to remove it."  Strabo
says that the same custom prevailed among  the Egyptians.
  Singular  as these customs may seem, at the present period of the world, they
are nevertheless founded on natural principles, and spring from the constitution-
al, and therefore permanent, qualities of our nature :—and hence, under all the
changing modes of things, the same custom has virtually  existed through all the
generations of mankind ; and so long as disease shall continue to result from
the transgressions of mankind, so long will the same customs virtually exist.
If any man is laboring under disease, and can hear that others have been affect-
ed in like manner, he will certainly be very curious  to know by what means
they were restored to health.  And this is natural and reasonable.  And were
it possible to secure a correct interpretation to all the phenomena of such cases ;
could the true relations between disease and its causes and cures, be always as-
certained, and recorded ; an institution like that of the ancients would be infi-
nitely more valuable to the human race  than  the present system of medicine. 
iv
But there was one grand defect in  the  ancient custom, which has continued
through  all time,  and prevails without bounds, at present.   In what we are
pleased to call the darker ages, and more benighted portions of the world, man-
kind have always considered diseases as the immediate inflictions of their gods ;
and therefore they have felt it necessary to appease  or propitiate their deities, by
sacrifices, offerings and services.  Well were it for the cause of truth—for the
happiness of mankind—and for the dignity of the intellectual and moral  nature
of man—if such egregious, and I might justly say  blasphemous, errors did not
find their way into the superstitions of even the Christian world, under the name
of the "dispensations of  Providence."   One man gives himself up to the ex-
cesses  of stimulation ; another to gluttony ;  another to  some other species  of          *■
sensuality ; and thus chronic or acute disease is induced.  The subject suffers
through days—months—years, and death prematurely closes his career:—and
all this is the dispensation  of Divine Providence.  Well might our benevolent
Father in Heaven demand of the whole human race,  as he did of Job, •' Will
ye condemn me, that  ye may be righteous?"   "Do yourselves no harm!,,
  With the universal  opinion, that all their diseases and sufferings were the di-
rect and  arbitrary and even vindictive inflictions of, their God, or gods, man-
kind have cherished no other fear of disease than that which grows out of their
gross superstition—a fear that God would send sickness and  death  upon  them,
independently of any laws which he has established in relation  to health  and
disease.  Therefore, as a  general truth, it has never occurred to them that there
is any  relation between their own voluntary habits, customs, and indulgences,
and the diseases with  whioh they are afflicted.  Consequently, they have never
sought to find the causes of their diseases within the precincts of voluntary  con-          j
duct;  and have never taken any care to prevent disease by avoiding the causes.
The whole drift, therefore, of the human world, in all generations, has been to
this one point, on  this subject,—the ascertainment of remedies for disease in
every  form.   And hence  the phenomena or symptoms of  disease have been
studied,  even by physicians themselves, less, far less, for the purpose of ascer-
taining the nature of the disease in relation to its causes, than for the purpose of
ascertaining what remedies are to be used.  How could it be otherwise,  amidst
such errors, than that disease should soon  and universally come to be consider-
ed as a thing distinct from its causes, and  consequently be treated with little or
no reference to the causes :—nay, indeed ! the active causes be permitted to
operate unsuspected ;  and yet worse,  the causes be associated with the remed-
ial agents ; and worst of all, the very causes, themselves, be exhibited  or ad-
ministered as remedial agents in the case.   Such a delusion necessarily has led
to the deeper and more fatal error, that there is in medicine an intrinsic health-
giving virtue ; that it  has the power absolutely to take away or kill disease and
impart health !  And  this  has led the way to that wide-sweeping evil which
has spread, more calamitously than all the plagues of Egypt, over the whole
civilized world :—the eternal and suicidal drugging ! drugging  ! drugging ! of
mankind.  Regarding disease as a thing  apart from its causes ; and believing
medicine to possess an intrinsic, salutary potency ; they  have  ignorantly and 
eagerly gathered upon themselves the causes of disease, and sought a redemp-
tion from the painful consequences only in the virtues of medicine, which has
too often proved more destructive than the original causes themselves,  and in
co-operation with those causes, has terribly  accelerated the work  of death.
Without any of that discrimination and correctness of judgment, which an ac-
curate knowledge of their own constitutional nature, and of disease, in relation
to its specific, remote, and immediate causes, would have afforded,—to them the
head-ache is the head-ache,—and the same, from  whichever of the thousand
causes it might have sprung.  Whether sympathetic or idiopathic,  it  is  still to
ihem nothing but the head-ache; and therefore any medicine which they are
told will cure the head-ache, is equally adapted to their case ! and  hence the
 melancholy fact, that throughout the world,  human throats are set open, like
 common sewers, for the reception of every vile and filthy thing that the ingenu-
 ity and cupidity  of man can torture into the form  of medicine.  Such  an all-
 pervading delusion has well prepared mankind for the successful imposition of
 every species of quackery ; and hence it is, that,  in every age, those most de-
 testable and abominable of human beings, the empirics and specific-mongers,
 have ridden triumphant over perverted and prostrated reason, in a more destruc-
 tive career than  the demons of war and pestilence.  The pirates of the high
 seas are honorable and humane men,  in comparison with these !  Multiply all
 the murders  committed annually in the civilized  world, by ten, and  yet the
 number will not amount to the tenth part of the number treacherously destroy-
 ed by these tolerated Judases.  Enlightened and scientific  gentlemen, of the
 medical profession, have, in all ages, perceived and deprecated this evil, and
 have not  been able  to overcome it.  But It me respectfully ask the members
 of that learned and honorable profession, if they, as a body, have not largely
 contributed to this result.   Have they not concealed their art in too much mys-
 tery, and-thus led their patients to believe that their whole skill lay in devising
 and distributing their doses? and has not this, as a necessary consequence, led
 to the universal belief, that the only functional duty of the physician is to pre-
 scribe and  administer medicine ;  and therefore, as medicine is  the exclusive
  means of cure, it is of little importance  whether it be prescribed by regular bred
  physicians, or by a quack, or by the patient himself?   Is it not also true, that
  too  large a portion of the regular Profession have at all times  been  little more
  than licensed quacks,—mere pill-giving, and blood-letting members of the fra-
  ternity ?   How else should such a man as the distinguished Hoffman, a physic-
  cian of great eminence,  gravely lay down,  as one of his  " Seven  Rules of
  Health,"—" Fuge medicos, et medicamentum  si  vis esse salvus !"  Avoid
  medicine and physicians, if you value your health.
    Surely, so learned and skillful a physician could not intend to  denounce the
  profession as absolutely unnecessary and pernicious.  He must, therefore, when
  writing his seventh Rule of Health, have contemplated physicians as having de-
  generated into that predicament which I have already named,-that is, observ-
  ers of symptoms, only with reference  to the medicine to  be prescribed, and
  therefore a mere drugging craft.  In this character, beyond all question, phy-
                                      \1 
vi
sicians,  as well as the  unlicensed quacks, can  only  be regarded as terrible
scouro-es of the human race.  "All things, considered," says one of the most
eminent English physicians of the present day, in reference to the modern prac-
tice of medicine, "it were better for mankind, if not a particle of medicine ex-
isted on the face of the earth."
  But it is asked, What remains for the physician to do, and what need is there
of a physician, if no medicine is to be given?  The question is the offspring of
io-norance and error, and shows how much the opinion of mankind has degraded
that noble calling.   What remains for the physician to  do ?  The fulfilment of
his enlightened  and philanthropic and legitimate duties.   To teach mankind the
laws of life,—the nature, and the causes of disease :  to  guide their fellow-crea-
tures in  the way of health; and when diseased, to make them wise by making
them acquainted with the  causes of their sufferings  ; to remove  those causes,
and thus enable the relieved system  to recover health ; and, when it is neces-
sary, to remove immediate obstructions, and throw off oppression ; to admin-
ister medicine as a necessary evil,  and therefore onjy  to be used when  ascer-
tained to be necessary by a scientific and skillful  physician, whose moral sen-
sibilities, in relation to  his duties, correspond with the 'responsibilities  of his
callino-.   Physicians of such stamp,  are not to be  avoided, but to be sought af-
ter, and sustained and esteemed and honored, as the noblest benefactors of man-
kind.  In re»ard to medicine, the grand  distinction between  a true physician
and a quack, is, that the former prescribes when necessary, and then expressly
as a. necessary evil, which, if not properly selected and applied, wilj do more
harm than good ; the latter prescribes it, as in itself a good, and therefore to be
taken on all occasions, and for all symptoms,.—and  which,  if it does no good,
will do  no harm.
  Mankind ought to know that disease  never results  from the constitutional and
legitimate operations of  the human system.   The  end of every such operation is
health,  and only health; and therefore, if the body  be  in all respects correctly
treated, it will continue, from birth till  worn out with  old age, free from dis-
ease and in the full enjoyment of health.   If, then, the  body becomes diseased,
it is always the result of some disturbing, some offending cause ; and the dis-
ease can only be kept up  while such a  cause continues  to prevent  the healthy
operations of the system ; and health can only  be recovered by the healthy op-
erations of the system.  The system, therefore, does not require the application
of any  causes of health ;  for it exclusively possesses those in  its  own  constitu-
tional powers;  and nothing but  the omnipotent  and miraculous power  of the
Creator, can substitute the vital economy of the living  body, in the production
of health.  To remove, as far as human skill and means can do, the causes of
disease, and to assist her  in relieving herself from the effects,  is all that nature
asks, or can  advantageously receive, from the physician ; and  every principle,
in relation to health and life and human  happiness, and  the  responsibilities  of
the physician, demands that this should be done, as far as possible, without the
use of medicine or artificial means.   And however learned in books a  man may
be, he yet knows little  of the laws of life, and the vital economy of the living 
vii
            body, who does not know, that, at least, ninety-nine cases out of a hundred of
            chronic  disease, may be removed, and health restored,  by correct regimen
            alone, without the use of a particle of medicine; or, at most, a single dose or
            two.  What, indeed, as a general rule, is  chronic disease,  but the continued
            result of the continued  action of disturbing causes.  Remove the cause, or
            causes, and the result will disappear ; and  be assured, those causes are almost
            universally to be found within the  precincts of our voluntary conduct,—and, for
            the most part, within the horizon of our dietetic habits.  Artificial stimuli, per-
            nicious preparations  of food, excess in quantity, are among  the most  fruitful
            sources of disease  ; and although the healthy and vigorous  body may, with ac-
  ,          tive habits, longmaintain health in the free use of animal food; yet the diseased
            body will find it difficult to recover health  and entirely eradicate disease, while
            flesh continues to  be a portion of its aliment.
             ' In a work of this kind, it would be impossible to lay down a regimen, which
            would  be specially adapted to the  particular case of every invalid.  Some very
            general Rules can, therefore,  only be given, in relation to diet.   In  the  first
            place, then, medicine of every kind, name, form, and quality, should be totally
            abstained from, unless a single dose should be rendered necessary by peculiar
            circumstances.   Distilled spirits, wine, beer, cider, tobacco, opium, coffee,  tea,
            pepper, mustard, and every other  kind of artificial stimulants and narcotics,—
            fluid and solid—should be totally abandoned; and if the invalid is much diseas-
            ed, he should totally abstain from  all animal food, including butter and milk,—
            or taking the last in  small and diluted quantities.   Pure water, and toast water,
            and water gruel, should  be  the only liquids received into the stomach.   The
  ,          solid forms of food should be taken in the  natural and simple state, and plainly
            prepared, or cooked with no other seasoning than  a very  little salt, and eaten
            in moderate quantities, at regular  periods—not too frequently—well masticated
            or chewed, and swallowed slowly.  The bowels should be kept regular by un-
            bolted wheat meal bread and  fruit.  Let the last meal of the day  be simple and
            light and at a  good distance from bed  time.  Never sleep on a full stomach.
            Keep the skin clean, and exercise it well with  a flesh-brush.  The  exercise
            should always  be  equal  to the strength, and increase with the strength, &c. &c.
             Many other directions adapted to  particular cases, may be required which can-
            not of course be given without a  knowledge of the cases.   But all this is the
            appropriate business of  the enlightened physician.   But the medical gentlemen
            reply, " we can do  nothing in this line ; it  is in vain that we attempt to regulate
            the diet  and regimen of our patients; and if we do not give  them medicine, they
            will dismiss us, and fly  to the quack for remedies."  I am fully aware  of this;
            but it is owing to  their ignorance on subjects which it is the appropriate duty of
t           the medical profession to enlighten them on.  It is because they suppose medi-
            cine to possess a virtue which it has not:  and while they feel that  the imme-
            diate effects of the medicine affords them a sensible momentary relief, they are
            totally unconscious that  it is really aggravating the disease, and that its ultimate
            effect is death:—and until they are enlightened on this subject they  will be the
            unfortunate dupes of every villainous  quack in  the world  !  " Stop ! stop ! 
Vlll
sir!" says the mercenary vender of specifics and patent medicines, "look at
the wonders which have been performed by the Panacea, the  Catholicon, the
Hygiean Medicine, &c. &c.  See the long list of Certificates in the newspapers!"
Yes, I see them, and my heart aches for suffering and outraged humanity!  Go
ask the grave-yards for their certificates !  Were there a tongue to tell the se-
crets of the "narrow  house," the ears of the specific-mongers would tingle
with a revelation, infinitely  more horrible than that which the ghost of Hani-
let's father dared not tell to ears of flesh and blood.  I know that in the thou-
sands and thousands of cases where these specifics  are used, it sometimes hap-
pens that an individual is apparently benefited by them : but, for this one instance,
hundreds and thousands are  hurried to the grave.  The  single  apparent cure is
trumpeted to the world, but the grave,  in everlasting  silence,  swallows up its
hecatombs of human sacrifices.  It may be  thought that I express myself too
strongly on this subject; but the sufferings and the devastation which 1 have seen,
resulting from these all pervading scourges of the world,  wake up the fervent
sympathies of my soul, and  constrain mo to speak  out.   Never was any thing
more egregiously fallacious than this  vile stuff that  is told about these  wonder-
working medicines.  In some  instances, they may answer the effect of any oth-
er evacuating medicine, and thus afford a momentary  relief to the oppressed
system.  In other cases, they may cause a morbid determination to the alimen-
tary canal, and thus upon the  principle of counter irritants, relieve some other
locality of disease; but this relief is generally too dearly bought:  the disease i*
cured, but the patient is killed; or if he lives, it is to drag out years of suffer-
ing, from a broken down and  deranged state of the stomach and bowels.  But,
in a vast majority of cases, there is  not even a seeming alleviation  obtained
from these medicines;  and yet, too  frequently, the deceived and wretched in-
valid is wheedled on to swallow box after box, or  bottle after bottle, of these
execrable things, until  death closes his career; or until, in despair, he abandons
this track of his delusion, to pursue some other.  I know not how many of my
unhappy fellow-creatures have come to me, in the most miserable condition of
disease, which, if not originally caused, had been  exceedingly aggravated by
these patent  medicines.  The paltry jargon of these books and advertisements
of Hygiean Medicine,  about the "impurity of the blood," &c. &c. is a tissue of
the most arrant misrepresentation, falsehood, and humbugging, that ever deceiv-
 ed mankind.   Many,  if not most,  of their certificates  of cures, are obtained
 while the patients are  under the operation of their medicine:  and while, upon
 principles easily explained,  the symptoms of the diseases, for which the medi-
 cine is taken, disappear.  But scarcely are the certificates written and in print,
 before the symptoms return, to prove that the disease itself has never been re-
 moved, but generally  much aggravated.  But this is not the proper place to
 discuss this question; I therefore only  glance at it here: a better opportunity
 may soon be afforded.
   Shall I be told that  the following  statements may be of the same  fallacious
 character?   What motive can there be for such a  deception?  These  are not to
 illustrate and prove the wonder-working potency of any patent medicine.  I 
IX
have no specific to sell; and therefore no money to make or lose, whether these
statements are believed or not.  But the cause of humanity has an immense in-
terest in the issue of this matter.  The vis medicatrix which I contend for,  is
none other than the renovating and conservative power of nature's own vital
economy.  The remedy which I propose, is in the reach of every human being,
and demands no  price.  The appropriation of it to ten thousand individuals,
would not enrich me a farthing; save in the grateful satisfaction I should expe-
rience, from the consciousness of having been the means of alleviating  the suf-
ferings of my fellow-creatures.
   Most of the following statements were given in consequence of a general re_
quest made to my class.  Several of them were taken down,  by myself,  from
the lips of the individuals; and many were received in their own hand-writing.
Every one may be strictly depended on.  I have a great number more on hand,
of the same interesting character; and  hundreds of individuals in New-York,
New-Bedford, Fall-River, Providence,  and other places where I have lectured,
stand ready to add similar statements.
   Gentle Reader! hast thou long been afflicted with disease;  and shouldst thou
be induced to try the remedy which I propose ?  let me caution thee in  the out-
set, to expect no magical, no miraculous effect.   Remember that there  is no
stimulating, no wonder-working medicine employed, which treacherously lulls
and soothes thy  symptoms, while it strengthens thy disease.  Thou throwest
thyself entirely on the resources of  thy constitution, assisted only by such nat-
ural and simple means as are conducive to its vital welfare, and tend healthfully
to increase its renovating powers.  Therefore be not surprised, nor disappointed,
if thou shouldst for a while, at first,  feel more unwell; if, in the commencement
of thy new regimen, thy symptoms should become more troublesome.  It is no
proof that thy disease is growing worse: it rather indicates the absence  of those
 artificial or improper means which have too long been used to keep  down the
 symptoms, to the aggravation of the disease, and the great expense of thy vital
 powers.  Therefore, patiently persevere!  Obey the laws of thy nature rigidly;
 and be assured, if any earthly means will give thee health, thou wilt, in  the end,
 recover and enjoy it.
   Providence, March 6, 1834                          S.  GRAHAM. 
X
                           MEDICINES.

   " All nervous persons are uncommonly fond of drugs; and they are the chief
consumers  of advertised remedies, which  they conceal  from  their  medical
friends.  Among some well-meaning people, this inordinate desire for medicine,
has frequently become, of itself, a disease.  With many of them, physic, to be
useful, must be clothed in mystery; and the moment a discovery is made of the
composition, the confidence is lost.  Medical attendants have too often brought
this punishment on themselves.  Were they unanimous in  combatting the prej-
udices of mankind, by candor and openness of conduct, by a fair avowal of the
imperfections of their art, and the honest  confession  that  articles of Materia
Medica, form but a small portion  of its resources, they would not so frequently
see their commands disregarded, or learn that their compounds  have been
thrown out of the window.   This  is the only way in which I can account for
so many persons of good sense and discernment, consigning  themselves and fam-
ilies, into the hands of impudent and illiterate quacks.
   " When active medicines are long continued, and do  not cure, it  is very
likely they may do mischief.  But the remedy that cures one disease, if inju-
diciously administered, not  unfrequently predisposes the body, and paves the
way to another malady.  Palliatives which tend  most to give immediate ease,
must inevitably have  the effect of increasing the predisposition, and endangering
the return of the complaint in  a more aggravated form.  If any fact more thai:
another, has been proved in my own practice, it is that spirituous liquors,  and
all wines, with tea, opium, and all other narcotics, mercurial courses, and the
sexual indiscretions, are the chief  causes of the acquired predisposition to  dis-
ease.  That society must be undergoing the last degree of vitiation, where
the Faculty of Medicine receives gold, and returns poison."—Dr. Trot-
ter, on Nervous Temperament.
   "We deceive ourselves, then, if we think that any thing, which is wrong in
itself, c;m be made right by habit; or that, what  is hurtful, if done seldom, will
become innocent by being constantly repeated.   By this repetition, we may be-
come insensible to the momentary irritation; but only to suffer with the more
severity ultimately."—Dr.  Lamb.
                       [from  the genius  of temperance.]

                            GRAHAM  MEETING.

          We give below, the proceedings of the meeting of the  friends of the Dietetic
        system, taught by Mr. Graham.   These proceedings will  serve as a memorial,
        at home and abroad, of the views  of a portion of our  citizens, on a subject
        which has elicited no small degree of feeling in this city, and elsewhere.  To
        persons unaccustomed to notice  the winding  labyrinths  of human  nature, it
        would appear strange that the advocacy of a particular system of diet, should
        encounter the opposition, misrepresentation, and  prejudice, that  have recently
        been witnessed.  The result now  recorded, should  serve as an encouragement
        to those who are called  upon to advocate unpopular truths, and as a salutary
        warning to such as are liable to use, and—peradventure—expend their stock
4       of influence, in the fruitless task of retarding popular improvement.

          tr^f Meeting of the friends of Mr. Graham's Lectures.—The
        undersigned, a committee appointed for the purpose, hereby invite a meeting of
        the friends of the Dietetic System taught by Sylvester  Graham,  to be held at
        the  lecture room in Clinton  Hall, on Thursday evening, the 18th instant, at 
XI
half past seven o'clock, to adopt resolutions expressive of their regard for the
principles taught by him in his late course of Lectures, and to afford him some
testimonial of their high sense of his important labors.
  Abraham Bell—Austin Dickinson—Walter Underhill—Arthur Tappan—Soly-
man Brown—Eleazer Parmly—James Hall—Robert G. Fairchild—Joseph Tit-
comb—Samuel J. Hunt—William Mitchell—John B. Jansen—Smith Lawrence
—George CorlieB—William Doane—F. L. Wilsey—James Smith—A Sanger—
Henry A. Lambert—Albert Woodman—John West—R. Griffith—R. L. Smith
— Abijah Smith—Mahlon Day—A. A. White—John Burden—A. A. Fairbanks
—William B. Van Nortwick—Samuel Sloan—T. J. Sawyer—Jehiel Parmly—
Truman Roberts—David Wood—Amos Keeler—Amos Pollard—Elihu Blake—
R.  N. White—Henry Fitz—A. B. Durand—Joseph Perkins—John Dodgson—
Jonathan Thorn—John H.  Ferris-------Howard—H.  R. Piercy—William
Goodell—J.  C. Jenkins—Joseph Allen—Jarvis F. Hanks—R. I. Polhamus—
William C. White.
   New-York, April 16th, 1833.

   Ao-reeably to the previous notice, the meeting was held at Clinton Hall.

   Abraham Bell, Esq. was called to preside,  assisted by Messrs. Robert
L.  Smith and William B. Van Nortwick.  Messrs. Eleazer Parm-
ly, and Jarvis F. Hanks,  were appointed Secretaries.

   Mr. Samuel J. Hunt, submitted to the meeting the following Resolutions,
 which were read by one of the Secretaries, and seconded by Mr. Solyman
 Brown, who sustained them in a beautiful and appropriate speech, when they
 were unanimously adopted by the meeting.
    1. Resolved,  That in the opinion of this meeting, the  subject embraced in
 Mr.Graham's course of Lectures, is one of great  and general interest to the hu-
 man race; and more especially to the inhabitants of populous cities in  which
 the prevalence of luxury, connected with the sedentary habits of most of the
 population, induces inevitable disease.
   '2.  Resolved,  That while we rejoice,  as individuals of the great American
 family at the progress of Temperance in our country, as relates to alcoholic
 liquors', it is the opinion of this meeting that the work of reformation should be
 prosecuted with equal zeal as to the quality and quantity of food, exercise, med-
 icine, and other kindred subjects intimately connected with the health, the use-
 fulness, and the happiness of man.
    3 Resolved,  That it is the sentiment of this meeting that Mr.  Graham is not
 less happy in his general mode of illustration, than in the fortunate selection of
 his subject;  and that he has shown himself to be eminently qualified, as well by
 nature as by education, to impart a deep and permanent interest to the science
 of dietetics and to those correlative sciences, so forcibly and beautifully illustra-
 ted in the progress of his Lectures.                     _
    4  Resolved,  That whatever speculations may  exist, in relation  to abstract
 theories- and whatever shades of difference may obtain in men's minds, in re-
 spect to minute practical details;  it is the decided opinion  of this meeting, that
 the eeneral doctrines and dietetic rules  of Mr.  Graham, are not only correct,
 but exceedingly important; and that actual experiments in this city, especially
 during the prevalence of epidemic diseases, has fully demonstrated this truth  m
 triumphant  ascendancy over  the representations that  have been made  to the

 ^T^Resolved, That the central position of this  city, its easy communication
  with the east, the south, the north,  and the west; its intimate connection with
  the interior, and with Europe; and the great number of its visitors, and transient
  population; render it the most commanding, eligible, and important location, in
  which the principles of Mr. Graham can be first established in consistent prac-
 tice  and best communicated to our countrymen, and to the great  family of man;
 and'that it is therefore desirable that the important labors of Mr. Graham should
 be continued in  this city. 
xii
  6. Resolved, That these resolutions be signed by the  President, and coun-
tersigned by the Secretaries of this meeting, and published.

  On invitation, Mr.  Graham then entered the Hall, and was presented, by
Mr. E. Parmly,  on  behalf of the committee  and meeting,  with an elegant
silver Pitcher, in token of their regard for his important services.   Mr. Parm-
ly accompanied the presentation with the following short address:—
  " Mr. Graham—The very pleasing duty of expressing to you the sentiment?
of the committee that organized the present meeting, has been assigned to me;
and I perform the  office with the more personal satisfaction, as it affords me a
fit occasion to give my public testimony in favor of the system of dietetic regi-
men, inculcated and enforced in your Lectures.
  " I can say, with the strictest veracity, that I esteem the various information
I have gathered from  your teaching,  which has  been impressed on my mind so
strongly by the force of eloquence, as of inestimable value, in the regulation of
my future life.
  " The committee, whose names are here enclosed, have entrusted me  to re-
quest you to accept a silver pitcher,  as a testimony  of their individual esteem
and gratitude, and of their settled conviction of  the great benefit which will re-
sult from a general dissemination of the doctrines of the new and beautiful sci-
ence, so justly denominated  the Graham System.
  "That you may go on, in the labor you have so successfully commenced;
and persevere in the doctrines you have taught with so much benefit to  those
who have heard and  followed you; is, I  am persuaded, the heartfelt wish of all
whose names I now have the honor of presenting to you."

  On accepting the Pitcher,  Mr. Graham returned his thanks to the donors,
on behalf of the  cause, of which he  was the servant; and entertained the au-
dience some time,  in advocating its claims.

  The following certificate,  attesting the personal  benefits they  had  received
from a conformity  to the dietetic rules of Mr. Graham,  and commending his
system to the attention of their friends and the public, was then read, and sign-
ed by more than a hundred individuals.
  "The undersigned, citizens of New-York, having made personal trial of the
mode of diet recommended by Sylvester Graham, and finding it eminently con-
ducive to health, consider it our duty to  attest the same, for the information of
our fellow-citizens, earnestly recommending to them an examination of his doc-
trines,  and a practical trial of his system."

  The meeting was then adjourned, sine die, after having proved a very pleas-
iug entertainment for above two hours.

  N. B.—See, at  the close of the book, the account  of a similar meeting in
Frovidence.
   N. B.—The reader of this work, will, of course, be aware that it does  not
pretend to contain any thing like an exhibition of what is called the "Graham
System.'*  It is only intended to exhibit the effects of that System, in its appli-
cation to invalids.
  Index at the back part of the book. 
.ESCULAPIAN  TABLETS.
                          [NO. I.]

                     Philadelphia, 10th Month, 31, 1831.
  Esteemed Friend—
                    It may afford thee some satisfaction to know
that thou hast been instrumental in relieving the sufferings of one
of thy fellow creatures, and I therefore take a pleasure in inform-
ing thee of the effects of thy course of Lectures, at the  Frank-
lin Institute, eight months since, on my own health.
  From my earliest recollections, I have been  afflicted with fre-
quent turns of very severe head-ache.  In my childhood it  was
so distressing  and so frequent that my parents consulted some of
the  most eminent physicians in  the city concerning it, and used
every means they knew of, for  my relief.  But all to no good ef-
fect.   The turns continued to come upon  me with somewhat in-
creasing  frequency and severity as I grew up to manhood.  My-
self and friends  believed it to be constitutional and incurable.—
For many years past, the recurrence  of my  turns of  head-ache,
has been as often as once a week, and sometimes more frequently;
and my suffering has been so intense and  prostrating, that when
the turns came upon  me, I have been  wholly unable to  at-
tend to any business,  and have generally been obliged to take to
my bed for the day, and often have been so completely overcome
that all my strength left me, and I became exceedingly relaxed in
my whole frame, and pale as a corpse.  After having been thus
afflicted for more than twenty years—after having failed to find
any relief in any of the numerous remedies which had been  re-
commended—and after having pretty much given up all expecta-
tions of ever being  entirely relieved from my afflictions—I attend-
ed thy course of Lectures, at the Franklin Institute last Spring,
and pretty strictly  adopted the  system of diet which thou didst
recommend.  After I commenced this course, I had my  regular
turns of the head-ache, but less severe  than usual.   When the
time came round again, the pain was very light, and when the third
time came, the pain was scarcely perceptible.   Since then, nearly
eight months have passed, during which time I  have been entirely
free from the head-ache, and all other pains, and enjoyed the best of
health.   That thou mayest be as successful in thy benevolent and
philanthropic  labors,  as thy soul desires, is the sincere  wish of
                     Thy Friend,                   J. K. 
14
                          [NO. II.]

                       Philadelphia, 11th Month, 2d, 1831.
  Esteemed Friend—
                    I feel almost overcome with embarrassment
in attempting to address thee, and have several times shrunk from
the  undertaking, with unconquerable diffidence ; and perhaps al-
so I feel an excessive cautiousness lest there  might be some  im-
propriety in my giving to thee any accout of my own case, as ef-
fected by the course of lectures, delivered at the Franklin  Insti-
tute early last  spring; but I  yield to  thy importunity in spite of
my  own misgiving, and perhaps the more prudent advice of some
of my friends.
  It is more than five years since my health began to fail, and al-
though I was not attacked  with any definite disease, yet 1  grad-
ually declined:—Suffering  first a loss of appetite—then a general
languor and debility, and sense of weariness,  and occasional  de-
pressions of spirits,—pains in my head, chest, side, &c.  I did not
for  sometime  at first, consider my indisposition of a character suf-
ficiently serious to require  medical treatment, but after a consid-
erable time,  finding myself becoming  more  and more unwell, I
thouorht it  advisable to consult a physician, and to submit to his
prescription.   Medicine however proved exceedingly delusive,—
continually exciting hopes, and continually disappointing them.—
In  spite of all prescriptions I  continued to grow  more unwell—
my appetite became poorer and more capricious—my body more
emaciated and feeble,—the sense of lassitude and inertness more
excessive, and  the  general languor and disquietude and depres-
sion of spirits, and  bodily pain and distress, almost  daily increas-
ing.  Yarious tonics were  prescribed to increase my strength, but
still I grew weak.  I was told to eat what I found to relish best,
and to take nourishing food: but nothing seemed  to please my
 palate nor to nourish my body.  I literally waited upon my appe*
tite, and continually strove to please it, but nothing tasted  good.
 Thus. I continued on, becoming worse  and worse, till I was hard-
ly  able to be about; and became shrouded in the deepest and most
 cheerless melancholy.  I had not the least enjoyment of life, and
 my existence was a burden to me.  I  consulted several eminent
 physicians, and tried their  prescriptions, but without receiving the
 least benefit.  I at length became so feeble that I was not able to
 sit up the whole day, but was obliged to lie down at least once, and
 sometimes oftener, during the day; and if I walked out,  I  was
 obliged  to calculate  my distance, which  seldom  exceeded the
 length of a single block; and if I walked two or three blocks, to
 see a friend, I was obliged to lie down and rest two or three hours
 before I was able to return.  And when I was on my bed or in
 my chair, I felt as though  I had not power to  rise, and as though I
 had no resolution to make the effort.  The weariness and distress
 of my body were habitual, and the despondency and gloom of my 
15
mind were excessive.  I felt as though nothing rendered life de-
sirable to me, and thought I should never again enjoy it.
  Such was my  situation and such  the state of my health when
thou didst commence thy course of Lectures at the Franklin In-
stitute, in the early part of the present year.  Feeble and misera-
ble as I  was, 1  resolved on hearing what thou hadst to say, con-
cerning life and  health ; though  1 confess  I did  not cherish any
very strong expectations of  being benefitted in regard to my own
health.  Being favored with lodgings near the Franklin Institute,
I was  able to attend thy whole course; and I assure thee, I lis-
tened to thy  instructions with the deepest interest  and the liveliest
sensibilities.  I  was fully convinced  of the truth of thy doctrines,
and believed that an observance of those doctrines would be ex-
ceedingly salutary to myself;  but  it did not seem to  me possible
that I could conform  to them.  At the  close of thy  concluding
lecture, I retired home with my friends, painfully oppressed with
a  conviction of tho  truth nf what I heard, and with a feeling of
my inability to comply with thy rules.   I was very much emacia-
ted, and extremely feeble, and as pale as a corpse, and had all the
appearance and feelings of  one near the close of life.   I told my
friends that I  verily believed that what thou hadst  told us was
true, and that if I could obey it I should recover my health.—
"But oh !" said  I, "how can I do it  ? Here I have been for years
studying  what nice dish, what delicate  morsel would please my
palate and awaken an appetite for food, that 1 might eat enough
to nourish my body and give  me strength;  and for years have  I
been seeking relief from my sufferings, in the use of various med-
ical remedies,—and now to  abandon the whole—anodynes, tonics,
stimulants &c. and instead of soliciting my appetite to select what
is most gustful,—to teach jit—nay to compel it, to  be satisfied—
to be pleased with that which now apeais wholly unsavory and
 forbidding,—to   submit for  months—and  I know not  how much
longer, to such  an  intolerable course of self-denial, and comfort-
less  abstinence!—indeed,  I  cannot  do  it.   No !  notwith-
standing  I fully believe I  should recover my health by it, yet  I
 feel that I  have not resolution  even to make  the beginning,
 much less, to pursue a course, long enough to be benefitted by it."
 Filled with such mental conflicts and painful sensibilities, I retired
 to rest, and  without coming to any  determination in my mind,  I
 fell asleep.   In the  same unsettled and irresolute  state, I sat
 down  to the breakfast  table  in the morning ; and without any fixed
 purpose I declined my cup  of coffee, and  took milk and water in
 its stead.  When the meal  was finished, I said,. I  have made a be-
 ginning and found it no hardship, and think I shall now go on.
   From that time I continued more and more to adopt thy system
 of living till I  got on to thy strict regimen :—taking thy bread
 with a cup of milk and water, and perhaps a little plain fruit, for
 my breakfast—the bread, with plain, boiled rice,  good potatoes or
 some other plain and simply prepared vegetables for  dinner—and 
                              16

 supper, the same as breakfast.   This plan of diet, with such little
 varieties as are consistent with the dietetic principles taught in thy
.Lectures, I have now strictly followed more than six months; ex-
 cept on two occasions, when I could not well avoid it, I took a cup
 of tea.   I  have  also in other respects carefully conformed to thy
 instructions.   I  had not long pursued this course, before 1  began
 to experience sensible benefits from it.  The various pains, and
indispositions, and lassitude, which  I had so long suffered, grad-
 ually forsook me, and my appetite and strength increased; so that
I was able  in a short time, to walk three or  four miles without  fa-
tigue.   The darkness and  despondency  of my  mind also  disap-
peared, and I became serene and cheerful.   In all respects  of
 body and mind, my health  improved, even  beyond  my expecta-
tions : and I  am now, and have been for  a  considerable time, en-
joying the most perfect and  uninterrupted health.   I  have gained
much flesh—my cheeks are full  and have  sufficient color—and
my countenance has  the  aspect of ruddy  health:—presenting
a most  striking  contrast with what it was when  I  first com-
menced thy system of living.   The habitual cheerfulness of my
spirits, clearness of my mind, vigor and elasticity of my body and
buoyancy of my  feelings, are such as no one can  conceive of, who
has not experienced them.   I often feel, when walking across my
room, or in the open  air, a desire to skip and jump about with
bounding steps, as  I used  to, in the romping buoyancy of my
childhood.   But  there is one point  of deeper interest than all.
Thou saidst in thy Lectures, that they who would make the high-
est attainments  in spiritual things,  and  have the clearest per-
ceptions of the  beauty of holiness, must  learn to  bring  under
their body and keep it in subjection, and crucify its improper pas-
sions and appetites.   I assure thee that this  important considera-
tion took the  strongest hold on my  feelings, and was one of the
most powerful motives which induced me to adopt thy system of
living ;  and verily I have realized much of  the promised benefits;
for I never before had so clear and full a sense  of that  scripture
which saith, "0, worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness;" nor
could I  before imagine  that the spirituality of the mind was  so
much connected with the state of the body and the  character of
the diet.
   I will not close this communication, without saying that I have
proved the  truth of  another of thy doctrines, which at  first appear-
ed  to me almost incredible  : and that is  this—" The plainer and
simpler our diet, the greater our gustatory enjoyment."  I have
found this strictly true.  Uninviting and forbidding as thy system
of diet at first appeared to me, I have not only become reconciled
to it, but love it, and can truly say that I never in my  life enjoyed
my food better than I now do.
  That thou mayest be greatly blessed with success in thy benev-
olent and truly philanthropic undertaking, and enjoy a large share 
17
of that health and happiness thyself, which thou  art so ardently
and laboriously endeavoring to secure to others, is the sincere de-
sire of
                   Thy grateful friend,                   G.
                          [NO. III.]

                                New-York, April 20, 1833.
  Mr. Graham,
               Sir—Justice to the cause of temperance, and phi-
lanthropy to my  own sex, induce me to place this in your hands,
to be used in a manner you may think most proper.   I look back
upon the precipice I have escaped, with an almost enthusiastic
gratitude; for truly, my feet had well nigh slipped.
  From infancy, my health was delicate, and violent fits of sick-
ness were my lot, through my whole childhood.   Being inclined
to study, I was kept  constantly in school,  and when at a proper
age, placed from home.   Applying myself closely to study, exer-
cising but little,  and eating the most hearty food, I was afflicted
with a lassitude, especially through the summer, which kept me
low, and unable to sit up through the middle of the day.   I  eom-
menced teaching in early life, and then  I  thought my excessive
labor called for good living, and the frequent use  of the dearly be-
loved, blessed beverage, tea; and this I considered the more neces-
sary, as I had an utter hatred to all alcoholic stimulants, and could
not use milk; neither could I drink cold water, without being se-
riously affected by it.   I soon became subject to melancholy, con-
tinuing days in succession; and if, by the "sadness of the coun-
tenance, the heart is made better," I should have had a very good
one.   This kind of sanctity was kept up, till, what with fatigue
during the day,  and intenseness of study at night,—with but five
hours' rest,—tea, pastry, sweetmeats, &c. &c—I had more the ap-
pearance of a rigid nun, doing penance, than an enlightened Christ-
ian; and was eventually thrown into what was pronounced a con-
firmed consumption.   It was  then, for  the first time  in my life,
that a plain diet was recommended,  with the entire exclusion of
tea.   Partial health returned, and I gradually relapsed into all
my former habits;  and a settled daily head-ache came on,  which
baffled all medical skill, and all pronounced it a pressure of blood
upon the brain;  though I have since learned it was a pressure of
tea, coffee, and their necessary appendages, on the nerves. Thus
I continued, till advised to open a boarding-school,  hoping differ-
ent exercise might be salutary.  Here I learned,  by constantly
observing some hundreds of scholars, that not one who was pecu -
iarly fond of eating, and took  much animal food, was a good schol-
ar   I then gave no meat in the middle of the day; but I had not
                           b2 
18
yet come to the knowledge of the truth.  In a few years, care, and
multiplied sorrows rolled over my head;—I sunk in the deep waters
of affliction;—my tears were my meat, day and night; and I nev-
er expected more to see good in the land of the living.  A palpita-
tion of the heart and increased distraction of ihe head, admonish-
ed me, that the narrow house would soon shut me from all living
—and I  had no confidence in  Physicians or medicine : but the
solicitations of friends prevailed ;  and one  was called. 1 told him
he could not  raise me, but 1 would follow all his  directions.  He
proved  himself a man of common sense:—a most rigid  course of
diet, with little medicine—exercise when able, and change of room
and circumstances, as far as practicable, were his prescriptions.
   Now it was, a  little  light began to shine into my benighted
mind.  The truth 1 had long been seeking, began to dawn.  In a
few  weeks, I  was able to  walk; adhering still to the same rigid
course  of diet, with  the  promise, from my physicician, that I
might soon return to the good things of this life.   Here  was the
rock  on which I split, and this was the false kindness of  my phy-
sician.   The least precaution, would have saved me; still, I feel
much indebted to him, however, as he was the pioneer to all I now
enjoy.
   Scarcely had I begun again to enjoy health, when a good neigh-
bor manifested her kind feelings, by making a  dinner, to break
my long fasting, on first going out.  I partook sparingly  of all her
dainties, but  the delicious  chicken pie,  who could withstand?   I
was  awaked at four o'clock the next morning, in great distress,
succeeded by a violent fit of the cholera morbus.   Death seemed
inevitable, and my folly unpardonable.  This was a salutary lesson.
I returned to the plainest food, but made free use of tea, and cof-
fee.  In May, 1829,  I came to this city, much improved in health,
 and entered into my favorite employment, determining to adhere to
 a plain diet, and discipline my pupils to the same.   In this attempt
 I found much difficulty.  Eating was the primum-unbile—the Al-
pha and Omega of all happiness.   I boarded at a  moderate price,
 specifying my reasons that principle would not allow me to pre-
 pare such rich food, and such a motley profusion, at the same time.
 All was unavailing.  Gentlemen who had lived well, could not be
 brought to a plain dinner; and ladies,—but I forbear, with barely
 naming a circumstance, which may  serve  as a little admonition.
 Two ladies were members of my family, whose excessive use of
 strong tea and coffee, truly alarmed  me.    One of the  two used
 butter, most extravagantly'; and was so afflicted with blains upon
 the skin, that one might have supposed a return of ancient leprosy.
  She complained much  of nervous affection; and often  in a cold
 winter's night, have  I been called to her room, and found her in
 all the horrors of a delirium—begging me to stay by her, saying
 that she saw strange sights; sometimes feeling upon the wall, or
 bed-clothes;  with every  appearance of delirium tremens.  The
  other was afflicted with violent palpitation of the heart,  and so se- 
19
vere as often to deprive her of the^power of speech.   In one in-
stance, she was called to breakfast, and, not appearing, I went to
her room and called, but received no answer.   The door was burst
open, and she was found in a kind of fit, which was* succeeded by
a week of severe sickness.   She told us that this was not unusual,
and that her only remedy was black drops.
   I then began to think seriously of the dangerous tendency of
tea; and when this beverage was dismissed from my family, I re-
solved that strong tea should not be brought to my table; but cof-
fee! coffee!  it was my meat and my drink,  and no one had ever
told me it was pernicious; yet I found my health failing,—my head-
ache returning,—and the palpitation of my heart quite severe.
 As this increased,  my attachment to coffee strengthened; and, to
 my sorrow I say it, I used it four times a day.  This was a year
 ao-o the past winter.  My invariable rule was, between the hours
 of ten and  eleven at night, to make a fresh cup of coffee, to take
 at retiring.  This had been a three months' practice, when a le-
 proof from  a tipler broke the charm,  and I abandoned my nightly
 drams of coffee.
    About the same time, I saw a paper  containing a communica-
 tion respecting a Mr. Graham, who was lecturing in Philadelphia
 on the Science of Human Life.
    I know  not why, but  never did such a  joy, such a gratitude,
 burst upon my soul on  reading any  communication whatever.  I
 handed  it  to a friend, saying—this is another link  in the great
 chain of events, to advance the millenium—to prepare the way
 for that longevity, which is so much promised in Holy Writ.   I
 examined  every paper to gain light on  the subject.   In the mean
 time, the folly and madness of living only to eat, so harrassed
  me, I resolved to dismiss my boarders, which I did accordingly,—
  living most temperately myself, except my coffee—which I now
  began seriously to fear, was injuring me, as the palpitation of my
  heart  immediately followed a free use of it.  My glad ears were
  now saluted with the intelligence that Graham had arrived. I was
  a hearty  proselyte, before seeing him; but when I  traced him
  through all his reasonings, comparing them with the experience of
  my own sad pilgrimage, truth  in all its splendor burst upon me,
  and I was resolved no longer, to be a fool!  I went from the Hall,
  making the firm resolre, to tear the  last idol from my lips, and
  bade a final adieu to my beloved coffee :  and when this desper-
  ate resolve was made, I  think it was forever!  But  O  the horrors
  of the following day ; ye, who have "tarried long at the wine,
   may best  understand me !  A mist, a drowsiness, a gloom, a  dark-
   ness, came  over  me, unknown before, even in my most melan-
   choly mood.  This insipid milk and  water,  recommended, was
   tried, and a wretched substitute it was.  The next morning came,
   the fumes  of the  coffee, passed like an exhilarating morning
   breeze, across the table, but I withstood the temptation; and, to
   conclude this long detail, would say,  as briefly as possible.   My 
20
sleep soon became sweet;  no horror of imagination has ever come
over me, by day, or by  night; the pain of my  head, and palpita-
tion of my  heart took their leave in a short time, and have never
made a call since.  For six months, cold water has been my bev-
erage, which 1 could  never use for the last  nineteen years. Even
an attempt  to take two or three swallows of cold water, would af-
fect me like the paroxysms of hydrophobia;  I  had ever supposed
warm drink necessary, even when going into the cold; but the past
severe  winter, 1 have been  out more, and suffered less than any
winter of my life.  In  short  I am  a wonder to myself, for I had nev-
er thought of uninterrupted health, either in body or in mind. But
the most valuable of  the whole is, the clearness of the mind.   To
those who love study, I would say, if the cords are still about you,
1 would entreat you to make one desperate effort and break them
asunder.   Most of all, do I regret, those  months I have lost, in
chasing shadowy ideas, flitting before  me, which  I longed to se-
cure, but in vain, till  the fogs and mists were dispelled; and often
have I arisen, at dead of night,  to pen  some thought  I had been
pursuing, lest  the  truant  should make  its escape forever.   Not
so now.  My thoughts, such as they  are, flow on impeded  by no
clogs, by night, or day.  Finally, I am  in theory, and in practice,
a thorough  convert to the  best, and most rational manner of living
in the world—the Graham System.
                              ASENATH NICHOLSON.
                           [NO. IV.]

  Mr.  Graham,
              Sir—I am a native  of Massachusetts, and was
brought up on a farm.  When a child I was not very robust, but
enjoyed ordinary  health.   My dietetic habits were such as are
common to farmers' children.   At the age of fifteen, I had some
symptoms of the asthma, which however passed away, and I con-
cluded that I had nothing further to apprehend from the affection :
but the symptoms returned upon me, at considerable intervals, un-
til my  eighteenth  year, when the disease fully manifested itself.
I continued to be afflicted, and often very seriously, with this com-
plaint, for about ten years ;—frequently so seriously as not to be
able to sleep with  any comfort for a week at a time.  I have ap-
plied to a great many  physicians ;  and followed their prescrip-
tions ;—tried a great many quack medicines, and all to no good
effect.  Smoking tobacco, was among other things, recommended;
and this for awhile afforded me a temporary relief from my pa-
roxysms of distress, but it soon lost its effects, as an anodyne and
antispasmodic, and only aggravated the disease.  My physicians
finally  told me that my disease was incurable, and that  I could
only hope for temporary relief from the effects of medicine. 
                            21

  On the 7th of March, 1832, I commenced attending your Lec-
tures at Clinton Hall, and soon after  began to adopt a rigid sys-
tem  of diet;—principally  of  unbolted  wheat-meal bread,  and
water.  Since that time I have not had the slightest symptoms of
asthma.
                    Yours Truly,
                                   ALVAN CLARK, Jim
   New-York, May 5, 1832.

   "I have recovered wonderfully.  I am heavier  than I  ever
was before ;  and never before was I so uniformly well."
   November, 13,  1832.

   "My health, since I wrote you last, has been uniformly as good
 as any mortal could desire to possess, unless he desired some un-
 earthly thing.  My whole living now  is bread and milk, with some
 apples.  My muscular power continues to increase."
   Fall-River, January  7, 1833.

   "I have gone thus far through the  winter, without any thing of
 my old complaint, I am about five pounds heavier than you ever
 saw me, and were I to judge from my own feelings  I should sup-
 pose myself a very sound man."
   February 5, 1833.

   "My health remains good, and since I wrote you last, I have
 increased much in weight.  I now weigh oyer 150  pounds, which
 is more than I ever weighed before in my life."
   December 16, 1833.
                          [NO.  V.]

                            New-York, January 2d, 1832.
 Mr. Graham,                                   T    1QQ1
            Sir—You will probably recollect that in J une, 18.31,
I applied to you for advice concerning my health;  and that I then
informed you that I had long been laboring under great infirmities
and disorder of body,—had suffered exceedingly from head-ache,
and was afflicted with continual and severe pain in the breast inso-
much that I was often obliged to desist from my employment  and
walk about for relief.  I was at that time very feeble and thin in
flesh, and had  been so for a  considerable time.  For ten months
previous to my  calling on  you, I had been very abstemious, ,n
my use of animal food, except butter; but I had  not_been equal-
ly careful to avoid seasonings and stimulants.  I drank coffee free-
ly.   After  hearing your Lectures, and receiving your advice, l
abandoned the use of tea, coffee, and all  other kinds of sitmu- 
                             22

lating and heating substances ; and  was careful to observe  your
rules in other respects so far as they were particularly applicable
to my peculiar case.  My health soon began to improve ; and I
continued to become more and more strict in my regimen, till I
got on to a diet of Graham bread and  rain water exclusively.
This regimen I observed rigorously through the  whole cholera
season, and not only became wholly freed from all my pains and
ailments, but recovered and enjoyed the most entire and perfect
health; feeling strong, active, and cheerful.  My sleep is as sweet
as a babe's, and when I rise in the morning, I always feel fresh,
and clear, and vigorous, and sprightly, as ever I did in my boy-
hood.
   During the cholera season, I was very much among the sick of
that terrible disease.  Several  times  a day  I visited   a family
(No.  62, James-sreet.)  who occupied a  house belonging to me,
and of which five members died.  I stood ovor the  hpds of the
sick,—handled their bodies, assisted in taking care of them, &c :
and after the death of five, and the house was deserted, I  went
into the house,—took up the beds, clothes, and other things ap-
pertaining to the rooms,  from which  the dead bodies had  been re-
moved, and carried  them out of the house, and was there three or
four times a day, handling the things, &c.
   After this 1 visited the remnant of  the same family, who were
still sick of the cholera ; and visited at least, four other  families,
who were sick of the same disease.   I sat beside the sick, by the
hour,—watched  with them,  rubbed them, lifted  them, &c, yet
through the whole cholera season, I had not the least touch of the
complaint, nor the slightest indisposition of any kind.
   Among others, I was called to watch with my neighbor Dr. Whit-
ing, No. 37, Mott-st., who was very sick with the cholera.  I was
ordered to give the  patient a tea-spoonful of  brandy or wine, with
about six times the  quantity of water, every half  hour.  I found
the patient unable to speak above a whisper,  and  so very restless
that it was exceedingly  difficult to keep any bed-clothes on him
for a minute.   I rubbed  him,—helped him  up and  down,  stood
over him &c. &c.   He asked me if  I was not afraid of taking the
disease ! I told him that I was not in the least afraid of  it:—that
I considered  my regimen a perfect security against it.  I then
told him how I lived, and how I had been exposed &c.   He ex-
pressed a wish to have some of my rain water.   I  told him he
should have some of it, and immediately I took a  pitcher and ran
over to my cistern and filled it.   I gave the patient a small quan-
tity of the water, without any of the  wine or brandy "O !" said
he, "that is exceedingly refreshing !  it  reminds  me of the sweet
draughts I used to take  from the running brooks in the days of my
boyhood ! Do give me a little more !—I yielded to his request and
gave him a little larger quantity, which still more revived him
and increased his importunities for more.   I  continued to indulge
him, and gradually  increased the quantity to half a tumbler at a 
\
23
time.   The  patient soon  became very  quiet and serene, and his
voice improved rapidly.   I  therefore gave him nothing but the
rain water during the rest of the night.  Before daylight, he was
able to speak in his natural  voice, and in the morning he got up
and dressed himself.  My neighbor, Mr. Everett, the electrician,
No. 4 Mott-st, also had the cholera pretty severely.   He was  at-
tended by two physicians, both of whom told him he must take
calomel and opium, by all means, or  he would  probably lose his
life.  The patient however refused to follow their prescriptions,—
sent for me,—took a mild purgative and  followed it  up with the
rain water alone, and very soon  got well.   I  had five daughters
who  remained with me in the city, and  who observed the same
 regimen that I did, and enjoyed the best health  through the whole
 season, without a touch of the cholera or any other  indisposition.
    During the summer season, I walked twenty-five  miles in six
 hours, one  day, when the roads were very muddy, to see my son,
 who was in very ill health and did not expect to recover.   1 found
 him quite sick and very much cast down.   I sat down by his bed-
 side and pulled out my coarse cracker and began to eat my sup-
 per.   He asked me what I  was  eating ;  and I gave him  some of
 it, with some water, which seemed to refresh him very much.   I
 then put him strictly upon this regimen, and he soon began to im-
 prove, and was able to return with me to the  city; where  I kept
 him on in the same way, and in a little while he was restored to
 health.
    But what will you say to me, when I acknowledge, that after
 all this practical proof of the truth and excellence of your  System,
 I have so far backslidden, since the cholera has passed away, that
 I am now actually indulging in the use of things which I  know to
 be pernicious, and which have already impaired my health.
               Yours, respectfully,
                                     DAYID S. BURGER.

                                                 i
                         [NO. VI.]

                            New-York, January 7th, 1833.
  Mr. Graham,
              Sir—In compliance with your request, I will re-
late to you a few facts concerning myself and family, in reference
to your Lectures in this city.  My own health has been quite del-
icate, from my childhood; and I have  always been very subject to
colds and coughs.  I have suffered much from  weakness and pain
in the breast; and have been habitually inclined to costiveness.
Though a man of active habits,  I  never could endure much fa-
tigue, and was easily  exhausted.  I never  considered myself de-
cidedly  an invalid; and yet I have long been apprehensive that I 
24
had hanging about me, those little ailments and susceptibilities
which would, sooner or later, terminate in a fatal consumption.
  In January, 1832, I commenced attending your Lectures,  in
Mulberry-street;  and about the same time adopted, pretty strictly,
your system of diet and general regimen.  My health began to be
better, very soon, and has continued to improve, ever since. Now,
I never take a cold, though  1 expose  myself much more than I
used to;—1 have no cough;  and am much more robust, and able
to labor, than I ever was before.  Formerly, if I over-exerted my-
self a little, and put forth my whole strength, on any occasion, I
was sure to suffer for it, and sometimes seriously;—but now 1 can
exert all my powers, without any sensible injury or fatigue.  My
bowels are perfectly  regular,—my spirits good,—and my health
uniform.
  My wife was tolerably healthy, till she was twenty years old;
from that time her health began to fail; and she became more and
more unwell and feeble, and seemed running into a consumption;
her body was habitually and incorrigibly constipated, so that she
was continually under the necessity of taking cathartic medicine,
to obtain relief.   Severe  cough—violent  sick head-ache—great
weakness and pain in the back—good deal of pain in the side—
flatulency—depression of spirits—general  debility—and withal, a
great deal of tooth-ache, and languor, and very distressing weak-
ness and trembling, and sinking faintness at  the pit of the  stom-
ach—together with many other complaints—made up the terrible
catalogue  of her sufferings  for  nine  or ten years.   During this
time, she took an abundance of medicine; and, among other things,
a great deal of cayenne pepper—sal volatile—lavender, &c. &c;
but she found that the more  she took of these things, the more she
required; till they sometimes ceased to have any alleviating effect.
A very little exercise fatigued her exceedingly;  and her appetite
was generally poor.
   Such was the state of her health, when she commenced living
on the Graham System, about the same time  I did.   Her health
began, almost immediately,  to improve.   Her long-standing cos-
tiveness was overcome—her sick head-ache  entirely left her—her
strength increased—and her appetite became uniform and good.
Her trembling and distress at the pit of her stomach—pain in her
side and back—cough, tooth-ache, depression of spirits,  &c. &.c.
all gradually  disappeared, till  every ailment and disorder was
gone:—and for nearly a year past, she has enjoyed uninterrupted
health.  She is at present healthy, cheerful, and strong;  and can
walk miles, or employ herself in her  household duties and labors
all day, and walk more than a mile to the Lecture and back again
in the evening, with very little fatigue.  Indeed, she has become
remarkably bright, elastic, and sprightly;  and seems to  enjoy a
new existence.
   My sister, Susan M.  Fisher, who is  a  member of my  family,
and is now eighteen years old, has  from her childhood been ex- 
25
 ceedingly feeble, nervous and sickly.  She never used any coffee
 and very little tea ; but was fond  of animal food, gravies, pastry,
 sweetmeats, &.c. &.c.
   She has always been subject to colds, and severe attacks of lung
 fever, during the winter season, and has often been  brought  very
 low with this complaint.   She was habitually costive, and always
 excessively nervous.  Her sleep was  very unsound and unrefresh-
 ing, and much  disturbed.   She often woke up in  the  night  in
 great agitation,  and thought some frightful creatures had  come to
 carry her away  ; and imagined that  her head was swelled  enor-
 mously large, and  that her  tongue was so big that  she could not
 talk.  She  was  exceedingly weak and could bear no fatigue ;  a
 very little fatigue or excitement during the day, was sure to bring
 on restless and distressing turns at night.  Her spirits were much
 depressed and she was seldom cheerful ; but most of the time de-
 jected and melancholy.  She continued in  this miserable state of
 health,  until about one year ago, when, at  the age of seventeen,
 she adopted your system of diet, strictly; and in a very short time
 her health began to improve in all  respects,  and  continued to im-
 prove until it became completely established.  Her  nervous com-
 plaints are all gone; all her  ailments and disorders have  left  her;
 and she is now every way well  and hearty and strong, and  uni-
 formly cheerful, and enjoys life very  much.   In  fact,  one would
 not think, from  her personal appearance, that she had ever been
 out of health. Neither myself, wife,  nor sister, has eaten any an-
 imal food or flesh, since we adopted the System.   We spent the
 past summer in the city, and never enjoyed better health than we
 did through the whole cholera season.  That dreadful disease was
 all around us, (next doors) and cut off many of our neighbors;  and
 I was much amongst the dying and dead,  and assisted in laying
 out several dead bodies, (twelve, at least,) and in putting them in
 to their coffins;  yet none of us had the least premonitory symptom
 of the cholera, nor any other illness.   Our  mother,  who did not
 live on the System, had an attack of the cholera.
   This much I feel it my duty to say, and from our  own  experi-
 ence I am induced to believe, thatif your System were generally
 adopted, it would be highly beneficial to mankind.
   Please accept the tribute of grateful hearts, for the  instruction
 which we have received from you.
              Your very obedient servant,
                               EVANDER D. FISHER.



                         [NO. VII.]
                            New-York, January 7th,  1833.
   Mr. Graham,
              Sir—In compliance with your wishes,  and in ac-
cordance with my own feelings of gratitude for the benefits I have
                             c 
26
received, I will give you an account of the effects of your System
of diet on my health.
  I enjoyed pretty good health till I was near twenty-one years of
age.  I was then quite sick for a while with fever and  ague,  and
took a good  deal of medicine, and tried various remedies, to rid
myself of that troublesome and distressing complaint.  After I had
succeeded in  breaking the chills, and began, as I thought, to get
better, I was  most grievously afflicted with a great many biles,
which were very painful and sore, and would not heal up, but long
continued to run.  I applied to a physician, who gave me some-
thing which healed them up;  but very soon after this, I was taken
with great oppression and dizziness of the head; this was followed
by general debility, great weakness in the lower limbs, and severe
pain about the sockets of my eyes,  which, at times, almost render-
ed me blind.   My eyes became very much inflamed, and so weak
that I could not  use them  to  read, without great pain.  If I at-
tempted to read, even  a few minutes, the anguish and distress of
my eyes became  intolerable, and compelled me to desist. I was con-
tinually and inveterately costive; and was very sensible to the va-
rious changes of the weather, and very easily took a cold.   My
mind was also much affected, and I suffered a great deal from de-
pression of spirits and despondency.
   Between three and four years ago, I commenced keeping bach-
elor's hall, and continued in this way nearly a year; during which
time my diet was very  simple, and  I ate  very little animal food.
 While  I lived in  this manner, my health improved exceedingly,
 and I  thought my  complaints were about taking their leave of me;
 but it did not once occur to my mind,  at that time, that the  im-
 provement of my health was in any way or degree connected with
 my diet.   Finding it somewhat inconvenient to live in this way, I
 therefore took board in a boarding-house;  and, without being aware
 of any impropriety in doing so,  I  indulged freely in the different
 kinds of food placed upon the table; and ate flesh very freely in-
 deed.   My old  complaints soon returned upon me, worse than ev-
 er; and although  I did not at the time suspect that this was in any
 way caused by my diet, yet I am now very much inclined to be-
 lieve, that the  quantity  of flesh which I ate had much to do with
 the return and  aggravation of my diseases.   However, I contin-
 ued to live on like other people, and learnt very little from my own
 experience.  About two years ago last fall, my afflictions were in-
 creased by the addition of a severe cough, which soon became very
 bad.   I tried many prescriptions and remedies, in  hopes to obtain
 relief;  but all to no good effect.   My cough continued  incorrigi-
 ble; and after  a while I began to suffer an intolerable gnawing at
 my stomach.   With this complication of disorders and sufferings,
  I  became, as you may well suppose, exceedingly emaciated and
  weak.   I raised a great deal of offensive matter  from my  lungs;
  and at length began to bleed at the lungs, considerably. 
27
  In this miserable condition, I left the cuy and went home to my
parents in  the country.  There  I consulted several physicians,
who considered  my disease to be a bad case of pulmonary con-
sumption.  I was very  low, and  all my friends regarded my case
as perfectly hopeless, and believed I was rapidly hastening to the
grave.  After spending three or four months in the country, how-
ever, and finding myself no worse,  but somewhat more comforta-
ble, I returned to the city,  where I continued to take medicine
constantly, for my cough, which seemed  at times to be better, and
then much worse, with  frequent and  copious bleeding at the lungs.,
and a discharge  of a great deal of very bad and offensive  matter.
The oppression and dizziness of my  head, and violent pain  and in-
flammation of my eyes, continued very  distressing: and nothing
seemed to afford me any relief.  Such  was my wretched condition
when  I was  induced to adopt the mode of living which is called
the Graham System, after having heard  a few of your  lectures in
Mulberry-street, in January, 1832.   But 1 had hardly got accus-
tomed to my new regimen, before I was taken with the measles,
which, though of the worst  kind,  was very light—owing, as 1 fully
believe, to my reformed manner of living.  Before I had entirely
recovered from this last disease,  I very imprudently went out and
exposed myself,  and took a bad cold; and this brought on  inflam-
matory rheumatism, which was exceedingly painful.   I however
took very little medicine, but dieted myself on  gruel and wheat-
meal hominy, and in about one week  found myself relieved from
my rheumatic complaints; and I  now fully believe that the Gra-
ham System saved my life in this emergency; for all  my friends
thought that I certainly must die,  when they saw me so taken
down after the measles.  After recovering from the measles and
rheumatism, I found  myself much  relieved also fiom my other
complaints, and  was in all respects,  much better than  I had been
for a long time before.   I  then went into the country again, on a
visit to my parents.  When they saw how  I was living, they were
much alarmed, and gave me no peace till I consented  to abandon
my new regimen, and  live as they did, on what  they called  good
nourishing food.  I had not  long indulged in their good things,
however, before I broke out with biles, like  another  Job.   My
cough and bleeding at the  lungs  returned, and  I was  every way
much worse than when I came into  the  country. At  the expira-
tion of three months, I returned to the city, far more unwell than
when 1 left it.   My head  and eyes  were as bad as ever they had
been.
   On my return to the city, I  again commenced living pretty
strictly on the Graham System,  and soon began to improve very
much in my health.  In about six weeks, the bleeding at my lungs
entirely ceased, and has not since returned, (now six  months.)—
My cough gradually left me, and for  some time past  has wholly
disappeared; the oppression  and dizziness of my head  are fast
wearing away, and already nearly gone  ; the  pain and inflamma- 
28
 tion and weakness of my eyes, are entirely gone; so  that I can
 now sit down and read by candle-light, as long as 1 wish to, with-
 out the least pain or weariness of my eyes.   My strength is very
 much improved, and my spirits are good.
   I remained  in the city during the past summer, and although
 the cholera was all  around me' and even next door,  and 1 was
 much amongst it, yet I had no symptoms of it.
   Some of my good friends profess great concern for me,  and
 have taken much pains to  convince me that I am certainly killing
 myself by this mode of living.  But  really, it appears to me that a
 regimen which enables one to  throw off so many old and distres-
 sing complaints, after six or seven years' dreary, and  at times
 hopeless endurance, is a very strange kind of killing one's self.
   While I have lived on your System, I have used no animal food,
that is,  no flesh:  but  I have  subsisted  principally on  Graham
bread and hominy, made of the coarse wheat-meal, potatoes, some
rice, a little milk, sugar-house molasses, some fruit, such as apples,
 pears, peaches and berries, in the season of them.
   With most sincere acknowledgments of gratitude to you,  as the
instrument in the hands of God in raising  me  as  it were from the
grave, and  restoring me to health, I  subscribe myself,
                         Very respectfully, yours, fyc.
                                                    W. T.
                         [NO. VIII.]

                            New-York, January 8th, 1833.
  Mr. Graham,
              Sir—For the benefit of others; as well as for the
sake of affording you that  satisfaction, which every philanthropic
mind must feel from the consciousness of having been instrumen-
tal in alleviating the sufferings, and increasing the comforts of his
fellow creatures;  I  yield with  gratitude and  pleasure, to the
promptings of my sense  of duty, in  communicating to you  a
frank and simple statement of my own case in relation to  your
Lectures on the Science of Human Life.
  Until I was fifteen years old, I enjoyed good health, and sup-
posed  that 1  had a sound and vigorous constitution:—from that
time, however, my health began to fail; and I began to be troubled
with pain in the stomach, and other disagreeable symptoms of in-
digestion, which continued to  increase upon me, in spite of the
various medical prescriptions and remedies, which distress and the
ill-judged advice of friends induced me to have recourse to, for
relief.   This state of things continued to become gradually worse
and worse, for fifteen years.  Habitual and inveterate constipation
of body, rendering aperient medicine necessary every few days, 
29
great debility, languor, nervous irritability and dejection of spirit;
together with an almost incessant and intolerable head-ache, ren-
dered my existence truly miserable.   At length I began to feel
great soreness and pain in my right side and shoulder; I became
exceedingly debilitated, so that 1 was unable  to sit up from morn-
ing till  night, but was obliged to lie down once or twice during
the day.  My general languor and prostration of energy, and de-
pression of spirits  continued to increase; and my head-ache be-
came so violent as often to cause a temporary derangement of my
mind.   I took a great deal of medicine, according to medical ad-
vice; but it only seemed to afford me a very momentary relief, and
that only to a partial degree.  Finally, a cough set in, which soon
became very severe and incorrigible; and in  this miserable condi-
 tion, which seemed to be beyond the reach of medicine, I began
 to despair of ever being any better.  At this juncture  however,
 after having  been a stranger  to health for more than  fourteen
 years,—feeble and miserable as I was, I was induced  to go and
 hear your Lectures at the Baptist Meeting House inMulberry-st.
 last winter.   I  was  fully convinced of the correctness of your
 doctrines, and determined immediately  to reduce them to practice,
 so far as I considered them applicable to my own peculiar case.  I
 accordingly put myself at once, on a rigid diet of the bread which
 you recommended, with milk and water, and observed such other
 rules which you laid down, in  regard to general regimen,  as the
 state of my  health and circumstances would allow.
   My  health began almost immediately to improve:—in ten days
 the pain in my head, stomach and side began to be less  severe:—
 my cough became better; my appetite and strength and the gener-
 al tone of my system and serenity of my mind,  greatly increased,
 and I was in a very short time, able to attend to business all-day
 without lying down.   I continued my  regimen very strictly, and
 my health continued to improve, till I felt myself perfectly well. I
 was strong, active, free from pain, cheerful,  had a good appetite,
 and could attend to my business through the  day without weari-
 ness, and with  a clear and active mind.
    In this manner, I was going on well and continuing to improve,
 when  the cholera appeared  in our city, and the general hue and
 cry  was raised in every direction, against the Graham System.
 Almost every acquaintance  I  met, assured me  that  I would cer-
 tainly  die of the cholera, if I  did not  abandon the  Graham Sys-
 tem, and take a  more generous diet.   The Medical Council for
 the Board of Health, also, recommended animal food; and I con-
 fess that I  was weak enough to be frightened from that  course
  which had in so short a time, been astonishingly beneficial to me.
  I returned to the use of animal food, and indulged to a  moderate
  extent in what is commonly called a more nourishing diet.   But,
  however well advised such a diet may be, in regard to the cholera,
  it certainly was far from proving beneficial to me in other respects;
  for my health suffered almost immediately from the  change:—my
       J                     c2 
30
strength declined—my  cough and the  pain in my side, &c. re-
turned—my spirits became depressed; and all the symptoms and
sufferings of my worst years of sickness began to come back upon
me.
  Since the cholera has passed away, I have generally lived more
strictly upon your System; and have always found that the more
rigidly I adhered to your doctrines, the better my health has been:
and when I have occasionally deviated and indulged for a few days
in animal food,  &c.  I  have invariably  felt the  symptoms of my
old complaints returning upon me.  In short; 1 am now fully
convinced, by my own experience, of the entire  truth of your sys-
tem, so far as  it  regards my own case:  and I have not the least
doubt but that an  undeviating  perseverance in it, would  secure
to me, good and  uninterrupted health.   Indeed,  Sir, I do sincere-
ly assure you, that two  thousand dollars would be no temptation
for  me to part with the information and benefit I have  received
from your Lectures, if I could not obtain them again.   My health
is now uniformly good, except  when I foolishly, against my own
judgment, indulge in the use of articles of diet  which I  know to
be injurious to me.   This however, I do not carry beyond a slight
indisposition;  when I take the hint and return to my conservating
regimen:—so  that in comparison  with people generally,! am
what may be called well; and able to attend to my business with-
out interruption, and generally with vigor and cheerfulness.
  While addressing  you  on the subject of health as connected
with your lectures, I  will also narrate to you the  case of my sister,
Jane, who, until about three  years  since, enjoyed very good
health.  At that time she took a severe cold, which settled on her
lungs, and  was attended with a violent cough. For a considerable
time she suffered it to run on, without doing anything more to re-
move it, than  to use  the ordinary domestic remedies,  thinking all
the time it  would soon leave her.   But in this she was disappoint-
ed.   The violence of her cough increased, and she became more
and more unwell; until,  at length, it was thought advisable to call
a physician.  He  blistered her pretty freely,  and administered
considerable medicine, but all  to no good effect; and he told the
patient that her mother had better nurse her, as his medicine would
do her no good, for she had the consumption, and the less medicine
she took, the better.
  At this time her cough was exceedingly severe, and she began
to raise blood  from the  lungs.  It was  now the  heat of summer,
and yet she was  constantly complaining of the cold, and required
as much clothing as  she used to wear in the winter.  The dis-
charge of blood from her lungs increased, and she  began to suffer
a severe pain  in her breast and shoulder."  A second  physician
was called, who gave her some mild palliatives  and  left her.  A
third physician was called to see her, who informed the family that
he did not think it best to do anything for her more than  to nurse
her well, as he  did  not think anything could help her;  and he 
31
should not be surprised to hear she was dead,  in three weeks.—,
A fourth physician agreed with the third in opinion.   But my sis-
ter thought while there was life there was hope, and she therefore
came  to  New-York,  and  applied  to  a Vegetable  Doctor.—
He said she had the consumption, and he did  not think' she could
be cured; but if anything could  help her, his medicine would.—
She was now so diseased, that if she  rose suddenly from her chair
and walked hastily across the  room, the  blood would  gush from
her lungs, and she would spit out mouthful after mouthful of clear
blood.  She was about three months under  the care of the Vege-
table Doctor,  and his medicine did her more good than  anything
else  had done.   Her cough became somewhat less  severe, and
the bleeding was considerably diminished.
   She now left the city,  and went about forty miles into the coun-
try, to visit a sister, where she was soon taken with chills and fe-
ver, and her cough became more violent, and  the bleeding of her
lungs returned as bad  as ever.  The physician of the place was
called in, and he gave her medicine which broke her chills once
or  twice; but they  returned again, and she  was not at all benefit-
ted by anything she was taking.  She therefore came back to the
city, and applied to another physician, who ordered a strengthen-
ing plaister and some syrup.  These afforded a momentary  alle-
viation, but no permanent benefit.  She was now continually suf-
 fering a severe pain in her side, which sometimes extended up to
 her shoulder and breast.  She went  again into the country, and
 there applied to another physician; but finding no relief from his
 prescriptions, she went to Albany to see her friends, and there ap-
 plied to a steam doctor.  He told her if she would follow his pre-
 scription, he would cure her.  He steamed her  powerfully every
 day and gave her his medicines, and she considered herself great-
 ly benefitted by his treatment, although she used often to faint on
 entering and  leaving the bath.   Her cough was much softened,
 her bleeding was not so copious, and the  pain in her side much
 relieved.  In short, she thought she left him pretty nearly cured,
 and in a  fair  way to recover her health.  But she had not  been
 long out of his hands before her chills and fever returned, and all
  her old ailments began to come back  upon her.  In April, 1832,
  she came  down from Albany to this city, and was  brought to my
  house in a carriage.   She was  then  in so  debilitated a state, that
  she had to be carried from the carriage to the bed.   She had now
  been sick more than two years, and had been taking cathartics,
  emetics, and other medicine, almost continually, during the whole
  time.  I immediately told  her  she must now try the  ' Graham
  System,"  from which I had myself derived  so much benefit,  bne
  begged most heartily that she might be allowed her tea and coffee,
  and a few other things that  she  loved; but  I persuaded her  to
  abandon them all,  and put herself strictly on the " Graham Sys-
  tem "  Her health began almost immediately to improve; and  in
  six weeks she was able to devote the whole day to active industry. 
32
Her health has continued to improve in a ratio precisely corres-
ponding with the strictness with which she has confined herself to
your regimen.   But to confess the whole  truth, she regards it as
a self-denying  manner of living, and  is by no means disposed to
allow it any more credit than it deserves.  She thinks it is much
more  agreeable to eat  and drink what she likes,  and  to be
steamed and physicked out of the bad consequences, than to pre-
vent those consequences by foregoing her indulgences ; but in this
she is by no means peculiar.  Had she been the  only delinquent
in this respect, your  system would have  been saved  from much
discredit, which  it has been made to suffer from the defection of
your professed followers.  My sister  is however at present enjoy-
ing very good health, and able to go through her daily employment,
without the help of medicine of any kind.  Her cough, bleeding
at the lungs, pain in her side, &c. &c. are all gone.
   Wishing you all success in your truly philanthropic undertaking,
I am very respectfully and gratefully
                       Yours,
                                 JACOB  H. WYCKOFF.
                          [NO. IX.]

                            New-York, January 9th, 1833.
  Mr.  Graham,
              Sir—At the age of five  years, I  was put  out to
live at  a place v/here I was  kept up late nights, and my  food and
clothing were very poor, and my meals were very irregular; and
my health was quite delicate.   At the age of seven years, I was
taken from this place, in a very poor state of health,  and was not
able to do anything for nearly a year.  During the two  succeed-
ing summers, my health was miserable.   At the age of ten, I left
the city of New-York, and went into the country, where I  re-
mained laboring  on a farm, till I was fourteen years old.  Here I
lived well; but I still continued feeble, and all  my friends thought
I would never be able to do any thing.   At the age of fourteen I
returned to the city and went to  the plumber's trade, which is by
no means a healthy employment.  My health did not improve  any
here;  and I therefore continued in this business only about  one
year.  At the age of fifteen I went again to the country;  and in
the spring of the year  I entered as an apprentice to the carpen-
ter's trade.   Through  the  summer I  was  very  feeble; but  my
health improved a little during the winter:—1 was generally  sick
two or three weeks, sometimes six, every summer.  While the warm
weather  lasted,  I had  a continual head-ache.  My health con-
tinued delicate through the  six years of my apprenticeship:—the
last two years of which time, I was much troubled with rheumatic 
33
complaints.  During the whole six years of my apprenticeship, I
ate freely of animal food,  and generally three  times a day: and
among other things, I ate a good deal of pork :  and most of the
time my head-ache was severe and continual.  I believed that it
was entailed, and did not expect evef to be freed from it.  At the
age of twenty-one years, I came once more to the city, and la-
bored at the carpenter's trade for one year.   My health was still
very  delicate:—I was troubled  much  with  rheumatism: and so
severely at times that I was obliged to quit work till it left me.
   When I walked fast, I always had a severe pain in my side.  1
was severely and continually troubled  with alternate costiveness
and diarrhoea; and was obliged to take  medicine, as often as once
in six or eight weeks.  I was very fond of my good coffee in the
morning  and tea in the evening.   I lived  well, was fond of warm
cakes, pastry, &c. &c.
   Finding my health still  feeble, and despairing of ever having it
any better, I quit the carpenter's  trade, and took up the business
of wood engraving, at the age of twenty-two.   Here I continued
my former habits of what I then considered good living.  When
I thought that I needed  it as a medicine, I occasionally took a
glass of gin, or brandy and sugar.  My  health continued quite
poor, and I became much more weak and languid: and very soon
found myself unable to stand up and work:—and was  finally
obliged to sit down at my work, all day.
   My head-ache became  much more severe  and distressing.  My
eyes were very weak;  and I tried to  benefit them by the use of
glasses; but without success.  In the autumn of 1832, I had the
s-arlet fever about two weeks.  After recovering from this, 1 com-
menced attending your  Lectures  at Clinton  Hall, and was  taken
with the Influenza, and had it pretty  severely.  I took a good
deal of medicine for it, but to no  good effect.  I then put myself
on water gruel only, and in a few days found myself free from the
 Influenza  I then adopted  the Graham  System quite strictly-
 avoiding all artificial stimuli of every  kind.    After adopting this
 recrimen, for about two weeks at first, I felt pretty weak, but other-
 wile better.  My health and strength then began to improve; and
 I was soon able to stand up and work part of the day :—and after
 three weeks I could stand up and work all day.   My head-ache
 diminished rapidly, and soon left me entirely,  except when 1 over-
 eat, in which respect I have too  often transgressed.
    I have a wife and one child,—an infant nearly a year old.   My
 wife lrves as I do, and her health  is excellent-  Before she  com-
 menced living on'the Graham System, she was always complam-
 ing.  She  n?w  says, she never felt so well in her life before, as
 she does at present.  Our child is remarkably healthy, and sleeps
 all night, and seldom wakes once  through the night.
    We remained in the city through the  cholera season;-ate no
 flesh during  the prevalence of  that  terrible epidemic; and  al-
 though we had much of that disease all around us, and a family in 
34
the same  house had it; yet, neither myself, wife, nor child, had
the slightest premonitory symptoms, during the season.
  It is now more than a year since I commenced living on the Gra-
ham System, during which time, I have taken no medicine of any
kind;  and my health is now good,—my spirits cheerful, and my
mental powers, clearer and more vigorous than ever before.  I can
now walk  fast without a pain in my side—my eye sight is now very
good; and I have no head-ache  excepting occasionally, in a slight
degree when I over-eat.
   In short, I am free from complaints, and am  able to pursue my
employment, with strength and ease; and I now enjoy myself, and
family, and friends.
   With sentiments of  most  sincere respect and gratitude, I pre-
sent you with this simple but  accurate  statement, hoping that it
may not  only afford you much  satisfaction in knowing that  you
have  been instrumental in promoting the welfare and happiness of
a fellow creature,  but  also that it may serve, in your hands, as an
evidence  of the truth of the important doctrines which you teach.
          Very Respectfully Yours,
                                ROSWELL N.  WHITE.
                          [NO. X.]

                           New-York, January 17th, 1833.
  Mr. Graham,
              gIR—Agreeably to  your request, that those who
had been benefitted by adopting your System of diet,  would hand
you a communication to that effect, I shall  endeavor to make a
brief statement of my own case.
  For seven years, I had been afflicted with the Jaundice; and to
you, who no doubt are acquainted with this disease, 1 need not en-
ter into a description of the distressing head-aches,  back-aches,
and various other aches, which are attendant upon this complaint.
Suffice it to say, I had it severely; the complaint was seated; and
my physician, a man who stands among the highest in his profes-
sion, candidly told me,  that medicine would  not remove it.   Still,
I was continually trying every new  thing  I  heard recommended,
for I was indeed leading a miserable existence, "dragging at every
step a lengthening chain;"  but it was to no effect.  I experienced
no relief, until I was induced by a friend to  attend  your course of
lectures last winter.   Being convinced  there was truth in what
you said, I was resolved to try  if J could not be benefitted by fol-
lowing your advice. From that time I have  thrown aside all med-
icines, tea and coffee, pastry, warm bread, meat, and various other
articles of which you disapprove; and  I  have in consequence
thrown aside the Jaundice, and all  disagreeable symptoms attend- 
35
ing it.   I  feel as if my  youth was  renewed.  And what is the
sacrifice at which 1  have obtained all this amount of good?  A
mere momentary gratification, not worth naming.   To be sure, I
am obliged to endure the laugh and ridicule of many of my friends,
and by others 1  am called an  enthusiast;  but all  these things
move me not.   I am the one to laugh.  But I do not  laugh—I
pity.   I remember the days of my own ignorance.  My  prevailng
feeling is gratitude  to you,  and to the great First Cause of all be-
nevolent effort, the great and good  Being who first inspired you
with the wish of benefitting mankind.
   I am aware you  have  many enemies; you  have also  many
friends, and among them none more grateful, than
                                      ELIZA G. HUNT.
                         [NO. XL]

                           New-York, January 27th, 1833.
  Mr. Graham,
              Sir—It is with pleasure and gratitude that 1 com-
municate to you the following information concerning the effect of
your Lectures on myself and family.   I am now about forty years
old, and during the  last half of my life, my health has been very
poor.   1 have been habitually and inveterately costive, and suf-
fered a great deal from distressing dizziness in the head, causing
vomiting, sometimes every day, for five or six years.
   For a considerable number of years past, I have been troubled
with many symptoms of consumption: such as weakness of the
lungs, hoarseness, cough, and raising from the lungs a great deal
of bad matter.  I have also suffered much  from billious habits;
and my liver has  been considerably affected.  Besides all this,  I
have been subject to severe rheumatic pains in my head and limbs;
and sometimes so intensely severe in  my lower limbs, as to cause
my shin-bones to bend, and become  as crooked  as my elbow.—
 Seven years ago I was under treatment, by Dr. Y., for consump-
 tion, but received very little benefit.   The same physician, when
 my liver was  affected, advised me to diet myself on bread and
"milk; but I received no just notions of the importance  of a cor-
 rect regimen.  For seven years past, I have taken emetics once a
 month, and cathartics twice a week.  I  have been  exceedingly
 feeble, and felt unable to attend  to any business at all.   For five
 years past, my eye-sight has been very poor indeed, and at times,
 so bad, that I was  unable to endure any continued application  of
 my sight to any object.
    Such were the complicated disorders of my feeble body, when
 I was induced by a friend to put myself on what is popularly called
 " the Graham System," about the first of June, 1832.  In a very 
36
  short time my health began to improve.  My costiveness was re-
  moved, and my bowels became regular: the dizziness of my head
  left me; my lungs became  stronger; the hoarseness disappeared;
  and my health and strength generally improved.  I soon  became
  able to  attend to my business through the day without fatigue, and
  was relieved from all my aches and pains.   I used  to be troubled
  much with deafness; but now  I have nothing of it; and my sight
  has continued to  improve ever since I adopted  my present regi-
  men.   I have scarcely taken a dose of medicine since I have lived
  on the System.   On the whole, my health is every  way much im-
  proved, and continues to improve.
   My wife has, from her childhood, been rather feeble, until she
  was eighteen years old, when her health became much poorer and
  continued so till she was twenty-three years of age.   After that, it
  was various,—sometimes a little better, sometimes much worse,—
  till she was twenty-seven.  On every  occasion  Of  exposure, she
  was sure to take cold, and this was always attended with a violent
  and distressing cough.   She had almost constantly a severe pain
  and soreness in her side,—soreness and pain in the chest,—and
  was very weak and languid.  She was  also troubled a great deal
 with soreness and pain across the small of her back.  Her appe-
 tite was  very capricious and unstable; sometimes very craving, and
 sometimes none at all.  She lost her mother, and  two brothers,
 and two sisters, with the consumption, within seven  years; two of
 whom have died within the last three years.   In February, 1832,
 she was  induced to adopt the Graham System, pretty strictly.  Her
 health began, almost  immediately, to improve.  She grew strong-
 er;—her appetite became uniform and good. She  has taken no
 cold,  though equally or even more exposed.   Her cough has left
 her; her soreness and pain in  the side and chest are gone, save,
 very rarely,  slight symptoms of the old complaint  in the side,
 which, however, soon pass  off; and  she is in all respects quite
 healthy.
   She is the mother of two children.   Previous to the birth of the
 first, she was very feeble; and for two months before her confine-
 ment, she was not able to do any kind of work, and scarcely able
 to walk across the room.   Previous to the birth of her second child,
 (since  she has lived on the Graham System,)  her health was fine.
 She was  able to be about,  and attend to her own household affairs,
 with great ease and comfort,  till the very last day before her con-
 finement.  Her sufferings  were twelve  hours longer,  and rriuch
 more severe, at the former  birth, than at the last; and in three
 weeks  after the birth of her last child, she was able to dismiss her
 nurse, and to be about and  attend to all her  domestic concerns;
 whereas  she was obliged, before, to keep extra help all the time.
 Her last  child, now four months old, is  remarkably  healthy,  and
has not had a sick moment, nor cried from pain or  uneasiness, since
its birth.   And my wife says she feels perfectly able to do her own
work, washing and all. 
37
  My little daughter about eleven years old has from her infancy
been very delicate and feeble.   Her  health has improved aston-
ishingly on the Graham System.   We all spent the cholera sea-
son in the city, and our  neighborhood was  very  sickly.  The
cholera was  all around us, and the people died on every  side of
us.  One man  died next door, so  near to us, that I could reach
my hand out of my window into his room, and the offensive smell
of his body after death, came in and scented our house ;   and yet
we none of us had anything of the disease.
   I have  two  apprentices;—the elder one lived on the Graham
System through the  worst of the cholera season, without the least
indisposition.  He then went into the country, where he spent
two weeks, and lived quite freely on animal food, pies,  cakes, &c.
and returned to the city and took the cholera immediately, and
had three doctors  to keep him alive.  My other apprentice has
improved  in health  very much indeed, since he has lived on the
Graham System, and  has become quite fleshy.  He  spent the
summer in town, and  enjoyed excellent health, and.  had not a
symptom of the cholera.
                      Very gratefully yours,
                                 EDMUND VAN  YORK.
                         [NO. XII.]

                           New-York, February 1st, 1833.
  Mr.  Graham,
              Dear  Sir—I ought  long since to have communi-
cated to you what I am now about to state, and I have continually
been haunted with a sense of my injustice to you in neglecting it.
  In 1828, I took up  my residence in the  city of New-York, in
<rood health; having left a country life for  that of a city.   The
only sickness I then  knew, or  had to encounter with fortitude,
was that of  the head-ache, which at times was very severe;  so
much so, indeed, as to cause me, during some of its paroxysms, to
care but very little whether I lived  or died.  This pain  in the
head, I had been subject to, ever since my  earliest recollection;
and I am confident of my correctness in saying, that I have had it
on an average, moie than twenty-five times a year, for twenty-sev-
en  years of my life.
  For  the first two years,after I became a resident in the  city, I
ate flesh quite freely, as I boarded at  a house where it was served
up  at  every  meal; besides, I was   extremely fond  of gravy,
which  I used plentifully, I assure  you.  I also ate pudding,  pies,
&c, drank tea and coffee, and smoked a  plenty of cigars; but
never  chewed tobacco.
                             D 
38
   The consequence of all this was, that I began to be dyspeptic;
 and as I became more so, I resorted to the remedies, recommend-
 ed by  various persons, as well as those prescribed by the  physic-
 ians whom I consulted, to remove this tormenting disease.   I felt
 a continual pressure at my stomach, and a weakness daily increas-
 ing.   One advised me to carry cassia in my pocket, and every now
 and then, eat a little of it,  and that would cure me.  Another,
 a Druggist, advised me to use the dyspeptic bitters, for an infalli-
 ble cure.   (And by the way, let me here remark, that at this time,
 I was  every now and then obliged to take medicine, and often, to
 go to bed for a day or two.)  The third  person, a physician, ad-
 vised me to keep a bottle of dissolved epsom salts, and  every morn-
 ing to  take a moderate dose, when I felt a pressure in the  head
 and stomach, and  it would relieve  me.  The fourth said,  use a
 plenty of mustard on your  meat.  The fifth said, drink brandy and
 water  with your dinner, that will assist digestion. The sixth said,
 you must  eat no flesh at all.   Another said, you must eat  no veg-
 etables.   Another  said, do not take so much food. Another said,
 eat more—stuff yourself  full, and that will cure you.  Another
 said, use a plenty of cayenne pepper, horse radish, &c. with your
 food.  And thus prescriptions, too numerous to mention here, and
 of a diverse  and  contradictory character, were  multiplied  upon
 me.  Suffice it, however, to say, that all  these did not effect the
 cure, and I continually grew worse.
   In August, 1831, I had become so very much  reduced in health
 and strength, that  I went into the country, and remained there
 about a month, during whbh time 1 ate  nothing but vegetables,
 and improved so much, that  I returned, as I supposed, in perfect
 health, and resumed my old method of living ; which, however, I
 did not long pursue, before all my dyspeptic difficulties came  back
 upon me,  as  bad as ever; and  I continued to  be tormented with
 them, with increasing severity, till I heard your Lectures.   Pre-
 vious to my taking tickets for your course, however, 1 had some
 warm debates concerning your System, with three or four of my
 fellow-boarders, who had attended your first course in the fall of
 1831.  They were convinced of the correctness of your doctrines,
 and defended them earnestly.   I heard, what I  then considered
 their nonsense, with a great degree of disgust.   What! said  I, do
 you think mankind have lived five thousand years, and have not
 before this found out how to live?  Do you think that the wisdom
 and experience of all past ages, are  now to be set at nought by
 this Mr Graham 1   Nonsense! nonsense !  Depend upon it,  he is
 humbugging you!   Can you suppose it possible  that  all the wise
 philosophers and learned physicians of past times have  lived and
 died in ignorance of what diet was best for man, and that Mr  Gra-
 ham is the first to  make the mighty discovery ?  Pshaw! this is
 outrageous humbugging !  You may go without  your  coffee, and
 tea, and flesh, and  I will use them, and we will see who is the
wiser for it. 
39
   Nevertheless, with all my prejudice against your System, I was
 at length, prevailed on  by my friends,  to  go and hear what you
 had to say for yourself.   I  commenced with your second course,
 at the close of 1831, and gave the utmost  attention to your argu-
 ments, and during the first Lecture I found my opposition  so
 shaken, that I was unable to bring  into existence  one argument
 to gainsay what you advanced.   I continued to be more and more
 convinced by the  successive Lectures, till  I became a complete
 convert to  your doctrines,  and began  to advocate your System
 with as much zeal, and as openly and fearlessly, as  I had ever
 opposed it.  Yes,  far more so!  Nor did I only advocate:—I prac-
 tised, also, strictly.                  y.
   On the first of May, 1832, I left  of     - coffee, tea, flesh, all
 kinds of spices, peppers, mustard,xj;     v  and the  like;  and in
 a great measure dispensed Avith alfipS    -i  pastry, and discarded
 entirely, alcoholic liquc   A every .-»nd, and  even went beyond
 your instructions and 1ait the use of salt, except what was in the
 little butter I used.  1 have not taken any salt upon my plate, nor
 put it upon my food  for the last nine months.
   Now let  me tell you what I use  for food.  Most generally for
 my breakfast and supper, I have eaten rice and milk,  hominy, and
 samp and milk, &c.   For my djinner I  have eaten Graham bread,
 potatoes,  turnips,  squashes,  beans, cabbage,  &c.   My bread I
 generally  use when it is two Or three days old, because I know it
 is most healthy so.   I never use cheese, as it does not agree with
 me.
   Almost  as soon  as I commenced living  on  your  system, my
 health began to improve, and I continued to grow better very fast,
 until all my symptoms and ailments  left me, and I was restored to
 good health ; and since  then I have  enjoyed  the most  perfect, un-
 interrupted health, to the present moment; and in no one instance
 have I felt the slightest  indisposition, that I could not trace imme-
 diately to  the violation of your rules.
   Dyspepsia has  long  since left me;  but  not without leaving a
 deep and lasting impression upon my mind.  I  had  been tortured
 with it for more than three years; and had concluded that I must
 quit business, and return to the country and  get ready to die. My
 body being continually diseased, my mind became extremely mel-
 ancholy, and every thing  looked  gloomy around me.  When I
 sat down,  I had no energy or resolution to  get  up;  and when I
 retired at  night, my eyes refused to  sleep;  and if I  slept, I would
 wake in the morning, shivering  in a cold sweat, even  in July,
 when the thermometer indicated a temperature of ninety degrees.
 My memory was short and unfaithful—my nerves extremely weak
 and irritable—my vision dim and confused—and in fact, my whole
 system seemed completely disordered, both in body and mind.
   I have all my life time been accustomed to the head-ache, as I
have before mentioned,  and  have till very recently supposed, that
it was constitutional and necessary; and as my mother was subject 
40
to it, I believed that I had inherited  it from her, and that  I could
no more get rid of it, than I could live without breathing.  But,
sir, let me assure you that your theory put into practice, has whol-
ly removed this difficulty.   I  have never been free from a severe
turn of the head-ache  as often  as  once in a month, for  the last
twenty-seven years of my life, up to the first of May, 1832. Since
that time, now nine months, I have felt it two or three times, in a
very moderate manner;  but when I did, I could always trace it to
imprudence in  eating; and to effect a cure, I always used with
complete success, your  remedy, cold water, instead of tea; and
as soon as my stomach was relieved from its oppression, my head
was well  and I in good, health.
  I am now fully convinced that the head-ache seldom occurs, in
any one,  except from the abuses of the stomach.  Indeed, I have
looked around me and back upon my past life, to find some traces
of a disease, that did  not arise from the abuse of the stomach, and
I confess, there is none within the scope of my view or limits of
my knowledge, except those which arise from external violence.
  I have had  no occasion to use medicine  of  any kind, since  I
adopted your mode of living, other than cold water,  which  I use in
all cases, whenever I feel the least indisposition; and alwaya with
the most perfect success.              \                  f
   During the cholera, last July and August, when thousands were
afraid to eat vegetables, and some dared not eat even bread, lest
it should give them  the  disease,  nor even dared they drink cold
water; yet I, amidst all this quackery and infatuation, continued
to eat nothing but bread and milk and vegetables,  and drink cold
water, without  feeling or fearing a  symptom of that  disease, or
any other.   I  would fearlessly have slept in a house where  there
were a thousand cholera patients, if [ could only have fresh air.
   I fear that I have  exhausted your patience by the length of my
communication, and  I will,therefore close, by craving your pardon
for having so long delayed this  acknowledgment of the inestima-
ble advantages I have derived from attending your  Lectures.
   Please accept, sir, this statement, imperfect as it is, as a cordial
tribute of respect and gratitude, from him who is, and I trust ever
 will be,
        Your very humble, sincere, and devoted servant,
                                          TEMPLE  FAY.
                         [NO. XIII.]

                          New-York, February 11th, 1833.
  Dear Sir—From infancy until 1 attained to my sixteenth year,
1 was subject to a great deal of sickness.   In the course of that
time, I had several very severe attacks; and once or  twice was 
41
given over by the physicians.   Between my fifteenth and sixteenth
years of age, I was attacked with a very severe disease of the hip.
On the 16th day of August, 1822, a physician was called in, who
took a considerable quantity of blood from me, and 1 was put un-
der a regular course of medicine.  It was very warm weather, and
I took powders  every  two hours, for several weeks.  Under this
treatment, I grew very weak;  while the disease  appeared  to in-
crease in strength.   I was now reduced so low, as not to be able
to help myself in the least; and my parents were given to under-
stand, by the physician, that I was past all hope  of recovery.  I
had ten ulcers below the  knee—all running at this time—occa-
sioned by some ointment, applied by the physician.   I lay  in this
state for several months, in the most excruciating pain and misery
that any human  being could possibly suffer.   I often wished for.
death to free me from my troubles.  The  Doctor appearing to be
baffled with the disease, and my parents, wishing to relieve me  in
any way they possibly could,  procured every thing that was re-
commended by my  friends, who called to see me.   Of course, for
sometime I was a complete depository for  every thing in the shape
of poison, that they could possibly get.  I took a great quantity  of
fourth  proof brandy and horse-radish; likewise poke-berries and
gin; with a variety of other drinks, of the  same kind.  As I grew
worse and worse every day,  if possible,  I came to  a resolution
(weak as  I was) to abstain from taking any kind of medicine; and
used electricity.   I now grew strong very fast; and in the course
of a few weeks,  I  could walk about the room; and in two months
from the time I refused medicine, and took  nourishing food, I walk-
ed out in the street on crutches.  About this time, which was ten
months from the time I was first taken, I was strongly importuned
to go to Connecticut, to a celebrated Dr. Sweet.  I accordingly
went, and was operated on; and I think he did me some good.  A
short time after  returning from thence, my hip,  and likewise my
arm, began to swell, and became very painful; and I soon had four
large ulcers on my  hip, and three on my arm, which discharged a
number of small pieces of bone.   I was now advised to put myself
under the charge of a Root Doctor, who had met with great suc-
cess in such cases, as I was told.  I left the city for his dwelling,
 in Westchester  County, and resided with him five months, when I
 returned, but very  little improved in health.   I continued his prac-
tice for some time after I returned;  but  grew  no better.   I then
commenced taking Swaim's Panacea; and continued until  I had
taken, as near as I can recollect, nine bottles.  I was then advised
to try Potter's Catholicon; and I persevered  in this until  I had
taken thirteen bottles; but I grew no better.   At this time I was
 able to go out occasionally, though part of the time sick and con-
 fined to the house.   In reading a book one day,  I was struck with
a passage I saw, stating that dieting was the best medicine for any
 disease, and recommending some few things that struck me as be-
 ing exactly what I ought to do, to obtain  health.  I immediately 
42
 commenced living on bakers' bread and molasses, and continued
 for twelve months,  occasionally taking a small quantity of animal
 food.  I abandoned the use of tea, but continued coffee; and im-
 proved very much in health, strength,  and countenance.  I now
 began to hope I should be able to enjoy myself, for a few years, in
 comparative health.  About this time,  I heard your first  course of
 Lectures at Clinton Hall;  and partially adopted the mode recom-
 mended  by you.  I abandoned the use  of animal food, altogether,
 and improved very  fast; although I still continued the use of cof-
 fee.  I  had been  gradually improving, until about nine months
 since, when I totally gave up the use of coffee,  which I  had used
 to great excess; and I have really been astonished to find  myself
 so much improved, in so short a time.   My  appetite is  so  much
, improved, that I have the greatest  care to keep from eating more
 than I ought: in fact,  I have to allowance myself, to keep within
 bounds.   I am now in a great deal better state of health  than any
 of my friends  ever expected to see  me; although I think there is
 great room for improvement, yet.  I have bathed  in cold water,
 winter and summer, for two years, in the morning; and I find great
 benefit from it.  In fact, I find the nearer I  approach to  the rules
 you have laid down, I can assure  you, I experience the greater
 benefit in so doing.   I  live in hopes of spending many happy years
 in the earth, yet; and shall always remember, with a heart full of
 gratitude, the lessons of truth I have heard in Clinton Hall.
   I respectfully remain
                       Your sincere friend,
   Mr. S.  Graham.                          W. DOANE.
                         [NO. XIV.]

                          New-York, February  16th, 1833.
  Mr. Graham,
              Sir—I?am a native of Glasgow, in Scotland.  By
vocation, I am an Engineer.  For sometime before I left my na-
tive country, my health was very poor ;—I was habitually costive,
and very subject to the head-ache, and was obliged to take a great
deal of medicine: often had to take an emetic, and more frequently
acathartuv As my health continued to decline, it was thought ad-
visable for me  to cross the Atlantic, for the  benefit of a sea voy-
age and a change of climate.   I accordingly embarked for Amer-
ica  in the autumn of 1831, and  arrived in New-York in the month
of November of that season.  During the voyage, my health was
very miserable.  I was  tormented  with a  continual head-ache,
and was extremely weak; and was obliged to take, on an average,
four hygean pills a day, as aperients, but experienced no improve-
ment of my health.   After landing in America, I found myself in
no respect better than I was at  home, but in some things worse. I 
43
became very billious:—my costiveness and head-ache continued
extremely severe and inveterate, and  1 was  obliged to take rhu-
barb pills, daily, to procure a motion of my bowels. My sleep was
broken, unsound, and unrefreshing, and I continued to be exceed-
ingly weak and very irritable.   As often  as once a month, or  six
weeks, I was severly affected with the diarrhoea, which hung on
a week or ten days, and was excessively debilitating.  The winter
after my arrival in this  country, I spent in Brooklyn,  on Long-Is-
land, and  in the  spring of 1832, I  came into New-York city, in
wretched health of body and mind;—my  spirits were dreadfully
depressed, and I was continually tormented with morbid cautious-
ness, and haunted with indefinite fear and dread.  My sufferings
were very great, and I  tried every  means I  knew of, to procure
relief, but nothing seemed to benefit me.
   In April 1832, I commenced attending your  Lectures at Clin-
ton Hall, and very soon after began to live according to  yeur di-
etetic rules for invalids.  In a very short time, my costiveness, di-
arrhoea,  head-ache,  nervous irritability, mental depression, &c.
&c. all left  me entirely, and in a  few weeks my health became
very fine.
   Before adopting this system of living,  I was not able to apply
my mind at all:  but in less than eight weeks, I  could sit down at
evening or any other time, and  draw, or do any thing else that I
wished to, with a clear and composed mind.
   During the summer of 1832, I boarded at No. 24  Wat-street,
near  Varick.   Through the whole season, my  health was excel-
lent:  without the interruption of an hour's illness: and without an
occasion for a  single dose of medicine.  While the  cholera  pre-
vailed in the city there was much of that dreadful disease, in the
neighborhood where I lived:  and much of it at Hoboken, where I
was employed in the construction of locomotives for a rail way,(for
Robert Stevens.)  Most of the  other workmen, in the company,
were, at one time, or another, sick with diarrhoea, cholera, &.c.
   The people in the house where I boarded, were constantly com-
plaining and sick; but through the whole season I remained per-
fectly well, and had not the least indisposition, nor need of a par-
ticle of medicine.  During the sickness, I lived entirely on Gra-
ham bread and water, and occasionally fruit.  I increased much
in strength,  and  became quite vigorous, and  able to perform much
more labor without fatigue.
   Formerly, in  Scotland, I used  to  take a cold on  every slight
exposure; and if I walked even a short distance about town, my
feet would blister  badly:—now I never take a cold, nor have my
feet blister nor become sore, though I walk ever so far.
   Having recovered  my health so perfectly, and living in the en-
joyment of the best  of spirits, I am  now about to return to "my
own—my native land," where I hope, by teaching, and by exem-
plifying the excellencies of your doctrines, to be the means of re-
lieving many of my afflicted kindred and friends, from those  dis- 
                             44

eases, under which they have  long suffered.  And would to
Heaven, that you, sir, could go with me to  that mother-land, to
teach that other portion of the erring world, the way of salvation,
from  the  thousand  ills that flesh is heir to,  by reason of the
bodily depravities of the human race.
  Though a  stranger to you, and  a stranger  in your country,
yet I feel an acquaintance with you,  which I could not easily for-
get—and  would not, if I could; and therefore  my feelings would
not suffer  me to leave this interesting country, where  I have been
so greatly benefitted, without making to  you, an acknowledgment
of those benefits, and expressing the fervent sentiments of grati-
tude  and esteem which I  cherish towards you.   Nor do  I leave
your  country with  the feelings of an alien, but rather  with the
spirit of adoption, which induces me to believe, that I  shall sooner
or later, return to make this western world my  home.
  May  health, and happiness, and increasing success  be yours.
                          Farewell,
                                  JAMES WHITELAW.
                          [NO. XV.]

                          New-York, February 19th, 1833.
  Mr. Graham,
             Sir—It is with much satisfaction and fervent grat-
tude that I communicate to you, the following information con-
cerning the effects  of your System of diet  on my health:  and  I
sincerely hope, that this testimony  may be in  your hands, the
means of good to others, who are suffering as I have suffered.
  My health, from childhood,  was very delicate,  and became
more  and more so as I  grew up.  Indeed, I never  knew what it
was to enjoy health before I commenced living on  your System.
For  twenty-four years past, I have been very  feeble.  In  the
morning, especially, I  have felt so languid  and weak, that I did
not feel able to make any exertions; and could only walk a very
short  distance without  being fatigued  and exhausted.   A severe
head-ache  continually  afflicted  me; and this was  accompanied
with  violent  and almost blinding distress in my eyes.   My sight
was so much  afflicted at times, that I could scarcely see to sew at
all.   My body was habitually and exceedingly constipated, re-
quiring the frequent use of cathartic  medicine.   Several other
difficulties, of a  very distressing nature, afflicted me dreadfully.
With this  congregation of disorders upon me, I  led a most un-
comfortable life, from about the age of eighteen, till I was forty
years old:  most of which time, I was to a greater or less extent, a
subject of  medical  treatment, and  endured  a  very  great deal of
misery.  From the age of forty to forty-two, my health was ex- 
45
tremely wretched.   I was so feeble that I was obliged to be car-
ried wherever I went.  My  appetite was very poor and irregular.
I had seldom any inclination to eat in the morning or evening; but
at noon I had generally  a better appetite for my food.   I  was in
the habit of drinking coffee pretty freely and  pretty strong.   I
never cared much for tea.
   It is now more than a year since I adopted the mode of living
and system of diet, which you teach in your lectures, as applica-
ble to  invalids.  For about four weeks  after I commenced this
system of living, my wretchedness was  beyond all description.
My whole system  unstrung, and falling to  pieces;   the most in-
tolerable  faintness, and  sinking, and lassitude, and undefinable
distress, and  depression  of spirits seemed but the harbingers of
 approaching,  and inevitable, and speedy dissolution.   My  friends
 all declared that I was destroying my life and  continually  remon-
 strated against the course which 1 was pursuing.   And  I confess,
 that my dreadful distress and their importunities, often shook my
 resolution: and I was more than once, on the point of giving up
 my new regimen.   Yet, I thought to myself, shall  I prove faint-
 hearted ?  Shall I throw down my cross before I have fairly tried
 its virtues ?   No 1  I  will persevere a little  farther at least.   At
 length my distress left me as a dark cloud passes frpm the face of
 the sun, and the change in  my feelings was truly astonishing!  I
 have often told my friends that the change in my body  was  as
 great as it was in my soul when I was converted to the Lord. All
 my complaints began to  leave me.   My  constipation, head-ache,
 distress of my eyes, poorness of sight, and other  more grievous
 difficulties, all began to  forsake  me, and  my  strength  increased
 with  wonderful rapidity. /»My sleep, which until now, had always
 been miserable, became sbund, sweet and refreshing.
    I soon found myself  wholly  relieved from  all  my complaints,
  and began to enjoy a degree of health, which I had ever before
' been a stranger to.  In a few weeks I was able to  walk a consid-
  erable distance with a firm and steady step;  and in less than six
  months after I adopted my new regimen, 1 walked four miles  be-
  fore breakfast, without  fatigue—took my breakfast with a good
  appetite,  and went to work about my house,  without any  sense of
  weariness.   Formerly,  I used to take a cold on the slightest  ex-
  posure;  now I never take a cold. I used to be under the necessi-
  ty of faking medicine  very often; now I take none  and need
  none.  My  sight has become  perfectly good.
    During the prevalence of the cholera, our  family, all except
  myself,  had more or less of that dreadful disease.   Through .the
  whole season, I had not the slightest indisposition.  But  what, in
  all probability, would have been my case, if that awful epidemic
  had found me in  that condition of body, in which I was,  before I
  adopted your system of living ? I verily believed that but for you,
  I should not now be among the living on earth.  But  blessed be
  God!—I am not  only living, but well! I have scarcely known an
/ 
46
hour's indisposition during the  past year:  and no one enjoys life
better than I now do.  Even  my  religion  is sweeter and  more
consoling, and full  of peace and  joy in the Holy Spirit.   None of
my former despondency and gloom now remain to darken scenes
of life and obscure the Heavenly prospects of eternity.
  Indeed, as I  have said before, the  change in my body and my
mind  is almost  incredible.   I feel a lively sense of gratitude to
God, that  he has made you instrumental of so much good to me ;
and I must add, that I cannot easily express my feelings to you, as
that instrument of  Heaven's benefaction.
  I pray God, that the greatest success may attend your labors of
philanthropy, and you  may receive many such testimonials as this,
to afford you the rich satisfaction of knowing how  much misery
you have  been the means of removing, and how many  of your
suffering fellow mortals  you have been instrumental in restoring
to health and the enjoyment of life.
  It may still  farther serve  your purposes of benevolence, to be
informed that my eldest daughter, who  has been married  about
two years, became  afflicted before her marriage, with some of her
mother's most troublesome complaints, and continued to be  so till
she adopted your  system  of living, about  the time I did; after
which she was soon entirely relieved, and has in other  respects
experienced a great improvement of her health.
  I am now healthy,  active and strong, and able to attend  to the
domestic affairs of  my family with great ease, comfort and cheer-
fulness.
                  Very gratefully yours,
                                        H. WHEELER.
                          [NO. XVI.]

                          New-York, February 19th, 1S33.
  Mr. Graham,
              Sir—With a deep, and I trust permanent sense of
gratitude for the instruction and benefit which I have received
from your interesting and  valuable Lectures, I  cheerfully give
you a statement of my own case, in relation to your philanthropic
labors in this city.
  From my childhood,  my health was considered rather delicate.
At thirteen years of  age, I  was  afflicted with  inflammatory rheu-
matism for six months, so severely that I was not able to leave my
room.  After recovering from this complaint, my health continued
delicate, and I was  exceedingly nervous.   In July,  1828,  I  be-
gan to be much  more unwell; and grew worse very fast.   I  be-
gan  to experience great difficulty in breathing;  and to be very
much distressed with palpitations of the heart.  My sleep became 
47
very unsound and broken, and my nights were so restless that  I
was obliged to get up and walk my room every night.  To relieve
me from the dreadful sinking turns which I often felt, I was advised
by my physician  (Dr. C----)  to take cordials and stimulants,
and I soon  felt that they were indispensably necessary, and that I
could not live without them.  Our family physician, a man of much
experience and reputation, whom we all regard with great respect
and esteem, informed  me that  my complaint was dyspepsia; but
he told my mother that it was an  organic  affection of the  heart,
and there was no hope for me but in my youth.
   I had become so  extremely nervous, that the very idea of going
out, or of  seeing company, completely overcame me.   I conse-
quently seldom went out at all; but kept myself secluded, in the
most cheerless and  excessive melancholy, while  at the same time
I suffered all but death, and  I often thought even more than death,
from the most excruciating and distracting  head-ache.   In the
summer of 1829, I  went,  by the advice of my physicians,  to the
sea-shore on Long Island.   Contrary to expectation, however, the
situation did not agree with me at all: the air and every thing else
seemed to have a most unhappy effect  on my health :  and I be-
came so much woise, that my friends  thought they would  hardly
be able to get me home alive.  Indeed, I  was exttemely reduced.
 On returning to the city, my health improved a little:  but  I lin-
 gered on in great  misery.  A dreadful sick  head-ache afflicted
 me beyond measure, two or three times a week, for which I was
 ordered to take a powerful  dose of billious:medicine, as often as
 once in two or three  months ; this seemed to afford a temporary
 relief, but it was very short.  I was advised to use the white mus-
 tard seed to overcome inveterate constipation of body.   The mus-
 tard seed seemed to have a happy effect for a while, and I  took a
 great deal of it; but it soon lost its effect entirely.   I continually
 endured the most intolerable languor and despondency.   My phy-
 sicians gave me a great deal of mercury and other medicine of dif-
 ferent kinds:  sometimes to reduce me and sometimes  to stimu-
 late: tonics were administered in abundance.
   At  times, ray physicians thought that my lungs were affected:
 but  they gave me very little satisfactory information, as  to the na-
 ture of my complaint.  They blistered me, and  rubbed me with
 mercurial  ointment, and said that  if  I did  not get relief soon I
 should run into the consumption.  They told me I must be care-
 ful as to the quantity of my diet, but gave me no other instruction
 concerning the quality, than that I must take such  as I found  to
 agree with me. They said nothing against tea and  coffee, which
 I was fond of, and had indulged in from  my childhood.   I now,
 however, very well recollect "that after  drinking my  coffee, my
 sight used to be dreadfully affected;  so  that I would  see things
 shockingly distorted, and  sometimes by  halves; and then would
 follow my excruciating head-ache. 
48
  With all the advice and medicine of my physicians, I grew  no
better, but continued to drag out an unspeakably miserable exis-
tence;—suffering at times the most awful distress, from  difficulty
of breathing: and feeling in some of my  paroxyms as  though I
should actually suffocate.  These dreadful turns were  attended
with violent palpitations of the heart, and the most  acute and se-
vere  pains shooting through my breast, like  the  piercing of a
knife.   And with all,  I was subject to bleeding excessively at the
nose.
  My mind had become so  much  affected, that  at times, I was
not  able to command my  thoughts: sometimes  I could not call
things by  their  right names; and was often unable to  tell what
I wanted,—though I knew the  things, but could not express my-
self as I wished to.   This was very  distressing.   So 1 endured
a living death for three long, comfortless years.
  Hearing of your  Lectures in Mulberry-street last winter, and
residing but a short distance  from the place, I determined',—weak
and wretched as I was, to  go and  see  if I could not find some-
thing applicable to my own case: but I did not think I should  be
able  to sit through a  whole  Lecture.   I  however, became  so
deeply interested in  the subject, that I  was unconscious  for the
time of my bodily infirmities and distress, and heard the  whole
Lecture, and since that time, 1 have continued to attend all your
Lectures in the city.  When 1 commenced attending your Lec-
tures, I also began by degrees  to adopt your system of diet.   I
left off my coffee and tea the  next day, and commenced  eating
the Graham bread;  and continued  to be more  and more  strict,
until I got onto  a pretty plain and simple regimen.  After about
a month I began to  perceive  a decided  improvement  in my
health; and at the end of two months, my  head-ache was  almost
entirely gone,—the palpitations of my heart had nearly left me;
and in every respect my health  was much better, and continued to
improve, to the utter astonishment of my friends, physicians, pas-
tor and all that know me.  I became  healthy, fleshy and rosy;—
so that that they called me a picture of health:—and I have  con-
tinued to enjoy excellent health, to the present time.  Indeed, I
am  a  new creature, in  health, spirits and every  thing.   I am
cheerful and even buoyant, and enjoy life very much.
  My older sister, Mary  L., though what is generally considered
healthy and of good constitution, yet from her childhood, she had
always been afflicted with weak and  watery eyes;  and had also
been subject to  frequent and sometimes  very severe billious at-
tacks,—sickness of the stomach,—dizziness of the head,  &c. For
her weak eyes,  our family physician had prescribed  an eye-water,
with which she used to wash  her eyes, and from which she  receiv-
ed a momentary relief, but no  permanent benefit.   She  attended
the  Lectures with me, and we commenced the Graham System to-
gether, and pursued it together, hand in hand.   Her health, also,
improved exceedingly.  Her eyes became much better, and her 
49
bilious complaints and  other ailments left her entirely.  So we
went on together, pleasantly and prosperously, for three or four
months;  when my sister, in the latter part of June last,  went out
to sit up  with the corpse of  a deceased friend, and was  then pre-
vailed  on to take a cup of green tea.  This revived her  old appe-
tite, and when she came to the breakfast table, the next  morning,
she told what she had done, and said the tea tasted so good that
she must have some more with her breakfast.  I expostulated and
entreated in vain.   She said her resolution was  overcome by the
tea she had drank the  night before, and she could not deny her-
self.  In spite of all I could say, she took her tea with her break-
fast,—and, as a matter of course, she soon began to take her cof-
fee again; and in a very short time, she was drinking her tea and
coffee again, freely and very strong;—and so she retrograded, till
she got back to all her former habits and indulgences.   I remon-
strated, with all my power,  at every step; but it was in vain!  she
would not believe me, nor desist, but continued  on  till the 28th of
July, in  the midst of the cholera season, when she was taken with
vomiting violently, and threV up every  thing she took  into her
stomach, for three days in succession,—during the whole of which
time, she said she felt  no  sickness at the stomach, at all.   Her
physicians ordered brown stout, port wine, Madeira wine, brandy,
laudanum, peppermint, cinnamon, &c &c.  to settle her stomach.
 We also, according to their prescription, rubbed her all  over very
freely with mercurial ointment, and gave her a  large pill of mer-
cury every two hours.   On  the third day, at one o'clock, the doc-
tor bled her;  and at three o'clock, the same day, she rapidly grew
worse, and before we could get the physician in, she was in what
 he pronounced a collapsed  state of the  cholera;  and it was with
the greatest difficulty that she was raised from it.  During the
whole of her sickness, 1 stood over her, and was constantly nurs-
 ing her,—administering medicine,—rubbing her body,  &c.—and
 several times, while she was in the  collapsed state, she desired me
 to kiss her; I did so,  knowing her condition,—and, without any
 fear, suffered her to kiss me in my mouth, a number of times.
 Yet neither then,  nor  at any time,  did I have the slightest touch
 or symptom of cholera.
   About the middle of August last, I went again to the  sea-shore
 on Long-Island,  where I before had become so much worse,  and
 at my second visit I found an entirely different effect produced on
 me.  The air was very salubrious,  and my health continued to im-
 prove.
   Since my sister recovered from the cholera, her health has been
 very poor indeed.  Her constitution seems to have been much im-
 paired, either by the disease or the treatment, or both; and yet
 she has  not resolution sufficient to get back on to the Graham Sys-
 tem,—notwithstanding  she sees me as one raised  from the dead,
 and enjoying the best of health,—a living example and  preacher
 of the benefits of that System.   She is now constantly taking med-
                             E 
50
icine—has a great  many  unpleasant  symptoms about her—and
fears she shall die of the consumption, before a great while.
  One other fact I will mention, which may be of interest to you.
Always, until I adopted your system of living, if I took vinegar or
any other acid into my stomach, it was sure to produce palpitation
of my heart, and violent piercing pain in my chest—seeming as
though I had a pointed steel in my heart.  Now I  can use acids
with perfect pleasantness.   I have used vinegar with my  dinner,
three days in succession, without] experiencing the least unpleas-
ant effect.
  Sir,  I trust I shall ever remember the invaluable  instructions
which I have received from you.  Long may you be spared to
bless mankind, and reap a rich reward for your exertions, in wit-
nessing the blessed  effects of your labors upon society in general.
May you ever have the prayers of the righteous—the testimony of
a good conscience—and the guiding influence of the Holy Spirit,
to strengthen your heart and hands in the philanthropic work in
which you are engaged.
  I give you my signature with pleasure; and feel  it an honor to
sign myself        Your well-wisher,
                           ANNA MARIA PRIMROSE.

  P. S.— Since the  foregoing was written, my sister has been pre-
vailed on to throw aside her medicine, and return  strictly to the
Graham  System; and  I rejoice to be able 1o say, that by it alone,
she has again recovered very good health, and is still improving.
  May 28, 1833.                                 A. M. P.
                         [NO. XVII.]

                          New-York, 2nd Mo. 19th, 1813.
  Esteemed Friend,
                   My health in early life was what is ordinari-
ly called good, and continued to be so until  within  about  five
years, including seven years of married life,  during which time I
have been the mother of three children.
  About five years since my health began to  fail—I began  to ex-
perience loss of appetite, feebleness and general languor—con-
stant costiveness,—headache  almost continually, which disquali-
fied me for all enjoyment.  Great  weakness and faintness  at the
pit of my stomach,—for which my physician prescribed Stoughton
bitters, with good old wine,—also, beer  and porter,—drank two
ups of pretty strong coffee every morning—but was not very fond
of tea,—used to eat whatever my appetite seemed to crave or rel-
ish best—but nothing seemed  to taste good.  This state of  things
continued to grow worse and worse,—my  health gradually sink- 
51
ing.   I was obliged to take aperient medicines every few days—
could not live without.  Summer before last I went into the coun-
try, to try the benefits of the  country air and riding—but this
seemed to do no good—my appetite was exceedingly poor,  and  I
was  extremely wretched—I was very  feeble  and felt unable  to
endure any fatigue,—was easily   overcome—felt great  languor
and  much depression of spirits—head-ache constant—nothing
seemed to afford relief or enjoyment.   Still I kept up the use of
my wine  bitters, and felt that I  could not live without them,—my
beer  was also continued.  I thought these things benefitted me
very much—but yet, I continued to feel that distressing weakness,
and sinking at the pit of my stomach, and  increasing  lassitude—
every thing I did about my own house seemed fatiguing and bur-
densome to me, and irksome.   Indeed, I felt that I had but very
little enjoyment of life: and  considered that mine was a hard and
cheerless lot,  doomed to suffer affliction and pain.   So I lived on
till I heard thy Lectures at the  Baptist meeting-house, in Mulber-
ry-street, in the latter part of January, 1832.  In March I com-
menced eating the Graham  bread, which in the course  of about
three weeks, relieved my costiveness, and with it my head-ache—
at the same time, gave up the wine bitters and beer, cider, &c. and
all high seasoned food.  The weakness and faintness at the pit of
my  stomach  left me; my  larfguor and lassitude  went off; my
strength  improved, very much;  and my health became in  every
respect very much improved.   During the cholera season  we ate
very little flesh indeed, but subsisted mostly on the Graham bread,
plain boiled rice, potatoes, milk, &c.   We had no touch of chole-
ra in the  family, but enjoyed very good health, through the  whole
season.  My  health has since  continued to  improve, and I can
now truly say that I have  not enjoyed better health in ten  years.
   Before  I adopted thy System,  I could  with  difficulty walk to
meeting, or about an eighth of  a mile—now I can walk four miles
without fatigue, and feel  every  way well and  strong, to attend to
my domestic affairs.
                                         MARY WHITE.
                         [NO. XVIII.]

                          New-York, February 11th, 1833.
  Mr. Graham,
               Sir—I enjoyed good health till I was twenty-two
years old, when I  began to  be afflicted with head-ache, languor,
capricious appetite, habitual costiveness, &c.  Sometimes I could
eat  nothing, and sometimes when I did  eat, I would throw up my
food,  a short  time after  eating.   I drank very  little  alcoholic
liquor of any kind, very little  tea, and no coffee.  When I ate 
52
at all, it was of what was set before me, and  such as is ordinarily
upon our tables.   I had recourse to a variety of remedies, and of-
ten, judging from the immediate effects on my feelings, thought 1
was benefitted by them.   Still, however, my complaints continued
to become worse and worse. My head-ache increased in severity,
till it became extremely violent, especially  in the morning.   My
spirits were dreadfully depressed, and the weakness and faintness
and sinking at the  pit of the  stomach, were very distressing.—
Thus I continued on for  four years, in great misery; when (in
March, 1825)  I went to South  America, where I lived on vegeta-
bles entirely.  My food  consisted principally of yam, casada, ba-
nana and plantain, with  fruits,  such as oranges, &.c.   I also took
considerable exercise  in the open air, spending eighteen months
amongst seven different  tribes of Indians.   Here, and in this man-
ner, 1 recovered my health entirely.
   In July, 1826,1 returned to New-York, in  fine health, and con-
siderably heavier than ever I was before.   On my arrival in this
city, I  immediately commenced living as I  had done before I  went
to the  South, and was not conscious of any particular inconven-
ience from it, for about one year.  Then I began to be constipated
again,  and soon became more inveterately so, than ever; going
sometimes ten days without a  motion of the bowels.  My head-
ache again  became very severe, and so  by degrees all  my old
symptoms came back upon me.   My mind  was  awfully gloomy
and desponding, my memory decayed, my sight was much impaired,
my head became subject to turns of very distressing dizziness;
and frequently my mind  was much bewildered.  But my appetite
now continued good, and seemed to increase; yet for an hour af-
ter eating 1 fnlt a good deal of distress, and was extremely languid
and stupid.  In this manner I continued  on, growing more and
more unwell, until February, 1832, when  I commenced attending
your Lectures at Clinton Hall, and very soon  after, began to
adopt your system of diet.   I left off my tea, and discarded my se-
gar;  used the Graham bread and took no flesh for breakfast; and
so continued to drop off one thing after another, till, in the course
often or twelve days, I  began frequently to make my dinner  with-
out flesh, and in about six weeks I left off the use of flesh entirely,
and abandoned all spices, gravies, seasonings and butter.
   From the commencement of this dietetic change, my health be-
gan gradually to  improve, and continued to do so, till my system
became perfectly regular,  and I was entirely  relieved from all my
complaints, and felt as well as ever I  did in my life.
   In August,  1833, I went into  the country, where  I sometimes
took a little flesh for dinner, and smoked  one segar after  dinner.
This indulgence I continued for one month, when I began to find
my costiveness and head-ache returning upon me.   I therefore
abandoned my segar and flesh  meat, and my complaints again for-
sook me.  Since then, my diet has been principally Graham bread
and milk, roasted potatoes, apples-, and other fruit and vegetables, 
53
and on this last regimen, I have been uncommonly and uninter-
ruptedly well; and now enjoy as perfect health as a man can.
  With sincere gratitude and respect, wishing you  unbounded
success in your philanthropic labors, 1 am, dear sir,
              Yours truly,
u                                      JOSEPH ALLEN.
we^
                         [NO. XIX.]

                          New-York, February 19th, 1833.
  Dear Sir,
           In compliance with your request, I very willingly and
gratefully communicate to you, a statement concerning the effect,
which your system of diet, and regimen, has had on my own health.
Some six or seven years ago, I went to Charleston, South-Caroli-
na, where I spent some time in the mercantile dry-goods business.
  While at the South, I became very  bilious,  and much out of
health.   Finding no relief from medicine  there, I  returned  to
New-York, in a very miserable condition of body, hoping that a
change of  climate might  prove beneficial  to  me.   But  nothing
seemed to  have a salutary effect on me; my disorders continued
to  grow worse and worse, in spite of the variety  of remedies,
which according  to medical prescription I tried   All my  friends
believed that I was fast sinking in an incurable decline.  My wile
wept much over  what she considered the certain prospect of  my
fast approaching death.
   But I lingered on between life and death,—scarcely living, and
yet not actually  dying; but gradually  becoming more diseased,
and feeble  I suffered  excessively from head-ache, which  was
often so violent as to cause great dizziness and even at times, I
 used to be very much bewildered; and sometimes  stagger like a
 drunken man when I was walking.  At length I became so  un-
 well, as to be a part of the time confined to my  bed,—1 was  ex-
 ceedingly  bilious and  had a great deal of fever, which at times
 was very  high, and attended with severe chills.   This caused
 general and extreme debility, and reduced me to a mere skeleton.
 I was habitually and inveterately costive, and obliged to take medi-
 cine very frequently.  With; all these, difficulties, however, I en-
 deavored to keep up and attend to my daily vocations as much as
 possible; and that I might be able to  do this the better, I, accor-
 ding to medical advice, used to drink one pint of port wine a day
 This  I thought absolutely necessary; and verily  believed  tha
 without my  wine I should not be able  to sit up at all.  Indeed it
 seemed to be  my whole  support, and I did not think that I could
 relinquish it but at the risk of my life.
                            e2 
54
  About this time I heard of your Lectures at Clinton Hall, and
with great difficulty and exposure, miserable as I was, I  crawled
down to the Hall and heard  three of your Lectures in the  first
course.   I immediately adopted what is called the Graham Sys-
tem of living, not however with the least expectation that I shoi'„VI
find  any particular  relief in  it from the complaint under wh,'jCul
was suffering;—but  much to my surprise, in about one week J jkd
gan to feel better, and found my health decidely improving.   I
therefore attended the whole of your second course of Lectures:
and continued  to improve  in health, till  I was, in about two
months, completely  restored to  good health; and from that time
to this, now nearly one year, I have enjoyed excellent and unin-
terrupted health;  notwithstanding my employment, cares and con-
finement, have by no means been calculated to promote health.
  I spent the whole of the past summer in the city, and visited
the sick of the  cholera in the hospitals and  elsewhere,  and was
much exposed;  but had not the least symptom of that, nor of any
other disease  about  me.   My diet,  during  the prevalence of the
cholera, was  principally Graham bread and milk, and rice and
milk.
  My wife has for many years been quite delicate and feeble, and
excessively troubled with constipation  of body, and  weakness in
the back, &c.  She also  adopted your regimen to  a considera-
ble  extent, soon after I did, and her health has been very much
improved by it indeed.  Our little boy likewise, about four years
old enjoys the finest and most uninterrupted health,  on the Gra-
ham System.  We had no sickness at all in the  family, during the
cholera season,  and  we are all now in excellent health; for which
we sincerely and  gratefully  feel that  we are indebted to you, as
the means in the hands of our merciful Father who is in Heaven.
  May the richest blessings of Heaven reward you  for your la-
bors of philanthropy, and crown all your efforts with success.
                    Very gratefully yours,
                                      ANSON  WILLIS.
                          [NO. XX.]

                          New-York, February  19th, 1833.
   Mr. Graham,
               My health was ordinarily good till I was nineteen
years old.  At that period,  in March,  1818, I was taken with the
measles, and was very sick; and before I had recovered from the
disease, I took a severe cold, by which means my lungs became se-
riously affected, and I was laid up with  sickness until June, during
which space of time I had  a  severe cough, and excessive night
sweats.  The principal medicine which I took, was hoarhound and 
55
honey, which seemed to benefit me very much, and my cough grad-
ually disappeared, till I thought my health pretty well restored
again; when, sometime in the month of June, I imprudently went
into the water, which  caused me to  have a very severe attack of
pleurisy.   I again came under the doctor's hands, and continued
under medical treatment about nine months, during which time I
went through  a  course of mercury.  After recovering from this
sickness, I removed from Albany to New-York, where I remained
two years, and where I had the second attack of the pleurisy,
which reduced me very low, and so much impaired  my constitu-
tion, that I continued for ten years in a miserable state of health.
Previous to this last attack, I had been entirely careless about my
diet;  but experience  subsequently taught me  the importance of
regulating it with care.  My cough became exceedingly severe,
and in the morning, regularly,  I  raised from my lungs a very
great quantity of thick, foetid, and  loathsome  mucus, which was
often mingled with blood.   I became extremely weak and emaci-
ated, and all my friends considered me  in the last stages of con-
sumption.  I was continually trying new remedies, and took a vast
deal of medicine; but all to no good effect. One physician refused
to prescribe for me, saying  that I was so far gone with consump-
tion,  nothing on earth could help me.   Another physician said I
could be cured, and he put me on a course of medicine, which did
me no good.   In fact, every thing seemed  only to aggravate my
complaints.   I was at length convinced that nothing would be of
any benefit to me, but a correct diet; and I began to practice ac-
cording  to the best of my  knowledge on the subject, having had
no particular  instruction concerning it.   All this time, I chewed
tobacco, and drank porter and beer, because I  thought my debili-
tated state required it.  I was habitually and severely costive, and
 was sometimes reduced so low, that I thought  it necessary to ad-
just all  my worldly affairs, and   make every arrangement for  my
 departure from this world.
   By great caution in my diet,  however, I continued to survive,
 beyond  my own, and my friends' expectations.
   While you was lecturing  in the Mulberry-street meeting-house,
 last winter, I went in to hear you, and was so fully convinced of
 the correctness of your doctrines, that  I soon began to reduce
 them to practice.   I  first gave up coffee, then dropped off  my
 porter, then began to eat  the Graham bread, which  benefitted me
 very much.   As I gave up my coffee, and  afterwards my  porter,
 &c, I could distinctly perceive, at each step of advancement tow-
 ards' your entire system, that my health correspondency improved:
 and  when I had got  completely  into the system, my improvement
 was  very rapid.  My cough soon left me.  I ceased to raise any
 thing from my lungs, and  in a short time my health was fairly re-
 stored.   I am now in the enjoyment of good health;  able to  at-
 tend to  my business vigorously; and for the last twelve months 1
 have not seen a day  in which I was not able to be about and at- 
56
tend to my business.   This is a change unexpected  and surpris-
ing; and demands my humble and sincere and fervent gratitude,
to the benevolent and merciful Dispenser  of all things:  and be as-
sured, sir, that  I am not insensible to the  obligations  I am under
to you, as an instrument of my restoration.
            Very gratefully, yours, fyc.
    ^                                THOMAS  DAY, Jr.
                         [NO. XXI.]

                           New-York,  February 22d, 1833.
  Mr. Graham,
               I enjoyed tolerable good health, till I was twenty-
one years old.  I then took a very bad cold, which was neglected,
and run on, till  it seemed to become seated.  After a while my ap-
petite failed me and I became  costive, and lost flesh, and then  I
began to have a pain in my side; and became languid, and irreso-
lute, and low spirited.  My cough continued to increase till it be-
came quite violent, and I began, occasionally, to raise blood.   I
now began to think that  it was time for me to set about  docter-
ing in good  earnest: and applied to  a physician, for  advice and
medicine: from this time onward, I became a faithful subject of
medical treatment, and was  almost continually  dosing;  and be-
sides the drugs, which I  swallowed, I was bled as often as once  a
month, for the  cruel pain in my side.  So I continued  on, for
three or four years, growing no better, but worse.   The bleeding
gave a momentary relief to the pain and soreness, which were
high up in my left side,  but  they would very soon return again,
and  sometimes  with  greater violence.  I had also a distressing
difficulty of breathing, and raised a great deal of matter from my
lungs.  I consulted a good many different physicians,  and for
awhile was encouraged by each, but was benefitted by none, and
was finally given up by  all as a confirmed and're'mediless case of
consumption.   I was much  reduced and very fe'eble; weighing,
with  a  pretty good  sized frame,  but  a  hundred  and  eighteen
pounds.  In  this way I  dragged out eleven or twelve years of
miserable existence; constantly medicining,  and building new
hopes, on new remedies, and obtaining no  permanent relief from
any.  In the latter part  of the time,  however, having proved by
long and painful experience, that medicine did me no good, I took
much less of it, and suffered less; but still, I was not  in any res-
pect  materially 'better.   In  regard to  my  diet, I  lived as other
people usually  do; in the use of tobbacco, coffee, tea, flesh, &.c.
I used flesh pretty freely two or three times  a day; that  is, a con-
siderable proportion of what I did eat, was flesh.  And  no one
ever said to me, that I recollect, concerning  the use  of any of 
57
these articles—Why do you so? About one year ago, I went into
Clinton Hall, and heard some of your Lectures.  I was convinc-
ed of the propriety of your views,  so far as I heard them; and im-
mediately adopted your system pretty strictly.   For a short time
after this change, I felt  considerably more debilitated, but it was
not long befoie  I began to feel decidedly better; and from that
time, my health  continued to  improve  very rapidly.   My  cough
abated fast, the soreness and pain in my side wore off; and in six
months I gained  twenty-five pounds of flesh, and  my health and
strength improved  proportionately.  I  have since gained several
pounds more, and  am at present, in excellent  health  and spirits.
   Accept my sincere thanks, for the benefits I  have received from
your instructions; and  believe me, with much  respect and grati-
tude,              Yours truly,
                              EBENEZER  MONTAGUE.
                         [NO. XXII.]

                          New-York, February 22d, 1833.
  Mr. Graham,
              Sir—Until  I  was twenty-eight years old,  my
health had always been rather delicate:  my body was frail and ea-
sily thrown out of order.  I had been  sometime in  the habit of
using a very little tobacco,  according to medical prescription, for
the tooth-ache.   Coffee,  I drank pretty freely; but was less fond
of tea.  I was subject to frequent turns of debility,  and a good
deal  of languor, and indefinite kind of indisposition.
  In June, 1831, I heard you deliver six or seven Lectures at
Clinton Hall;  and immediately abandoned the use of tobacco, cof-
fee and tea; and in  other respects generally  conformed to the
principles which you laid down.  On my new«regimen, my health
improved very rapidly, and continued to, till it became very good.
I never knew what it was to have a clear mind, till after I adopted
your System.  Before,  it was almost continually cloudy, and my
head was much affected with  vertigo.   Now, my mind became
clear, and my head free from disorder:  my strength increased ex-
ceedingly,  and I felt altogether like a different being.   I contin-
ued to improve in health, till  the  twentieth of November,  1831,
when I went to hear an  address on the subject of Temperance, in
one of our large churches.  The night was intensely cold, and the
house was very poorly—nay,  indeed, not at  all, warmed; though
there was fire in the  stoves.   I was seated in  the  coldest part of
the house;  and,  being in company with ladies, was obliged to re-
main through the exercises, which were very long; and I was not
well prepared with over-clothes for such a sitting.  I became com-
pletely chilled through.   My  feet were  nearly frozen.  After the 
58
 exercises were over, I walked about three miles, but could not get
 my feet warm.   I returned home; the fire was out; went to bed
 with cold feet, and  lay with them cold, all night.  I soon  found I
 had taken a severe cold.   I was quite unwell, the next day; and
 this indisposition increased upon me till the twelfth of December,
 when I was taken with a violent pain in my right knee.  I room-
 ed with a physician, who being  a friend of mine, insisted on my
 taking medicine, and assured me that it was necessary for me to
 return to my former habits of diet, and drink strong coffee and tea
 freely.   I yielded to this advice, wholly against my own judgment.
 My medical friend also put a large blister upon the diseased knee;
 and, as soon as it began to draw,  the pain suddenly shifted into
 the left knee.  He then began to give me medicine; and  said he
 must put me under a course of medicine.  To all which I submit-
 ted, with sufficient reluctance.  He  dosed  me  with Colchicum,
 bella-donna, gum-guiac,  &.c. &c.  The medicine having no good
 effect, and the disease growing  more violent, the doctor called in
 another physician, who was also a personal friend of mine.  They
 agreed that my situation was very critical, and^required the most
 skillful treatment.  The pain which I suffered, was keenly excru-
 ciating, and very constant.
  Finding  his medicine not to produce the effect he had desired,
 my  physician said that the Graham System of living had so impair-
 ed my constitution,  that he could produce no effect  on  it with
 medicine; and he also gave me to understand that my system had
 been predisposed to the disease which I was suffering, by my man-
 ner of living.  When the pain was most severe,  he occasionally
 gave me  a little brandy or wine.  Being foiled in all other exped-
 ients, he next applied hot oil, externally, to the parts which were
 most affected with pain.   This failing, he  returned to the old
 course of Colchicum, bella-donna, &c.  My nurse, however, was
 more successful than the doctors;  for she, by rubbing and bathing
 me in warm water, afforded me much more relief than  the medi-
 cine did.  All this time, according to the  advice of both of my
 physicians, I was drinking  coffee and tea quite strong.  About
 the  middle of January the weather became more mild,  and I was
 so much  relieved as to be able to sit up, and to gain a respite from
 my medicine: and in three or four days, I walked about the room.
 The pain, however, continued very distressing;  flying from my
 knee to  my  shoulder, elbow, hand, and so around to  my knee
again;  and producing where it went, an extreme soreness and
 considerable swelling in my flesh.
  Now my attending physician began  to order me brandy and
 water,  and Madeira wine.  I drank a great deal of  wine through
my  whole sickness.  I now drank brandy and  water.   When I
began to  walk about and take less  medicine, I felt less pain.  But
in a few days, the pain commenced again: and in its round it now
visited  my feet, which swelled very badly indeed: and  the  pain
 shifted to my knee, shoulders,  elbows, hands and feet; and all 
59
these parts swelled exceedingly and were  very much inflamed'
  My two physicians again put me under their old course of med-
icine, and soon I became worse than ever.  My pain was intense-
ly excruciating; and I was brought so low, that for one or two days
and nights my physicians gave me up, as incurable; and my death
was  hourly expected.   A  great deal of opium was administered,
with my other medicine; but without allaying the pain.
  My father and friends came to see me, and I became somewhat
easier, and grew a little better.  I greatly desired  to see you; but
knowing my physician's opposition to you, I did not send for you.
I, however, refused to take any more medicine, and suffered  less
violence of pain.   My flesh was extremely sore, aud my joints
and limbs  were shockingly swollen.  My hands swelled enormous-
ly, and I was entirely unable to move  my arms and legs, and had
no more command over them than if they were dead.
   Notwithstanding I refused medicine, my  physician still insisted
 on my continuing a free use of brandy, wine, coffee and tea, and
 flesh meat; and said that  the salvation of my body depended on it.
   My appetite being good, I ate very heartily.  About the twen-
 tieth of February, the weather being pleasant, I began to be some-
 what relieved, and  tried  to stir about the room a  little; and in a
 few days, went out of doors.   I  however had a relapse, for which
 my physician blamed me; but I refused to take any more of his
 medicine, and in five or six days began to improve again.  I also
 discarded my brandy; but continued my wine, coffee, tea and flesh.
 In this way I continued  to be better and worse; some days con-
 fined to  my room, and some days able to  go out, till  about the
 middle of May, when  1 was again severely attacked.  The pain
 was violent, and shifted as before  from my  knee to my shoulders,
 elbows, hands, feet, knees and soon; producing great swelling
 and soreness in its rout. I was now induced to try  the steam
 bath, which relieved  me, momentarily, for  a few times, and then
 ceased to have any alleviating effect.  Entirely despairing of re-
 covery, by any of  the means  I had tried, I now determined to see
 you; for I had all  along  doubted the propriety of  my physician's
 practice;  but he being a room mate and a  personal friend, I felt
 extremely delicate about sending for you.  But I now saw plainly
 that there was no hope for me in this way, and I  resolved to see
 you; determined in my own mind, that if  you could not help me,
 to give up all business and retire into the country.
     You will  doubtless  recollect that when  you saw me, my condi-
  tion was miserable enough.  My pains were very intense, and my
 limbs were excessively swollen, and I could  scarcely move  them
 at all; especially my hands and arms.   I  could  not raise  them
  half way  to  my head; and it was with difficulty  that I could put
  one foot before the other in walking.
    You will perhaps remember, that you advised me to abandon, at
 once, my wine, tea, and all  other stimulants, and would  prefer
 that I  should use no animal  food, at least, for awhile.  You also 
60
advised me to take a cold shower bath  in the morning, and rub
myself off briskly and  thoroughly with a good flesh brush.   Or
to spunge my body all over every morning with cold water, fol-
lowing it with the  course towel and brush:  and to use the flesh-
brush freely, on going to bed every night.
  You told me that as it was impossible for you to say how much
my system had been injured by the posions which I had been tak-
ing, you could not tell how long it would take my system, under a
correct regimen, to throw off the deleterious effects, and to  get
rid of its disease:  that you had no doubt, if I continued strictly on
your regimen, I should soon be benefitted and ultimately attain to
good and permanent health.
  Not being able  to obtain the advantages of a shower bath, I
omitted that part of your prescription; but in all other respects I
followed  it strictly, maugre  the fears of my medical chum and
friend.  In  a few days I began to improve  in my health.  My
pains, swelling, soreness of flesh, &c, all began to decrease, and
in a short time I was quite comfortable.  In this way I continued
to improve;  although for some time,  when  easterly storms came
on, I would feel some slight touches of pain in  all my joints;  but
all this gradually wore off, and my health became perfectly estab-
lished.  And  from that time to the present, I  have enjoyed far
better health, than I ever did before in my life.  Indeed, my health
is as nearly perfect, as it well can  be.   Through the whole chole-
ra season, I was in the midst of the disease, visiting the sick, &c;
but had not the least touch or symptom  of it, and no fear of it;
while my medical chum  was much alarmed for himself, and said I
was exceedingly imprudent  in eating fruit, and in not eating flesh.
He has always persisted in saying that  I would have a return of
my rheumatic pains this winter;  but the winter is now nearly
past, and thus far my health has been uninterruptedly excellent;
and now I cannot ask nor desire to have it better than it is, not-
withstanding I have had to endure, since I have been on your reg-
imen, great mental anxiety  and  embarrassments in  business, and
family afflictions of the  most painful kind.
   Dear sir, I cannot well express the depth and  fervency of my
grateful feelings towards you; and my desires for your happiness
and success in your great cause of humanity.
                   Yours truly,
                            ROBERT G.  FAIRCHILD.

   Gen. Thomas Sheldon, of Westfied, Mass. informed me in  Oc-
tober, 1833, that having been severely afflicted, for many months,
with rheumatic complaints, of so serious a nature that he had been
hardly able to move, he heard my Lectures and adopted the Sys-
tem pretty  strictly; and before the expiration of three months, he
was completely restored to health, and became as active and nim-
ble as a boy.  Several  other cases of the kind  have come to my
knowledge.                                          S. G. 
61
                        [NO. XXIII.]

                              New-York, March 1st, 1833.
  Sir—
       I enjoyed ordinary health till I was about fifteen years old.
My father was a farmer and kept a generous table.  Animal food
was generally upon it three times a day, of which I partook freely.
I also ate  freely of different kinds of pastry, and drank freely of
coffee and tea, and  moderately of alcoholic  drinks.   About July,
1815, 1 became afflicted with a severe cough, which  was suffered
to run on till the frost came on in September, when my cough ran
into severe asthma, which laid me up for about six weeks;  after
this my complaint continued in paroxysms, which came on very
regularly about once a  week.  Our  family physician, an old and
experienced practitioner, was consulted in regard to my case, and
he said that he  knew no cure for  it, but recommended the syrup
of squills as a palliative.   A celebrated  French physician came
into the place, and he was also consulted.  He said  also that  he
knew no cure for the  complaint, but recommended some pallia-
tives.  My parents took  much pains to  obtain relief for me, but
were wholly unsuccessful. My complaint continued to grow worse
and worse for about eighteen years.   During this time, my suffer-
ings were, at times, unspeakably great.  For three months at. a
lime I was unable to sleep upon  my bed, but was obliged to get
what sleep 1 did, in my chair, and was often  supposed to be dying.
On an average, through the whole eighteen years, as many as  fif-
ty days in a year I was confined  to the house, and  most of that
time, so that I was unable to dress "myself, and frequently unable
to speak;  and as many as fifty days more in a year, 1 was unable
to do any thing.   In the meantime, I was continually trying the
various remedies which were recommended.  Among the rest, I
went  through a course of steaming  under  a Thomsonian steam
doctor, but without benefit, if not with injury.   Smoking was also
recommended, which I tried, and have continued  to  the  present
time.  In  1827, I went to the West Indies and  South America;
but found no relief.  I have since used a great deal of hygiean
medicine, and this seemed at the time to benefit me; but it proved
only a momentary alleviation.  My asthmatic difficulties continued
in all their violence and distress.  Indeed, I  cannot describe the
hundredth  part of my sufferings.
   1 had often heard of your Lectures, but in such a manner that I
 had become most rankly prejudiced against you, and considered
 your Lectures all a humbug.  In the latter part of January last, I
 saw hand bills  put up, giving notice that a Doctor  King would
 give  a Lecture, exploding your whole System.   I went  to hear
him, expecting to hear you put down completely; but his perform-
 ance was such an entire failure, that I determined to go and hear
you for myself.  I immediately commenced attending your Lec-
 tures at Clinton Hall, and at the same time began gradually to adopt
                             F 
62
your System.   The first thing, I quit chewing tobacco, and then
left off one thing after another, and  my health  began to improve
in the same  ratio.  One week before I commenced  attending
your Lectures, I was so severely handled with  the asthma, that I
was unable to be out, for several days.   After I commenced a re-
formation of diet, I began to improve so  much, that I lost  not a
single Lecture.   It is now about four months since I have  lived
on the System, during which  time 1 have had two or three very
slight turns of asthma; but these were brought on by great impro-
prieties of diet.  Always when 1 have followed your System strict-
ly, I have been  entirely free from all my complaints and  symp-
toms.  My health in all respects has improved exceedingly.  In-
deed, my improvement is almost beyond  credibility.   I  am con-
vinced that I  can now perform ten times the amount of labor, and
endure ten times the fatigue, that I could  before, and feel no in-
convenience from  it.  I am  ashamed to  say that I have not yet
wholly laid aside my pipe;*  but I  am diminishing  its use, and
hastening to forsake the habit.   I have the most unbounded con-
fidence in your System, and am sure that  I  have  only to follow it
properly, to enjoy the most entire health.   In fact, I am now well,
and enjoy life  very much.
                                  PEREZ S.  WHITING.
                         [NO. XXIV.]

                               New-York, March 3d, 1833.
  Mr.  Graham,
               Sir—You will recollect that I called on you a few
evenings since, but in consequence of your having other  compa-
ny, I did not have that opportunity to converse with you that I de-
sired, and I have therefore concluded  to address you in writing,
and give you  a brief sketch of the history of my complicated dis-
eases and sufferings.  I  will commence by  stating, that, as far
back as my knowledge extends, my ancestors, both on my father's
and mother's  side, have  all  died with  consumption, excepting  a
few, who died  suddenly by accidents.   As to myself, I have al-
ways, from my earliest remembrance, been subject to gloom and
melancholy and despondency of spirits; and these with many oth-
er distressing  difficulties, which  I will  mention, "grew with my

  *Had the tobacco been entirely abandoned in every form, from the first, he
would  have had no returns of his asthmatic complaints. Asthma cannot be
cured while tobacco, opium, or coffee are used.  Narcotics of every kind are
peculiarly pernicious in asthmatic  cases.   I have known instances where the
abandonment of coffee cured the asthma.  The most inveterate and long stand-
ing cases may be entirely cured by a correct regimen.             S. G. 
63
growth and strengthened with my strength," until I was about
twenty-three years of age, when  my health became very much
impaired, and both body and mind extremely debilitated. Besides
my intense and  unbroken melancholy, and dark despondency of
spirits, I was afflicted with distressing dizziness of the head, blind-
ness, staggering, reeling, weakness, stammering  and catching of
voice.  Excessive irritability  and weakness of stomach; no ap-
appetite.    Extremely nervous; twitching of the different parts of
my face; eyes very dull, weak and watery; deafness, and absence
of mind; great aversion to company; sometimes severe head-ache;
dull, stupid and sluggish; fullness of the chest; after eating rest-
less, uneasiness; very sleepy; yellowness of the skin  and eyes; at
times very sour stomach;  sometimes sore  throat,  and raising of
blood; depression of the chest and difficulty of breathing; wild ap-
pearance out of the eyes; internal soreness at the lower part of the
stomach  or chest; extreme fretfulness or peevishness; starting or
jumping  at any  sudden noise or  touch;  memory  very poor, and
frequent alienation of mind; weariness of life; great desire for se-
clusion, or retirement; and often a reluctance to speak when spok-
en to; considerable fever at intervals; occassionally  raising  from
the lungs hard, tough, green, putrid lumps of matter ; easily irri-
tated, and passions ungovernable.  Suffering extremely, and of-
ten laid up with the piles; for the cure of which all remedies fail-
ed.  Eyes becoming highly inflamed, by the least irritation, and
often requiring the most rigid  treatment.   In one case I was con-
fined to  my room nearly two months, and it was with the greatest
difficulty that the disease could be arrested, by successive bleed-
ing, cupping, blistering,  purging, rigid dieting,  scarifying the
eyes, Sac.
   Dr.  W------, of  Fishkill, Dutchess County, New-York, was
the  first physician whom I consulted,  (being  then myself a resi-
dent of that place.)  He gave me some medicine, and advised me
to quit my business, and take a journey to Saratoga Springs, on
horse-back; take shower baths, &c. &c.  I followed  his advice—
spent three or four weeks in visiting some of my northern friends,
and at the Springs; and returned home without much, if any im-
provement in my health   I resumed my occupation again, (which
was that of a machinist in a cotton factory) and dragged out sev-
eral years  more of miserable existence, all  of which time my dis-
eases—for I believe I had  many—were increasing in power and
severity, apparently threatening my speedy dissolution.
   I  was  in appearance, a living skeleton, was all the time exces-
sively  constipated in body, and occasionally taking  emetics, ca-
thartics,  mustard seed, wine  bitters, &c. &c.  My wretchedness
and misery became almost insupportable, and my only expectation
was, that a few  more months would terminate my  sufferings in
death.  I  however lived on, in this state of misery, a few  years
longer; all the while doctoring, and sometimes seemingly a  little
better, but on the whole growing worse. 
64
   On seeing some hand-bills, announcing your public Lectures,
last June, I was induced to go and hear you; more from a spirit
of novelty  and curiosity, however, than  any thing else.  But  I
confess I was  forcibly struck with the reasonableness of the
principles you  taught, and I immediately adopted your system,
and almost immediately began to get relief; and I  am now nearly
well, of all  the  multitude of my disorders.  1 am about twelve
pounds heavier than I ever was before in my whole  life; and al-
most a perfectly healthy person, in body and mind, and still im-
proving.  So great is my enjoyment, to what it has been for nearly
twenty years past, that I do not think  I  would be willing to ex-
change my  present sytem of diet, for  all the money  in  Wall-
street.
   Excuse  my  scribbling, for I am  not  accustomed  to writing
much.  I shall always feel myself under great  obligations to you for
the benefits I have received  from  you; and  wish I were able to
make you some better compensation than my sincere acknowledge-
ments, for my deliverance from so many miseries.
   J am, Sir, your ever thankful and grateful friend,
                                     CHARLES LEWIS.
   P.  S.   I ought to have told you that I have always abstained
from alcohol and tobacco.
                         [NO. XXV.]

                             New-York, 5th Mo. 2d, 1833.
  Respected Friend—
                     It affords me  pleasure to communicate to
thee, the information thou desirest, concerning  the  health of my
wife, as affected by the system of diet and general regimen, taught
in thy interesting Lectures "on the Science of Human Life."
  The health of my wife has always  been delicate;  and  for more
than twenty years past, she has been more  or less of an invalid;
and has been, a considerable portion of that time, a subject of med-
ical treatment.  Twice in  the time, she  has been considered by
her physicians, as in a far-gone and almost hopeless stage of pul-
monary consumption.  From these very  low states,  she  so far re-
covered, as to be able to be about her house, and to go out, in fine
weather;—but she still remained a feeble invalid; suffering almost
continually with a distressing trembling,  fainting, sinking feeling,
at the pit of the stomach;—and being severely afflicted  with sick
head-ache, which recurred very frequently.
  She has lived about one year on thy System, carefully avoiding
coffee, tea, and all other narcotic and stimulating substances;  and
in other respects, generally, observing thy  rules.  The  result is,
that her health has improved amazingly.   The distressing  sensa- 
65
lions which she had so long endured,  at the pit of her stomach,
have all entirely left her; and for several months past she has been
wholly free from sick head-ache.
   When she heard  thee proscribe feather  beds, she thought she
could never conform to thy doctrines,  in that thing; because she
was so thin in flesh and so feeble, that she  was sure, if she should
attempt to sleep on  a hard bed, her bones would come through her
skin;  and she would certainly freeze in the winter.   As the warm
season of 1832 came on, however, she threw off her feather bed,
and we slept on a mattrass till late in the fall, when she gave her
mattrass to her two daughters, and substituted for herself a straw
bed, on which we have continued to sleep,  through the winter, and
to the present time.  Winter before this last, as ever before, she
slept on a good feather bed; and was so sensible of the cold, that
she had her bed warmed as often as three times a week; and even
then, frequently complained of feeling  cold, during the night;—but
during this last winter, she  did  not  have her bed  warmed,  even
once,—nor suffer at all from the cold; and instead  of  having her
bones come through her flesh, her flesh  increased upon he'r bones;
so that she has become much more fleshy than she ever was before;
and is more strong  and vigorous; and her bodily  elasticity, and
ability to endure fatigue—and her mental  serenity and cheerful-
ness—have very much increased.   Indeed, she now enjoys better
health, in every respect, than she has ever done before, in the past
fifty years of her life.
    I unite with my whole family, in sentiments of sincere  respect
and esteem for thee; and in fervent  wishes for the success of the
good cause in which thou art so diligently engaged.
                         [NO. XXVI.]

                          New-Bedford, 1st Mo. 22, 1833.
  Respected Friend—
                    I will now endeavor to answer some of thy
inquiries concerning my health, which has improved astonishingly
since I commenced the mode of living recommended by thee, when
here, three months ago.  I had been afflicted  with epileptic fits,
for about four years;  having had them for the past year, till I saw
thee, as often as once a month,—and sometimes more frequent.
During the latter part of the time, they often occurred as frequent-
ly as once a week; and almost every day I had a turn of swooning,
or losing myself, for a moment or two.
  During the first week of my trial of thy  regimen, I lost three
pounds of flesh, and was much debilitated.  After that, I remain-
ed stationary for about a month, or perhaps six weeks.   Since then,
                          f2 
66
I have gained seven pounds,—four more than I weighed before I
adopted thy System.
  I continue to use the same diet, and all  the  other  things, (too
numerous to mention here) as thou  recommendedst; and when in
company I refuse to touch those things generally provided on such
occasions.   I depend chiefly on the bread,  which I am very fond
of, indeed;  and I find when it is eaten very  dry,  and freely masti-
cated and mixed with the fluid of the mouth, it answers the purpose
of cathartic medicine, which I was formerly obliged to take, every
two or three days; but have  not taken any, since I commenced
this mode of living.
  As for my fits, I have had three,  since thee left here:—the first,
in about three  weeks after I commenced thy mode of living; the
second, in five weeks after the  first; and the third, in one week
after the second.   Since then,  I have not had any at all; which is
now approaching two months;  and  I think I  shall not have any
more, from the circumstance of my being much stronger and  bet-
ter, every way imaginable.
       •                 Thy affectionate friend,        M. H.

  3d Mo. 20th, 1833.—Thinking that thou wouldst be anxious to
hear how I am progressing in regard to my health, I  am induced
to state, in a  few words, that  I continue upon the same regimen
as at first,  although I do not now weigh my food.  1  have gained
three pounds more, since my last  letter; and  now weigh seven
pounds more than I did  when I commenced  living in this  simple
way.   It is now about three and a half months  since I have had a
fit or an ill turn.   Every day convinces me, more and more, of the
correctness of thy views, with regard to living;—but yet 1 have had
to use all the powers of  my  mind,  to withstand the temptations to
eat that which  I know would undo, perhaps,  all that has been done.
                                                       M. H.

  5th Mo. 22d, 1833.—I do not recollect  of having indulged in
any thing improper,  except eating a few oysters,*  soon after thee
left here;  but since then, I  have not deviated from the course pre-
scribed by thee;—and I do verily believe, if I do not indulge more
than I have since thee left here, I shall entirely rid myself of those
disagreeable fits; as I have now been a number of months, with-
out a symptom.                                        M. H.

   I might add several other very interesting cases,  of the same
complaint;  and of the same favorable results of a proper regimen;
but the limits of the present work,  compels me to withhold them.
                                                        S. G.
  *Se» the second paragraph above.—" As for fill," &.<•. This yoong gentleman, after enjoying the be»t ol health,
without having a fit for about eight months, imprudently ate very freely of  clam  chowder, and the next day bad a
fit. This brought him back to a strict regimen agjin, and he continued several months more, enjoying excellent
health, w tliout any recurrence of his fits; and then he began to relax and be careless, and eat at all limes of day,
and very freely, and thus brought on another fit, whi. b again made him more prudent, and he H now free from fits
and in most excellent health. Another young man, aftei going three or four months without a fit, began to use
his tctocco again,and brought back his fi:s. 
67
                         [NO. XXVI!.]

                                New-York, June 1st, 1833.
  Mr. Graham,
               Sir—Though I have never considered myself an
intemperate man in any respect, nor given to excess of any kind;
yet I have been, in former life, what is called "a good liver."   Of
the bounties of the table I partook liberally, but still, as I thought,
reasonably.   I Used animal  food freely; but not more so than  is
customary  among our citizens generally.  I, however, used con-
siderable seasoning  with my food, such as pepper, mustard,  &c.
Sec.   I also chewed and smoked tobacco, but not very  excessively.
  About nine years ago, I began to feel somewhat unwell. Con-
stipation of body was becoming habitual; and head-ache, which
had occasionally troubled me, was now becoming more frequent,
periodical and severe.
   My mind sympathized with my body, and I began to feel  less
equanimity  and cheerfulness.  By degrees, a painful  sense  of
languor, and a kind of discontent and depression of spirits, increas-
ed upon me.   My appetite became irregular aud capricious, and
I was slowly emaciating.  I could not say that I  had any definite
disease: but  yet I was unwell, and languid, and irresolute,  and
dispirited;  and  full  of that  indescribable kind of disquietude,
which' is not  the less intolerable, because it is vague, and name-
less.
   In this condition, I applied to one of the most eminent and cele-
brated physicians of our city, (New-York,) to  learn of him what
was the nature of my indisposition, and what I must do to get re-
lieved from it.   I stated to him all  my feelings and symptoms, and
was informed by him that I was laboring under an affection of the
liver.   As yet, however, I had felt no pain nor soreness, nor un-
 easiness of any kind, about the region of the liver.  But 1 suppos-
ed that the doctor knew best, and therefore I passively submitted
to his  decision and prescription.   In  the course of a few days he
gave me a hundred and twenty grains of calomel, after whieh he
pronounced me cured and turned me off his hands as a  well man.
I however soon found that the doctor, eminent as he was in repu-
tation, was by no means infallible;  for I was incomparably worse
when he left me than when he began with me.  My stomach was
in a shocking condition.  Its tone and digestive energies seemed
to  be  almost entirely destroyed;  and its irritability was  so great
that it rejected nearly every thing I took into it:  and now  for the
first time, I actually began to experience a pain and soreness  in
the region of my liver.  My costiveness was more severe and in-
corrigible than ever; and my head-ache more violent and contin-
ual.  I therefore returned to my physician,  and his  second  pre-
scription was, that  I  should go  and spend  a  season  at Sara-
toga Springs.  In this I obeyed him also, but with no more sue- 
68
cess than before:  neither the water, nor the  country air, nor the
exercise, nor the society, nor the amusement of Saratoga, did me
any good;  but  I  continued  to become  more and more unwell
while  I  staid there;  and returned to the city miserable enomdi.
My costiveness was inveterate, and obliged me to keep up The
constant use of cathartics; and these  I  was obliged  to  change
often, and increase in quantity, because they would lose their  ef-
fect on me.  My head-ache was intense, and  almost without inter-
mission.  In this way  1  dragged  out a miserable existence  for
three  years; continually seeking relief, and daily hoping to be bet-
ter to-morrow.
   I then applied to another physician (Dr. R.----) who said that
the source of all my suffering was an inflamation of the stomach.
He was a follower of Broussais, and put me on an antiphlogistic
regimen, of arrow-root, gum-water, &c. with an  abundance of
medicine daily.   Under this mode of treatment, 1 suffered beyond
measure, and almost died of down-right inanition.  Finding  no
encouragement in this course, 1 next applied to Dr. J. S. R----,
whose high reputation,  prepared me to receive his advice with as
much confidence  as I could that of any other physician, after what
experience I had had.   On  hearing a statement of my case,  he
promptly told me  that all my difficulty was dyspepsia; it  was a pity
I had been made to suffer so much, and so long, and so unnecessa-
rily, by  erroneous pratice; but with a  little care and  persever-
ance I might soon be relieved, and in a short time be restored to
health.   He said I  must avoid all fruits and vegetables,  except
bread and good mealy potatoes, and  take good tender broiled beef
and mutton, well seasoned with cayenne and mustard freely, twice
or three times a day, accompanying them with  a good cup of cof-
fee at breakfast, a glass of brandy and water, or two or three glass-
es  of good Madeira  wine, at dinner, and tea  with my third meal:
and make a generous use of good porter and wine during the day.
He also prescribed  some aperient  medicine, and recommended
exercise and amusement.
   I commenced on this regimen;  and almost immediately began
to feel all the benefits  the  doctor  had promised : it seemed to set
me on my feet at  once.  My  strength  increased with  astonishing
rapidity: I gained flesh very fast,  and my spirits were roused from
their  despondency:  and I  returned to my business  like a new
man; full of animation, and resolution, and delight.   Yet I could
not reflect  on my past sufferings of body  and mind, and loss of
time, without feeling  something approaching to indignation, at the
error and  mal-practice, of my former  physicians.  The feeling,
however, was mingled  with satisfaction, that I had at last got into
the hands of so eminently skillful  a man, and was now sure of be-
ing soon restored to complete  and permanent health.   I was now
prepared to advise every invalid to eat beef-steak, and to  make a
generous use of brandy, wine, porter, coffee, &c. &c.
   But alas! alas ! In  the flood tide of my prosperity and confi- 
69
dence and rejoicing, 1 found myself suddenly stranded amidst ter-
rible breakers, and only supported by the  foam of the reffluent
waves!
  With all my renovated health and strength, and energy, I sud-
denly began to break down, and sunk with greater rapidity than
ever before, into  a  more complicated disease, and into a state of
deeper  and darker suffering and wretchedness, than I had ever
known: and continued in the most miserable condition of body
and mind for three or four years.   Often was my wretchedness so
intense that I would  gladly have exchanged conditions with the most
stupid animal that lives:  I longed to be out of the world.  In the
latter part of this time, I got hold of some coarse brown crackers,
called dyspepsia crackers.  When I first began  to eat this bread,
my stomach was so weak and irritable, that  I was somewhat dis-
tressed by  it; but  after  awhile  I became accustomed to it, and
was able to use it  without any  unpleasant effects; while on the
other hand, it relieved my costiveness  very much.
   Still, however, I was unutterably miserable,  and  began to feel
the darkness of despair gathering upon my soul.  I had no longer
any hopes  of being benefitted by any thing on earth.  Some med-
ical friends, however, thinking I might be benefitted by a sea voy-
age, and a change  of climate, advised me by all means to  go to
 Europe.   Finding myself perfectly useless here,  and believing
 that I could be no worse, if I was no better, on the voyage, I con-
 cluded to comply with their advice.  The companion of my voy-
 age, with whom 1 became very intimate, and from whom I received
 the utmost attention and kindness, was a very respectable physic-
 ian from the North of France.   Contrary to the expectation of my
 medical advisers at home, the sea voyage  afforded me no relief;
 nor was I  in any degree benefitted by it.   My constipation was of
 the most fixed and  unyielding character; and it was with great difc
 ficulty that I could so far overcome it with  medicine as to obtain
 even a momentary relief; and of  course my head-ache and other
 difficulties were proportionably aggravated.
    I remained a short time in England, travelling about in pursuit
 of health;  but not finding myself in any measure improved, I yield-
 ed to the wishes of my medical companion, and accompanied him
 to Paris.   He had by this  time seen so much of my sufferings,
 'and become so much interested in me, that he appeared to feel
 all the sympathy and solicitude of a brother for  me.   On our arri-
 val in Paris, he told me  that he was going to take me in hand and
 cure me.   He called in several  distinguished physicians of the
 city, and all agreed that I was laboring under  an inflammation of
 the stomach; and  that  the Broussaian mode of practice was the
 only safe one in my case.  I was therefore put again  on gum-
 water, arrow-root, rice  water, &c; was leeched all  around  the
 region of  my stomach, and flax-seed  poultices  were  laid over my
 stomach and bowels.  But neither the friendly desires and inde-
 fatigable assiduity, nor  the skill, nor  the regimen, nor the medi- 
70
cine of my  medical  friend,  availed any thing; I grew evidently
worse under his treatment.  He then persuaded me to accompa-
ny him to the city of Metz, in the North of France, where his fa-
ther resided, who was a physician of extensive practice, and high
reputation.  He then commenced  again with me, with a determi-
nation to  overcome my complaint and restore me to health.  No
man could be more ardently desirous of success than he evidently
was.   He, with the advice of his father, pursued the same prac-
tice here that he had done in Paris; adding much more exercise,
such as dancing, fencing and gunning.   I also took a  warm bath
every day.  The exercise did me some  good, but still there was
no radical improvement in my health, which 1 regretted almost as
much for the sake of my generous medical friend, as on my own
account.
   A short time before I left Metz, I went down  among the sol-
diers who were quartered in the barracks in that city, and found
them eating the coarse unbolted wheat bread, and  perceived  that
they were remarkably healthy, robust and strong.  I thought, if I
could have some of that  bread to eat, it would certainly help me:
and I requested my medical friend to procure some of it for me.
By some means or other, however, it was  neglected, and I  soon
left the place, without  obtaining any of it.  As the only|benefit
which  I had as yet received  in France, was from exercise, I de-
termined, contrary to  the advice of my  physician, to  attempt to
walk to Paris, a distance of somewhere about eighty miles. When
I left Metz,  I was so thin in flesh that I only weighed  a  hundred
and seven pounds with much extra clothing on—probably about a
hundred pounds as ordinarily clothed.
   I walked about half the distance, subsisting on fine flour bread,
(which in France is always acid,) and milk, and crude vegetables.
Finding myself becoming more unwell,  I then took the diligence
for the remainder of the journey.   On my arrival at Paris, I  had
considerable fever  upon me, and was wretched enough.   I  then
sent for Dr. N., an American physician in Paris.  He  told me
that the system  I was pursuing, was altogether wrong; and if per-
severed in, would destroy my life.   My costiveness still continued
inveterate.  Dr. N. gave me a pretty powerful cathartic, and in
forty-eight hours afterward, told me to  have a good  beef-stake
cooked, and eat it with very little salt, but no pepper, and drink a
good cup of coffee with my meal, and to continue this regimen.—
I found immediate and astonishing relief in this change of  diet;
and began once more to hope that I should be able to return to
my family with  improved health;  and on the third  day I took the
diligence for Calais ; keeping up my  new regimen, and drinking
coffee  pretty freely ;  which seemed, indeed, a most  refreshing
cordial  to me.   But before I reached  London, I again  broke
down, and when I arrived at that city, I was extremely wretched
and feeble. 
71
  I called to see Doctor Abernethy,  but he was not in; and, mis-
erable as I was, I proceeded on to Liverpool; as my face was now
turned towards home, and my heart yearning to arrive there, as
soon as possible.
  When I arrived at Liverpool, and took my passage for America,
my friends there—as they have since informed me—did not expect
that I would live to see New-York.   I was so feeble when I went
on board the packet, that  I was hardly able to get down the com-
panion-way.
  After I had been out to sea about a week,  I found my sufferings
increasing  upon  me, and my despondency became  very great.
The morbid irritability of my  system had become so excessive,
that I was afraid of every thing;  and was haunted with a continual
dread of evil.  I had  no hope of ever being  any better; and very
much feared  that I should not live to see my  family again.
  The Captain seeing the deplorable state of my health, and per-
ceiving the extreme dejection of my mind, endeavored to encour-
age mo; and said he could cure me,  if I  would strictly follow his
directions.   My misery  was such that I was glad to catch at any
thing for relief; and I consented to  become  his patient.   He or-
dered me to drink  port wine sangaree, and to live pretty generous-
ly.   Besides this, 1 had my man  rub  my limbs and body, freely,
every night.
  The Captain's regimen—and perhaps more particularly the rub-
bing—seemed to have a wonderfully  beneficial effect on  me.   I
began to pick up, rapidly; and on my arrival in New-York, I had
gained in weight,  in a few weeks, six or  seven pounds.   I was,
however, on the whole, really no better than when I left home, and
indeed scarcely as well.
  Being now, as I thought, fully convinced of the folly of depend-
ing on medicine or travelling, for the restoration of my health, 1
had little expectation of ever being any better; and determined to
try to divert my mind  from the contemplation of my sufferings, as
much as possible, by occupying it with  my  business.   And  soon
after, I commenced using the cold shower-bath every morning, and
eating the coarse unbolted wheat-meal bread. These things were
of considerable benefit to me: my costiveness was  relieved, and I
became much more comfortable.  But still I was rather alleviated
than cured.  My head-ache was less violent, and  my melancholy
less profound; yet all  my ailments continued to hang about me;
and I was, on the whole, very little better, in real health.
  About this time, Mr. Halstead's wonderful discovery of an in-
fallible cure for dyspepsia, began to make a great noise in the city;
and much was said about the  almost  miraculous cures which  he
had  performed.   It is a true proverb,—"A drowning man will
catch at a straw."   I went to Mr. Halstead,—paid him fifty dollars;
and gravely submitted to his manipulations, and followed his pre-
scriptions.   He gave me no directions about the  quality of my
food but told me  to eat as much as I wanted,—to  distend my 
72
stomach pretty well;, and take a little brandy and water with my
meals.   All this seemed to do nicely;  and once more I began to
feel very confident that I had found the philosopher's stone, at last,
and should soon be restored to health.  I continued to feel encour-
aged for some time, and my hopes were high and strong;  but in
about eight or nine months, I began to flag again; and perceiving
that I was in  reality  no better than I was  before  I commenced
Halsteadizing myself, 1 began to suspect that the whole concern
was a downright hoax; and was about abandoning  it in disgust,
when Dr. Sutherland, the partner  of Mr. Halstead, took me in
hand, and said that the grand secret of my want of success  was,
that I did not breathe correctly.  I must  breathe deeply,—draw-
ing down the diaphragm, and pressing out the lower part of the ab-
domen; and thus exercising the abdominal viscera, &c. &c.   After
having passed through a regular training in  the art  of breathing,
without being in any measure cured of my difficulties by it, I  was
more than ever inclined to consider the whole affair a real hoax;
and I abandoned it, with no small degree of chagrin and mortifica-
tion, and not one whit better than when I began.
   Soon after this,  some of  my friends invited  me to attend the
Lectures which  you were  delivering at Greenwich Village, last
winter.   I went  and heard you, with  much  interest, and  was
strongly impressed with the reasonableness  of your views: but I
must honestly confess, that I had now been  so often deceived and
disappointed, I was really ashamed to have my friends know that I
could be induced to try any new experiments.  I  however gradu-
ally slid into  the system, till I got myself into a pretty strict regi-
men.   I abandoned the use of coffee, tea, and all other  stimu-
lants, and flesh;  and put myself on a milk and vegetable diet; but
contrary to your  strongest prohibitions, I still continued to chew
and smoke tobacco occasionally.  Nevertheless my health began
to improve.  For more than a year preceeding  this, I had scarce-
ly passed a single night  without being obliged to get up and. walk
my room,  or have my  limbs and  body rubbed smartly:  now I
slept quietly and sweetly through the night.  My costiveness was
greatly  relieved—my head-ache was much alleviated—my ner-
vous mobility and  mental despondency were in a great measure
removed—my appetite  became more regular  and uniform—my
strength  and flesh increased, and in  every respect, my health ac-
tually improved  under  this regimen more in six months, than it
had ever done under any other one before, by all  odds.
   During  the cholera  season, I persuaded my whole family to
adopt the same system of living, to a considerable  extent, eating
very little flesh.  Bread and milk, and mush and milk, principally,
constituted our food: and we did not spend sixpence for medicine in
our family of sixteen in number, during the whole season.  1  used
none but the coarse bread.   I  however found that the free use of
miJk was not  best for me.   My stomach could not manage it with
perfect eomfort.   Indeed, liquid aliment of  any kind did not  suit 
73
my stomach so well as that which required mastication. I learned
from  my own experience, the correctness of your doctrine, that
that kind of food was best for me, which naturally had considera-
ble bulk in proportion to its nutritious properties.
   After the cholera had passed from our city, I began to use a lit-
tle flesh; but 1 found I  had very little relish for it; and my appe-
tite had no craving for it. After a while, I also  took a little tea;
but I  was soon obliged to abandon it again, as I found its effects
decidedly pernicious.
   I now likewise abandoned the use of tobacco entirely, in every
form, as I was fully convinced of its deleterious effects; and satis-
fied that it had retarded my  improvement since I had adopted, in
other respects, your system of diet and regimen.   From this mo-
ment my health improved with increased rapidity.   All the rem-
nants  of my costiveness, head-ache, languor, mental depression,
&.c. &c. very soon  left me entirely.   My appetite  became still
more  uniform and natural; I  increased in strength and flesh; and
I was cheerful,  sprightly and  active.   1 continued my cold bath
daily, and the free use of my flesh brush; both of which I  found
very beneficial.  After about one month more, I  commenced tak-
ing a little coffee in the morning; and, as I was inclined to think
that you carried some of your  doctrines to extremes, I soon after-
wards began to  eat  a little flesh at dinner, and after this meal, to
drink a little light wine.   For  awhile  I verily thought that these
articles did  me  good ; but a few months' experience disclosed to
me their treachery, and fully convinced me that the more closely 1
adhered to your whole system, the better it was for me.  I there-
fore abandoned them all, and soon found my health decidedly im-
proved  by it.
   I breakfast at eight o'clock, and dine between three and four.
Formerly, when I  used  high seasoned food and took considerable
stimulus, I could not stand it, without my dinner at twelve o'clock.
If I went  longer without eating, I had the most distressing sensa-
tions of gnawing and sinking, at the pit of my stomach, and gene-
ral languor and faintness of my whole system.   Now I  can go
from my breakfast till three or four o'clock in the afternoon, with-
out any unpleasant feelings.  I now weigh one hundred and twen-
ty pounds; about twenty pounds more than when I  left the North
of France, on my return home from Europe: and I am in much
better health than I have been before in ten years.  For eight
years,  my  existence was hardly to  be  borne; and often, during
that time,  I  have thought that even the damned could  not  be
more miserable  than  I was; but now I enjoy life, and the society
of my family and friends, as much as any other man.
   Almost, every physician through whose hands I have passed,
and who has prescribed  for me, (including Mr. H.,) advised me
to drink brandy  and water with my dinner, and some of them or-
dered me to use wine and porter generously: and  these things
                            G 
74
sometimes seemed at first to do me good; but I have always found
in the end that they injured me.
   When  1 drank porter, it seemed to benefit  me very much; but
in  twenty-four hours, the reaction  was tremendous.   I  would
sometimes, however, continue the use of it for three or four days,
and then was obliged  to abandon  it.   I found that alcohol, in all
forms and quantities, injured me: and I am fully convinced, that
no man who is thoroughly broken down with dyspepsia,  can ever
get well, while he uses brandy, or tobacco, or  pepper, or stimu-
lants of any kind.
   I have  a nephew, about twenty-two years of age,  who, when I
first adopted your system, began to have all the symptoms with
which I had been afflicted.   Costiveness, sick head-ache, and all
the horrid train  of dyspeptic evils.  He was constantly taking
medicine, and  continually complaining.  I  saw that he was evi-
dently going on in the same  terrible way, in which I had so long
travelled  in so much misery; and I advised him  to  go  and hear
your  Lectures.  He followed my  advice,  and became a perfect
proselyte, and adopted your  System rigidly, and pursued it with
undeviating integrity.
   He was soon relieved from all his difficulties, and restored to
good health;  and is now hearty and robust.  He ate no flesh dur-
ing the cholera season, and went through without the least indis-
position.
   As for myself,  1  now see  that I have  erred in many things,
since I adopted the mode of living pointed out by you;  and in so
doing, have beyond all  question considerably  retarded my pro-
gress towards complete health.  I  ought to have abandoned my
tobacco entirely,  at the very first start.   I ought also to  have used
less milk; and to have been more guarded and uniform in several
other respects.  Nevertheless, I have been  richly rewarded for
what fidelity I have exercised in the System.   I am now able to
attend to  my business in good health and spirits.
   My expenses for physicians, medicine and travelling, during my
nine  years' sickness, were not less than five thousand dollars; and
the loss in my business,  in  consequence of my sickness, was, I
should think, as much  more.
                     Yours truly,        D. A.  CUSHMAN.
                        [NO. XXVIII. ]

                              New-York, June 12th, 1833.
   Mr. Graham,
               Sir—The information which I am about to com-
municate  to you, may be both interesting and useful to you, and
through you beneficial to others. 
75
  My wife has experienced delicate and variable health ever since
she was eight years  old.  About the age of ten or twelve years,
she was very severely afflicted with rheumatic complaints, and be-
came so much affected, that she was scarcely able to walk.  Af-
ter recovering from this difficulty, her health continued very poor,
and for a number of years, she  was subject to turns of bilious
fever, as often as  once in about three  months, which sometimes
brought her very low indeed.   During these turns she took a great
deal of calomel, and other medicine.   At the age of eighteen she
had one of these turns of bilious fever, from which none of her
friends expected her to recover.  Her physician completely load-
ed her system with mercury, so that she was not only excessively
salivated, butter mouth became so sore that it  would bleed free-
ly,  and the flesh of her gums, &c, seemed as though it would all
slough off.  After recovering from this fit of sickness, her- health
continued very delicate, and at the age of nineteen she was mar-
ried and came to New-York.  She had not been long in the city,
before some one recommended to  her, the medical virtues of the
steam-bath.
   Feeling very  anxious to recover her health by  some means or
other,  she  was ready to listen to every  body's prescription, and
too willing to try all remedies.   She had not however followed up
the use of her steam-bath more than about two weeks, before she
found herself so exceeding debilitated by it, that  she was  hardly
able to walk; and before the end of the third week, the effect be-
came so injurious that she had  to take  to her  bed and even be-
came  seriously  deranged  in her  mind.    I now  became quite
alarmed, and called in  Dr. P.,  who said that the steaming had
nearly killed her.  She  had a very severe turn of sickness, and
was under the doctor's hands, for five or six weeks;—during a part
of which time, none  of us expected she would live many days.
But she recovered from this illness, and continued on about a year
and a half longer, in her usual feeble health, when she  took  a
very bad cold, that resulted in a  violent inflammation of her lungs,
which was attended  with a severe  cough;  great difficulty of
breathing;  distressing  pain in  her breast;  dreadful tightness
across the chest; and general, and extreme debility.  At this time
she was again reduced very low indeed; but she struggled through
it,  and slowly  recovered to her usual very imperfect  state of
health.  Scarcely a year, however, had elapsed after this last re-
covery, before  she was again afflicted  with something of a new
form of disease.   Her body, and  limbs, and feet  began to swell
very badly indeed, and she soon  became so much affected  that
she was unable to lie down  in her bed; but was obliged to sleep
sitting up.  The Doctor did not consider this a confirmed case of
dropsy, but called it a dropsical complaint, of a  very complicated
and blind character.  With  this new form of illness, she  was laid
up about two months, during which time Dr. P. visited her  two
or three times a day.  After this her health continued very mis- 
76
 erable.   Her cough was exceedingly troublesome; severe pain in
 her chest;  pain through the back and kidneys, and occasionally a
 sharp pain  high up in the left side.  Her eye-sight was very poor,
 and at times so bad that we were apprehensive that she would en-
 tirely lose it.   Her memory, also, was much impaired.   Thus  af-
 flicted, it was but natural that she should  be continually seeking
 for relief,  by every means  that was  suggested.  It is due to our
 physician, however, to say, that he always told her that a correct
 diet  would do  her far more good than medicine; but of this she
 was not easily convinced.
   About fifteen months since, we unfortunately saw an advertise-
 ment of the notorious  Hygiean medicine, which  is so  potent  to
 purify the blood, and thus cure all diseases.  I began now to fan-
 cy my own blood a little out of order, and concluded that both
 myself and wife had better give the Hygiean medicine a fair trial.
 Before we had got through the first course, however, it came near
 to killing us both.   It brought on violent vomitings attended with
 severe cramps in the stomach and limbs, resulting in dreadful ex-
 haustion, and debility, and languor.   We  both  quit the use of the
 Hygiean medicine at once; and  for  three months following, my
 wife  took very little medicine.
  During her five or six years of ill health, besides trying almost
 every kind of medical  remedies, for her  relief,  I had  travelled
 with  my wife a great deal, every  summer season;  and sometimes
made long journies with her for her health.  Sometimes we trav-
 elled in  a private carriage, and sometimes  in a public stage.
  During one of our journeys  in Vermont, near Canada,  about
three years ago, we met in the public stage, a Mr. Knowlton, of
Brooklyn, Long-Island, who was also travelling for his health.  He
was extremely emaciated, ghastly and feeble; and so  much  bent
 forward, with debility at the pit of the stomach, that he was very
crooked, and looked like an infirm old man.  Indeed, his appear-
ance was that of a very  miserable man, broken down and worn out
 with  disease.   He said  he had travelled much for his  health, but
 had received very little  benefit; and that nothing he ate seemed to
 agree with him.
  About fifteen months since, as  I was walking along one of our
 streets, a remarkably fine, hearty, robust and plump-looking man,
 apparently  about thirty years of age, came  up to me and calling me
 by name, asked me how I did,  in trro manner of a person well ac-
 quainted with me.   I had no recollection of ever having seen him
 before;  and therefore was compelled to acknowledge my ignorance
 of his name.  " Do you not know me ?"  said he.  "Have yon for-
 gotten the man you travelled with, near Canada, in Vermont, some
 two years ago?"   What! that ghostly-looking invalid,  who was
 travelling for his health; and was poor as  a skeleton, and crooked
 as a bow 1  I inquired.   " The same!" replied  he.  It is not pos-
 sible, that this is Mr. Knowlton,  of Brooklyn!  I exclaimed, with
 astonishment.   "Indeed, it is,"  said he,  "the very same man 
77
whom you saw in Vermont, a ghastly effigy of death."  But what
on earth has brought about this change in you? said I.  Why, you
do not look at all like the same man.   You appear as healthy and
robust as though you had never known a moment's disease in your
life; while my wife, who has been continually in pursuit of health,
ever since we parted from you, is even more unwell now than she
was when we were travelling with you in Vermont, and when you
appeared to be much lower than she was.
  " I will give you the whole history of my case," answered he;
"and tell you by what means I gained my health.   It is now more
than five years since my health began to fail: I  became habitually
and inveterately costive,  and this was soon followed by weakness
and distress at the pit of the stomach,—trouble with my food,—
and the whole train of dyspeptic symptoms.   My flesh and strength
slowly wasted away; and  in spite of all the medical advice and
remedies, which I had  recourse to, (and which  were by no means
few,) I continued to grow worse and worse, until I became so much
reduced and so extremely feeble, that  I was obliged to give up all
business,  and devote myself exclusively to the  pursuit of health;
and what greatly aggravated my afflictions, my  spirits were  so ex-
cessively depressed, that  I was almost continually in a state of de-
spondency.   Finding all  other means useless, I  was advised to
travel for my health; and  it was while  on this pursuit, that 1 be-
came acquainted with you, in Vermont.  After parting from you,
I returned home, no better than when  I started; and again  began
to consult the physicians, and to try their  prescriptions.  But I
soon  found myself growing worse; and again, in compliance with
medical advice, started on a journey to the South.  I continued to
travel till  I had spent nearly all my property, and returned  home,
without any perceptible improvement  in my health.  I was now
completely discouraged;  and felt that I must give up in despair,
and set down and die.  I  continually suffered  a dreadful melan-
choly; and became so exfcremely weak that I was not able to walk
more than half a block: I could not possibly exceed the eighth of
a mile.  In  this condition,  I accidentally heard  of the Lectures of
Mr. Graham, at Clinton  Hall, in June, 1S31, and made out to
hear  one of these,  which so fully convinced me of the course  I
ought to pursue, that I returned home, resolved to give his sys-
tem a fair trial.  I  put myself at once, on a  diet of the  bread
which he  recommends, and pure water, and observed such other
of his rules  as were applicable to my case; daily taking as  much
exercise as I could bear.   During the  first three months, 1 improv-
ed  very  slowly indeed.   My  mind was  more serene and even
cheerful at times, and my constipation was removed, and the un-
easy  sensations about the pit of my stomach, left me; but I con-
tinued very  feeble, and scarcely seemed to gain strength and flesh
at all; I however found,  at the end of three months, that I could
walk farther than  when I  first commenced living on the System.
After this, I improved  very fast;  and  have continued for the six
                            G 
78
months past, to gain health, strength and flesh, with astonishing
rapidity, till I  have become, as you see, perfectly  healthy, and
very robust, strong and active.   For the last  six months, I have
not known  an  ache or pain, but have  enjoyed the most entire
health.  "And now," continued he, "I advise you by  all means
to go and  hear  Graham's  Lectures, and persuade your wife to
adopt his System, strictly and perseveringly;  and depend upon it,
if any thing on earth will cure her, that will."
   The wonderful change which had  been affected in Mr. Knowl-
ton, and his interesting account of the means by which it had been
brought about, very much encouraged  me to hope that my wife
might  yet  be  restored to health; and I returned home and told
her what I had  seen  and heard, and  proposed that she  should
make a trial of the Graham System; and see what effect it would
have on her health.   From  various causes, however, the  matter
was deferred until in February,  1832, when she became much more
unwell.  Her cough  became exceedingly severe;  her lungs be-
came very  sore and weak, so that she was not able to speak aloud;
she raised a great deal of offensive mucus and some blood from
her lungs, and became so much reduced that she was obliged to
take to her bed.
   It was about this juncture, you will recollect, that you first saw
her, and was consulted concerning her case.   You told her that
her case was by no means a hopeless one: but that there was only
one way, short of miraculous power, by which she could reasona-
bly hope to recover her health, and that was by perseverance in a
correct regimen.  You said that she had been so long cultivating
disease in her system, and had abused her body so much with med-
icine, it was impossible for you to tell how soon she would  begin
to find herself benefitted by the course which you should propose:
it might be six weeks, and it might  be three months, before she
would be able to  perceive any  improvement in her health; but  if
at the end  of three months she  did not find herself any worse, she
would have reason to  feel much encouraged.
   I need  not remind  you Jiow exceedingly difficult you found  it
for several weeks at first, to keep her on your system, with any de-
gree of strictness and perseverance.   She had  been so long sick,
and so long accustomed to  have her appetite consulted, that she
was not prepared to deny herself at once, and teach her poor and
capricious appetite to be contented  with a fare which seemed to
her so  plain and uninviting.  But  when  these difficulties were
overcome,  and she had got fairly on  to the  System, she began al-
most immediately to experience some degree  of relief; and in less
than six weeks her improvement was very rapid; and before three
months had elapsed, she  was almost  entirely relieved from all her
complaints, and had gained so  much strength, that she was able to
walk about the city, two or three miles  at a time, without fatigue.
Her complexion and  countenance assumed the aspect of perfect
health, and her eyes sparkled with buoyant animation. 
79
   But with all these advantages derived from such a mode of liv-
ing, I must honestly confess, she  never loved the System.  She
rather used it as a necessary means of recovering her health, than
followed it because of its own pleasantness and virtue: and conse-
quently, she was ever inclined to contemplate with fond  desire,
those indulgences, the  denial of which she continually regarded
as a sacrifice.   With such  feelings, as a matter of course, when
she found herself much improved in her health, and began to feel
confident in her prospect of entire recovery, she relaxed the strict-
ness of her regimen, and began to indulge in little deviations; and
as these did not  immediately seem to affect her unfavorably, she
was encouraged in her transgressions, until  many of her  com-
plaints  began to come back upon her; and even then she did not
seem to possess the resolution necessary to get back on to the  strict
regimen which  you had  marked  out for her.   In this  state of
her health, I went into the country with her, just before the chole-
ra broke out in the city, and spent the summer in travelling and
visiting among  our friends.   Here temptations were continually
besetting her;  and although she always professed to be governed
by your prescription,  yet I must acknowledge that she constantly
indulged, both in the quality and quantity  of her diet, in a manner
altogether incompatible with the rules which you had laid  down
for her.  Either from this cause, or some other,  her health did
not improve in the country; but she began to be, more than  ever,
afflicted with acute and severe pain in her left  side, in the region
of her heart, which sometimes seized her  so violently,  when trav-
elling,  that we were obliged to stop  the carriage  instantly.  On
our return to the city, where she for a short time was more careful
in her diet, she was somewhat relieved.  But it was not long be-
fore mince pies and other kinds of pastry, and greasy substances,
and occasionally stewed oysters, began to find their way within the
pale of her regimen, till she suffered another  attack, of a more
distressing and alarming character, than any she had had for a very
long time.  The pain in the region of her heart became so violent
and continual,  and her difficulty of breathing  so  great, that she
was not able, at  times, to lie down upon  her bed.  Indeed, her
suffering was very great.  I again called  in our family physician,
Dr. P., who was exceedingly puzzled with her complaint, but was
inclined, at first; to consider it a decided affection of the heart.   I
now began to despair of her ever being any better; and concluded
that it was a vain thing for me to hope that any means on  earth
could restore her to health.  About this time you returned to the
city, and  called to see us;  and as you will doubtless recollect, you
told my wife that her complaint was not an affection of the heart,
but a highly morbid sensibility of the  lungs, sympathizing with the
irritations of the stomach ; and that an inflexible integrity in a very
strict dietetic regimen, would  afford her relief; and nothing else
on earth could possibly benefit  her.  I confess that I could not
feel much faith in the potency of simple diet in  such a case;  but  I 
80
 must now candidly acknowledge, that just in  proportion to the
 strictness with which she has followed your advice, she has  been
 relieved from her  sufferings and  improved in her health,   let
 surprising as the fact may appear, 1 have found it very difficult to
 induce her to follow your regimen with undeviating conformity.__
 She is continually hankering for some "forbidden fruit."  The
 last and most  successful expedient I have tried, and am at present
 pursuing, is  to  covenant with her, and to  put  myself under the
 same regimen in all respects, except quantity; and  by this means
 I  have succeeded  in keeping her tolerably strict, save that she
 probably eats much more food than you would approve of.  She is
 now once more relieved from her complaints, and is  enjoying very
 good health, and vyhether she continues to  or not, we  are all now
 fully convinced that your System of living is the only earthly
 means  from which she can reasonably hope to derive any  benefit;
 and the only  way in which she can expect  to enjoy any good de-
 gree of comfort in her bodily  existence.
   I will here observe, by-the-by, that since  I have been living pret-
 ty strictly on  your System, for the sake of  encouraging my wife,
 my own health has improved  considerably, although it  was what I
 called  good before; and I have increased in flesh very  much.
   Our  friend  Knowlton  called  to  see us a few days'since.  He
 was in excellent health, and  spirits, and said he was  now well,
 and hearty, and able to  perform the  hardest labor, and  to walk
 any distance, and to bear any exposure, without  sustaining arty
 injury.   He informed us, also,  that his father  whose  health had
 become much  impaired, had put himself on a diet of coarse bread
 and milk; but finding that the milk was too rich for him  and did
 not agree with him very well, he tried  coarse bread  and water;—
 and on this diet his health had improved astonishingly.
   Speaking of his  own recovery, after suffering so long  and so
 severely, he said with  lively  sensibility, "I owe my life  to  Mr.
 Graham!  My whole family," continued  he, "have  been greatly
 benefitted by  his system.  My  wife was always  a very  delicate
 woman until  I introduced the Graham System of  diet into  my
 family, since which time, although she has not been a  very strict
 follower of the system, except in the use of the coarse bread; yet,
 her health has improved exceedingly;  she has become hearty, ro-
 bust and strong, and when  she is without help  she  is  able to do
 all the  house work of my family, often members!   Indeed she is
 altogether a new creature—another woman ! My two little chil-
 dren, also, since we have lived on this system, have become un-
 commonly healthy  and hardy, and are never unwell.   In fact, my
 whole  family,  have, during the  past year,  been so much more
 healthy than our neighbors, that it has been a matter of observa-
tion and even surprise.   During the whole cholera season, terri-
bly sickly as it was, all around us, we  all  enjoyed  the most  per-
fect health; and while every  body else was full  of dismay, we
were perfectly composed, and  without any apprehensions  of dan-
ger in regard to ourselves." 
81
  Mr. Knowlton has recently left Brooklyn  in good  health and
spirits, and gone with his little family to settle in the valley of the
Mississippi.
  I have one more interesting case to relate to you.  My father-
in-law, U.  C.  H.,  of Vermont, is now fifty-two years old.  He is
by  profession  a lawyer.  He  has for  thirty  years  past been  a
great snuff-taker, and has always been very fond of strong coffee
and tea, and flesh; in fact, he  prefers to make flesh the greater
part of his food; and seems to care little about any other kind of
aliment.  For the  last twenty-four years he has been subject to  a
species of  apoplectic fits, which come  upon him very suddenly,
and entirely suspend  his  voluntary  powers and consciousness;
so that he appears like a dead man, while the fit  is on him.   He
suffers very great  distress while recovering, and is painfully be-
wildered for sometime  after the fit leaves him.   He had these
fits at considerable intervals, at first; but  they gradually became
more frequent till he came  to have them once a week, then twice,
then  three times  a week,  then once a day;  and finally they be-
came as frequent as three, and sometimes  four times a day.  He
has often fallen into a fit suddenly, while at his  meals, or in the
midst of conversation,  and when engaged in pleading a cause.
The effect on his head was extremely distressing, and sometimes
his appetite and health generally, have been much impaired.  He
has taken much pains to  obtain relief from these distressing fits,
but without success.   He came to  New-York in February last,
(1833) to make us a visit, and remained with  us  two or  three
months; and, when he first came, he  had three, and often  four fits
in a day.   We persuaded him to give up his snuff, and live with us
on the'Graham System.  He did so  for ten days, and in that time
did not have a single fit. He then returned to his snuff and former
 mode of living, and his fits returned as bad, and  frequent as ever.
 We then p©™m«Uod him to quit his snuff alone.   This made his fits
 somewhat lighter  and less  frequent.  Abstinence from coffee and
 tea also, benefitted him; but still, withal, his fits continued, while
 he continued to eat flesh;  and it was only when he abstained from
 snuff, coffee, tea,  flesh, &c, and ate the Graham bread, that  he
 was  relieved entirely from his fits.  We  are therefore persuaded
 that  his very free use  of flesh had much  to do  with causing his
 fits.   Perhaps if  he had not taken the snuff, he would not have
 had the fits, but it seems that the flesh was an auxiliary cause; and
 that when they were once  induced and established, the flesh was
 enough to perpetuate them.  I conclude this very long communi-
 cation, by saying that Mrs. Tracy is, at present, to use her own
 words,' in  perfect health and spirits;  and joins me in sentiments of
 most cordial respect and gratitude.
                v                   GEORGE M. TRACY. 
82
                       [NO. XXIX.]

                              New-York, June 12th, 1833.
  Mr.  Graham,
              Dear  Sir—I am now thirty-nine  years old, and
by trade a carpenter.  I have always  been accustomed to active
life, and from my childhood, have enjoyed health, till about nine
years ago, when I began to be unwell.  I have never used tobac-
co in any form  or manner, and have never used but very little
ardent  spirits; but  I have  eaten flesh very freely, always twice a
day, and often three times.   I have also been very fond of tea and.
coffee ; taking coffee once a day, and tea twice, as a regular cus-
tom.
  The first indications of declining health which I noticed, were
a dizziness, and distressing confusion of the head and the mind;
attended with general relaxation of the muscular system, some-
times amounting to a kind of paralysis;  and after these difficulties
had continued to afflict me for a considerable time, growing worse
and worse, the paroxysms at length became so bad, that they often
appeared much like a fit of apoplexy.   I became  excessively ner-
vous, so that  I  was continually full  of apprehensions of danger,
afraid  of every thing, and starting with alarm at almost every
thing.  If any thing came upon me suddenly,  it affected me very
much,  and sometimes overcame me entirely.  I often became so
much embarrassed and confused, that  I would lose the  power of
speech; and frequently, when in conversation, I used suddenly to
lose my thoughts in the midst of a sentence, and totally forget
what I was talking about.    Sometimes, when  engaged in family
prayer, I used to lose myself entirely in the midst of the exercise.
  When out from home, I was often  attacked with these turns
in the street, and became so  much confused  and  bewildered, that
it was with great difficulty  I  could find  the way to my house.   I
very frequently experienced a sense of a sudden rushing of blood
to the  brain; and especially if any thing came upon me unexpect-
edly; and sometimes it was very powerful and distressing.  If any
one came in upon me  suddenly, I suffered violent palpitations of
the heart, rushing of blood to the head, dreadful confusion of the
brain,  and became pale and bewildered, and appeared very strange.
Sometimes I  was taken at the table, with my knife and fork in my
hands, and perhaps half way to  my mouth, when my hands would
fall with sudden palsy, and my whole appearance would be that of
a dying man; and indeed,  I was often thought to be dying.  At
length, this state of things  became almost continual through the
day, and was nearly  as bad through the night.   My sleep was
very broken,  unsound and unrefreshing; and every thing seemed
to concur to destroy my health and life.
  When these difficulties first began to afflict me, I called Dr. M.,
who bled me and gave me  some medicine; but I was not in the
least benefitted by his treatment.  I afterwards called in another 
83
physician, who treated me in the same  manner, without any good
effect.   Throughout the whole time, my bowels were continually
in a state of disorder, either from constipation or diarrhcea.
   In spite of every means which I tried for relief, my difficulties
and sufferings continued, and gradually became  more and more
severe and permanent, until January, 1832, when I went to hear
your Lectures in Mulberry-street; and soon began gradually to
adopt the mode of living which you recommended.   I first gave
up tea and coffee, and began to eat the Graham bread; and so by
degrees came more and more into the System.  I had not followed
your System long, before  my health  began to improve; and in a
little while all my difficulties left me; and for more than seventeen
months, I  have not had an unwell hour.   Last summer,  during
the whole  cholera season,  I walked every day three miles out,
 and labored all day at  the carpenter's business, and then walked
 home at night; and through the season enjoyed excellent  health.
 My sleep was sound and sweet aad  refreshing.  During the last
 three months, I have eaten no flesh at  all; and in that time I find
 that my health has  become still more perfect, and that my enjoy-
 ment of life has increased.   1 am now stronger, and  able to  do
 more  work without fatigue than  I  ever was before.  I  used to
 come home  from my day's  labor, very much exhausted, burning
 with thirst, and without any appetite, and throw myself down upon
 the floor or  bed, all unstrung and full  of lassitude.  Now  I come
 home vigorous  and  cheerful, and  never  oppressed with fatigue;
 seldom thirsty,  and never unpleasantly so ;  and my appetite is al-
 ways good;  and my simple and  nourishing food has a very high
  relish; and my mind is always clear and composed; and my health
  is excellent. In fact,  I do not know how it could be better.
    My wife, who  is about my own ago, has been nearly as much
  benefitted by your Lectures as myself.  She always enjoyed good
  health, till she was over twenty years old:—then she began to be
  afflicted with head-ache and other unpleasant complaints, which
  were  light at  first, but gradually  increased in  severity and fre-
  quency, and durability. About fourteen years ago, the sick-head-
  ache began to come on with great violence.  And  many  distres-
  sing  symptoms of indigestion increased upon  her, and  became
  more frequent and severe, till she was afflicted with sick head-ache
  at least, three  days in the week constantly, and with  such  vio-
  lence that she was unable  to attend to any of her  domestic con-
  cerns; and frequently was obliged to keep her bed.  She was
  also  much  afflicted with  distressing  dizziness in  the  head, and
  very great depression  of spirits.  Her appetite was very irregu-
  lar and poor.    She was exceedingly debilitated, and at times her
  strength was all gone.  Her bowels were habitually costive; and
  she  was  obliged to take  charcoal and mustard seed, after every
  meal, to relieve her dyspeptic symptoms.
    In this manner she  went on,  year after year, suffering very se-
  verely, and gradually becoming more and more unwell, till  she 
84
went with me to hear your Lectures, and with me commenced liv-
ing on your System.  For a few days, at first, after she had com-
menced this course, she suffered very much; but after a while, her
pains and disorders began to be less severe, and of shorter dura-
tion,—and in the space of a few weeks, they all disappeared; and
for more than a year past, she has enjoyed excellent and uninter-
rupted health: being uniformly cheerful, active and vigorous; and
able to attend to all her domestic concerns, and to  walk any dis-
tance she chooses, without fatigue.   During the cholera  season,
her health was remarkably fine.   We were both quite strict upon
your System, eating no other bread than such as you recommend,
and which we made at home; and we had not the slightest symp-
tom of cholera.
   A Mrs.  M----,  a lady of much intelligence, of about thirty
years of age, who resided in a  part of my house, last year,  had
long been severely  afflicted  with sick head-ache, and other ail-
ments, for which she could find no permanent relief, till she adopt-
ed your System.  She attended your  Lectures to the females, and
immediately adopted the System, and  followed it with great strict-
ness.   Wheat-meal gruel, Graham bread, and Graham crackers,
constituted her  diet  during the cholera season.   Every pain  and
indisposition left her; and her health was as good as human health
can be: to use her own frequent declaration, it was perfect.   She
gained several pounds of flesh; and became very cheerful, robust
and active.  She often assured us, that her health was, in all re-
spects, as perfect as it could be.  She has since married, and left
the city.
   My wife joins with me in sentiments of sincere gratitude  to you;
wishing you, most heartily, the richest blessings of  Heaven, and
the best enjoyments of life.
                                       JAMES  LITTLE.
                              New-York, June 12th, 1833.
  Mr. Graham,
              Sir—My health was such as is commonly consid-
ered good, until  I was between sixteen and seventeen years  old.
Being then engaged as a clerk in a dry-goods store,  and not par-
ticularly careful  as to my diet, I began to decline in health.  The
first inconvenience which I suffered, and the importance of which
I did not then fully appreciate, was a  constipation of the bowels.
For this, I sought relief in the occasional use of cathartic medicine,
without knowing that by every momentary alleviation thus obtain-
ed, the real difficulty was more deeply and permanently establish-
ed.  As the constipation assumed a chronic character, I  began to
expeiience a pain in the breast, which soon became very dibtress-
ing and habitual.   A dull, heavy  feeling of the head, which  in  a 
85
little time grew into a continual and often very severe pain,  was
the next affliction in the train of my sufferings; and this was soon
accompanied by an almost incessant and distressing sickness of
the stomach.  My appetite became poor and irregular: I had sel-
dom any desire to eat, or any enjoyment of my food.  At break-
fast I had no disposition to take any thing but  my cup of coffee,
and this seemed to be my sustaining cordial. I became very weak,
languid  and dispirited; and felt  wholly unable to attend to  any
business or do any thing.   My mind suffered exceedingly with
my body, and I became dull and irresolute,  and extremely melan-
choly and desponding.  I consulted several different physicians;
indeed, scarcely a month  passed, in which  I did not feel myself
obliged to call a doctor; and I  was continually, as I then believed,
under  the necessity of taking medicine.   The relief,  however,
which  I gained by such means, was, if any, of a very momentary
kind; while on the whole I continued to grow more and more un-
well.   At length, a troublesome cough and severe pain in my side,
set in,  and became almost incessant.  My eyes also became very
weak, so that I could not read in the evening,  at all.  Such was
the miserable state of my  health;  and I began to despair of ever
being any better; when I commenced attending your Lectures, in
December, 1831, at the B-pg^f.A  ^eting-house in Mulberry-street.
As fast as I  learned you^-gjaPLa", \ _ adopted it; and my health soon
began  to improve; and in a few months I recovered  good health.
My long established, and hitherto incorrigible, constipation,  was
entirely overcome; the pain in my breast and head and side,  and
the sickness of my stomach, and weakness of my eyes, and my dis-
tressing cough, and cheerless melancholy, all gradually disappear-
ed;  and  a  good  appetite—increasing strength—sweet sleep—a
general sense of vigor and elasticity of body, and cheerfulness of
mind, succeeded them.  Nearly eighteen months have since elaps-
ed; during which time, I have enjoyed most  excellent and uninter-
rupted health,  without having one occasion  for medicine or medi-
cal advice.  I  now am in the enjoyment  of perfect health:  for
which, with  sincere gratitude, I gladly acknowledge myself indebt-
ed to you, as the instrument of God.  And may you  reap a rich
reward for all your truly philanthropic labors.
             Sincerely and respectfully yours,
                              SAMUEL S. KETCHAM.
                         [NO. XXXI.]

                              New-York, June 14th, 1833.
  Mr. Graham,
              Sir—My health was good until I was sixteen years
old,  at which time I went to the trade  of painting and gilding
chairs.  In about two years and a half, I began to experience great
                              H 
86
weakness in the breast, and pain seemingly about the lungs, attend-
ed with some cough.  I continued on about two years longer, at
my trade, and continued to grow worse and worse, in spite of every
medical remedy that I could hear of: plasters, &c. Stc.  Two phy-
sicians had me in hand, till I became unable to do any thing at my
business.   I suffered great  distress at  the  lungs—shortness of
breath—could not sit still  any length  of time: finally, I  quit all
business, and spent three months in pursuit of health, without ben-
efit.   I then abandoned my trade,  and  took to driving a carman's
cart.   In this employment, 1 became some better; but still  con-
tinued to be very weak in the breast, and particularly in the lungs.
After driving my cart three years,  1 became much more unwell, in
the spring of 1831, and was  very much affected with the difficulty
in my chest and head—dizziness, fainting, &c.  After partially re-
covering from  this, my breast continued  weak.   My particular
business has been, carting hay, which was straining to the breast;
and I felt much weakness  and soreness.
   This state of things continued,  till  I commenced hearing your
Lectures, in the latter part of January, 1833;  and at the close of
the course, I commenced living strictly on your System, My health
soon began to improve, and  has continued to ever since.   For the
last three months, I have eaten no flesh: my strength has improv-
ed very much;  my weakness and difficulties of the chest  have di-
minished exceedingly; and I have  found myself able to do  much
more work, and with a great deal less fatigue.  1 have this spring,
since living without flesh,  done as much again work as 1  ever did
before; and without fatigue.   I sometimes, when  pitching hay a
great while, feel a little weakness of the chest; but very light.   1
am confident that I can pitch hay now as fast again as I could be-
fore I adopted your System;  and 1 am  confident that my present
mode of living has done me more good than any thing else 1 ever
itried.  My difficulty of  breathing, shortness of breath, pain, Sic
are gone.  In short, I now enjoy excellent  health,  and feel strong
and active.                  WILLIAM T. MACKRELL.
                        [NO. XAA1I.J

                              New-York, June 14th, 1833.
  Mr. Graham,
              Sir—My health  was ordinalily good  till  I  was
about twenty-three years old, when 1 became rather suddenly ill,
suffering a general lassitude and debility.   My stomach became
weak and irritable, and  I was exceedingly troubled with indiges-
tion, and pain at the  pit of the stomach, and very distressing pain
in the left side.  1 lost flesh very fast, and my countenance soon
became sunken and ghastly; and my spirits excessively depressed 
87
and gloomy.  I consulted a number of physicians, and took a
great deal of medicine; but continued to grow more and more un-
well in spite of every thing, although  some of the  prescriptions
seemed to  benefit me awhile, and excited my hopes; but it was
only to plunge me in a deeper despondency, by really aggravating,
while they seemed to alleviate my disorder.   Myself and all  my
friends fully believed that I had the consumption, and  I began to
despair of  ever being any better.  I finally gave up business and
went into the country, where I staid six or seven weeks;  but  not
finding my health improve, I returned  as unwell as  I went.   My
body was so much disordered, and my mind so full of melancholy
wretchedness, that I had no social enjoyment and  no comfort of
my life, and despaired of ever again having any.  I forsook soci-
ety, and  shut myself out from all social intercourse, and  became
surly,  peevish,  fretful, and really ill-natured ;  I  did not wish to
spj.'ak  to any one; and  did  not, pleasantly, on any occasion.   I
was solitary and  unspeakably miserable.   The pain  in  my side
was constant and very severe.   In short, I was in all respects
wretched beyond measure, and my life was a burden to me.   Yet
my appetite was all the time good.
   In this condition, I went, in the fall of 1831, to hear your Lec-
tures at  Clinton Hall, and gradually adopted your System of liv-
ing.   For a considerable time, I found no great  change for  the
better, in my health.   In the course of three months, however, I
perceived  some improvement;  at the end  of six months I w^s di=
cidedly better, and before a  year had  elapsed I was altogether a
renovated  man; my health was  completely restored, and I again
became, as I  had ever  been before I  lost my health,  remarkably
social, cheerful and  active, enjoying life  as well as any one.  I
am now  in excellent health.  Indeed, 1 am a living demonstration
of the  excellence of your system.
   I am not at present quite  as  strict as I ought to  be; for I  find
that my stomach is now so free from all its disorders, and so per-
fectly  healthy  and vigorous, that  I  can digest any thing; and I
too frequently give way to indulgence; and by this means some-
times, when I  go too far, I feel a little touch of my old complaint
in my  side, especially if I-have a cold;  but a little more strictness
in regimen sets all right  again.
   I am persuaded that many cheat themselves out of great bene-
fits, and unjustly reproach your System, in consequence of their
own fickleness.   They will partially or entirely adopt your Sys-
tem, and follow it for a few days, or at longest, a few weeks,  and
because they are  not sensible  of that immediate  benefit which
they desire, they  abandon the  System, and perhaps  condemn it
with great severity.   But they ought to consider  that nature re-
quires time to throw off chronic disease, and recover health;  and
they ought, therefore, to persevere, at  least one year, before they
abandon and condemn a  System by which so many others have
been  greatly benefitted.  I  am fully  satisfied that no  one  will 
88
have cause to complain of your excellent System, if he will give it
a fair and faithful trial.  I am also persuaded that those who have
their bread made at home, will find much the  most comfort and
satifaction, in the mode of living which you recommend.
  With the  most grateful acknowledgments to  you, sir, as the
means of restoring me to health and cheerful enjoyment of life,
       / am very respectfully yours,
                                  JONATHAN ODELL.
                       [NO. XXXITI.]

                           New-York, 6th Mo. 17th, 1S33.
   Esteemed. Friend,
                  If a brief statement of my own case, as affect-
ed  by a conformity to that System of diet, which thou hast taught
in thy Lectures, will be of use to thee, or serve in any measure to
promote the success of the great and good cause to which thou hast
devoted  thyself; be  assured, thou art very welcome to  it; and it
will give me pleasure to bear testimony in favor of thy views con-
cerning diet and regimen, whenever occasion shall render it  prop-
er.
  From my childhood, my health has been exceedingly delicate.
When I was a child I was much afflicted with disordered bowels.
As 1 grew up,  I became some better, and continued so till I mar-
ried: but when I  became a  mother, the disorder returned  upon
me.  It would first commence with acidity of stomach, and  some
pain; and then run into a diarrhoea; and at length it became a
continued  diarrhoea.   The first  thing  in the  morning, when I
awoke, I felt  a pain and working, or  disturbance in the bowels;
and this would continue till a movement of diarrhoea took place;
and this state of things, has continued for eighteen years, without
intermission; and then been checked  for a short time;  and  again
returned upon me; gradually reducing me, and wearing me  down
towards the grave.   My bowels were extremely weak and irrita-
ble;  my back,  also, was  very weak, and I suffered a great  deal
from pain in the back, especially when I was troubled  with  acidi-
ty of the stomach.   For many years I experienced a dull pain in
my head;  and my head became weak and confused, and my men-
tal  powers seemed much debilitated; my body was very feeble,
and I had very little strength; and was unable to walk  any dis-
tance without  great  fatigue.   I always  used the utmost caution
not to wet my feet, nor expose myself in any manner.  Dr. B.----
was  my first physician, and after him Dr. G. S., and  after him
Dr. D. R., and others.   But medicine afforded me nothing more
than apparent and momentary relief. 
89
   Dr. S., said it was of very  little consequence  what my diet
was, while Dr. R. said that every thing depended on my die*-  I»
this, the latter agreed with Dr  B.;  but  none of them seemed to
have  correct notions concerning diet, after all.  If I had  under-
stood  things twenty years ago, as  I now do; if  I had  then had
some one to instruct me, as thou hast done in thy Lectures,  I am
fully  persuaded that  I should  have enjoyed sound  health, long
since.  But I did not fully understand my own  case, and  what
was best for me, myself; and I  was able to get but very  little in-
struction from others.  Thus I continued on, suffering in this man-
ner, for about  thirty years; and often during that time I was so
severely afflicted, that I was completely  prostrated, and  confined
to my bed, with extreme debility, and obliged to have cloths under
me, because I had not strength to sit up, nor to prevent an invol-
untary diarrhoea.   About fourteen years  ago, however, I  com-
menced a System of diet of my own, from which  I obtained con-
siderable relief; but still my complaints continued.  After  having
adopted my regimen,  I went to see a friend, who was afflicted in
the same manner that I was.   We sat down at her table  together,
and she was curious to  know how 1 lived, while  I observed that
she  ate  pound-cake, sweet-meats and  all other rich  and  (as
the world calls them,) "good things," before her.  When she saw
what my diet was, she declared that she could not live  as I did;
and should surely die, if she were to try to.  I  told her  that  I
was very certain that I could not live long as she did;  and I feared
she would not live long in the course she was then pursuing.  But
she was not inclined to  listen to  me; and she died of her com-
plaints in two years.
   Notwithstanding all  my sickness, I have, during it, given birth
to eleven children; eight of which by the goodness of Divine Provi-
dence, are still  living.   All my children, which I nursed myself,
have been affected with  my complaints, and  some of them  very
seriously.
   I have never been in the habit of drinking strong tea, and have
always given a great deal of care  to my  diet, and endeavored  to
regulate it according to the best of my knowledge.
   About eighteen months ago, I commenced attending thy Lec-
tures at Clinton Hall, and about the same time became  a pretty
strict observer of thy system of diet.  The Graham bread, mush,
made of the same kind  of meal,  plain boiled potatoes,  plain  boiled
rice, with a very little milk, have principally composed my food.
Since  I have adopted this mode of  living, I have not had  a severe
turn of my complaint, and have been a  considerable portion  of
my time, wholly free from it. I have not been once  confined to my
bed with it, during the last eighteen months  When I  am very
strict in my  diet, and avoid over exertion, confining myself princi-
pally to thy  bread, and mush made of thy  meal, I am  entirely free
from the complaint which so long has troubled me; but such is the
weakness and chronic habits of  my bowels, that  a  little deviation
                             h2 
90
from my regimen, in my food, or a little over exertion, brings On a
slight diarrhoea.  During the cholera season, and especially the
autumn  after it, being particularly cautious and  uniform in my
diet, my health was better than it  had been before, for twenty
years.
  But during the last winter I took a cold, which brought on rheu-
matic complaints, that put me back very much.  1 have, however,
on  the whole, been much benefitted by thy instructions, and feel
entirely persuaded  that were  I not so far  advanced in life, and
were not my system so extremely  feeble, and my body so habitu-
ated to diseased action, I should,  by the help of thy System, ob-
tain entire and permanent  health; and  1  am equally confident,
that no earthly  means can afford me so  great a degree of health
and comfort.   But the excellency of thy System needs no support
from my testimony, when there are so  many proofs of it, in the
wonderful cases of restoration to health by it, with which our city
abounds.  And the case of my son George is not the least remark-
able of these.   From his birth up, he has been extremely delicate,
and his health has always been so  poor, that we have continually
entertained fears, that we should lose him;  but since he has been
a follower of thy System, he has, as it were, become another man.
Indeed, we are not more delighted than  astonished at the change.
  The cause in which  thou  art engaged, is a very great, and ex-
ceedingly arduous one.   Thou hast much  to contend with, and
much to discourage and  sicken  thy  heart.  Much evil will be
said of thee, and  thou must suffer a great deal of misrepresenta-
tion and obloquy and detraction; but my young friend, be not dis-
heartened, but go forward. I verily believe that God is with thee,
and that*he will stand by thee, to  bless  thee and prosper thee.—
Persevere, then, with a humble heart, and  a meek spirit.   With
a soul full of benevolence for thy fellow creatures, and  with a full
reliance on Divine assistance, and on the excellence of thy cause,
and the integrity of thy purpose, go on  my young friend, and  re-
gard not the opposition of a blinded and deluded world. Do good
to thy fellow creatures, though they ask it not;  nay, though they
reject it with scoffing, still do them all  the  good thou  canst, and
verily thou shalt have thy reward.
                Thy sincere friend,
                                      PHEBE CORLIES.

   * * *  My mother desired me to  remember her to thee.   She
enjoys excellent health, and a fine flow of spirits.   She has nothing
of the diarrhoea.  What a wonderful instance of the efficacy of a
proper diet:—after having a chronic diarrhoea for more than twen-
ty years, to get relief at length, by living on the despised Graham
System.   She now confines  herself to the Graham bread, with the
addition of milk, sweet potatoes, and a little fruit.
              Thy friend,           GEORGE  CORLIES.
   New-York, 10th Mo.  1833. 
91
  William Goodell,  Esq. of New-York, recent editor of the
Genius of Temperance, and now editor of the Emancipator, after
having been sorely afflicted with chronic diarrhoea, for more than
ten years, without being able to obtain a permanent relief by any
means, has been entirely cured of that troublesome complaint, by
strictly adopting the system which I teach.
  Several other interesting cures of the same complaint have also
been effected by this mode of living.                   S.  G.
                        [NO. XXXIV.]

                              New-York, June 15th, 1833.
  Friend Graham—
                   I am now between  forty and fifty years old,
and have been the  greatest portion of my life afflicted with ill
health.  For a great number of years, I have suffered very much
from that troublesome and  distressing complaint, the gravel.   I
have followed many prescriptions, and tried a great variety of rem-
edies;  but found, from  none of them, any thing more than a mo-
mentary alleviation.
  In June,  1831, I went to Clinton Hall to hear your Lectures;
and was so fully convinced  of the correctness  of your doctrines,
that I immediately adopted your most rigid System, even in its ex-
tremes.  In this I was probably imprudent.  For several weeks,
I lost flesh and strength with great rapidity, till 1 became exceed-
ingly emaciated  and feeble.  Still, however, I continued to keep
up my  exercise,  and take my regular morning walks, of four or five
miles;  although  I was sometimes so weak that I used to stagger as
I walked along the streets.   Yet I felt  perfectly well;  and what
seemed to me rather remarkable, was, that I generally felt strong-
er, and more vigorous, at the end of my walk, than  when I first
started.  Several months passed off in this way; and although my
old complaint had left me entirely, and I was free from every pain
and sense of illness—and, so far as my feelings were concerned,
enjoyed the best of health—yet, somehow or other, I could not
manage to pick  up my crumbs, and regain my flesh and robustness
of appearance.  Every body said  I was starving myself to  death,
on Graham's System; and my family kindred, who really believed
it, were exceedingly exasperated against you, and seriously thought
that you ought to be hung, for destroying human life in such a man-
ner. Nevertheless, I persevered, against all opposition; preferring
greatly, my  ghostly form, and all the sneers and ridicule and oblo-
quy which I received, with an entire immunity  from my old com-
plaints and sufferings,—to a portly body, and the world's approba-
tion, with the constant torments of the gravel.  By patient endur-
ance, and resolute perseverance, however, I have gained an entire 
92
victory over both disease and opposition.   After rigidly observing
your System, for the best part of a  year,—during  the  whole of
which time, I felt perfectly well,—I began to gain in flesh, and im-
prove in strength;  and continued to gain, till I became much more
fleshy than I ever was before.   My cheeks became full and round,
and my complexion assumed the clearness and ruddiness of youth-
ful health  and  vigor;  and in  every  respect I  became  perfectly
healthy and robust, and  cheerful;  and I have since, for about one
year, continued to enjoy  the most perfect and uninterrupted health,
up to the present moment.   During the prevalence of the cholera
in this city,  I had not the least indisposition of any kind.  I con-
tinued my daily exercise as usual all through  the  sickness;  and
one day in August I took a walk of forty miles out into the coun-
try, and could  have gone ten miles farther, without unpleasant fa-
tigue.  The next day 1  walked back  into the city with great ease
and pleasantness.
  I am perfectly satisfied, that, as a general  rule, every  man may
enjoy health if he will;   and that it is  disgraceful to be sick.
  Thus much  concerning myself,  in relation to your system.
  I have a neighbor, by the name of Higgins, who is a blacksmith
by trade, and now about the middle of life.   He had been for sev-
eral years in bad health, and had become so completely disordered
and broken down,  that   he was able to attend to little or no busi-
ness.   He first heard your Lectures, at the same time that I did,
and immediately adopted your System; but he did not go to such
extreme as I did.   He very soon got rid of his disorders and com-
plaints, and entirely recovered his health, and has ever since con-
tinued to enjoy the best  of health.  He is a very large, well  pro-
portioned and  powerful  man:  still adheres closely to your  Sys-
tem; and is driving on  his  business with great  industry and suc-
cess.   During the cholera season, neither he nor any of his fami-
ly who lived on your System, was troubled with that disease.
  I could tell you of other interesting instances of benefit deriv-
ed from your Lectures;  but I will  not weary your patience.
              Yours with much esteem,
                                     JOHN B. JANSEN.

  Mr. Richard Griffith, of New-York, after having been most
grievously afflicted with the Gravel  for several years, and passed
through the hands of a number of physicians, without benefit, has
recovered the most perfect health, by  living according to my rules.
He has written me a long and interesting  letter on the subject,
which I am compelled to omit here.                    S. G. 
93
ABSTRACTS.
           In order to keep the size of the present volume within the bounds originally
         contemplated, I am obliged to give the following very brief abstracts, instead
         of the full and interesting communications, wnich I hope still to have an oppor-
         tunity to publish.

           Miss A.  Hussy, of New-York, after being afflicted from her
         childhood with distressing sick-head'-ache—and several years with
         dyspepsia in its worst form, adopted the system which I recom-
         mend and was soon restored to most excellent,  and  uniform, and
         permanent health.
           Francis G. Macy, of New-York, had  been dreadfully afflicted
         with the sick-head-ache, for more than thirty years.  He heard my
         Lectures, abandoned coffee  and tea, and ate the unbolted  wheat-
         meal bread, and soon obtained an entire and permanent relief.
           Andrew  Cook and wife, of New-York, after having suffered
         from fifty  to sixty years with  very frequent and violent turns of
         sick head-ache, were entirely relieved by living on this System.
           Hervy Spencer of New-York, was alarmingly troubled with
*         bleeding  at the  lungs, and many  other  symptoms  of pulmonary
         consumption, and received good health  by following  my directions
         of general regimen.
           Andrew  Luke, of New-York, after having  been severely af-
         flicted  for several years, with bilious  complaints;  bleeding at  the
         lungs,  and many other distressing symptoms of pulmonary dis-
         ease,  has been restored  to the best of health, by this system of
         living.
           Stephen P. Hines, recently one of the Editors of the Genius
         of Temperance, New-York, lost  several brothers  by the con-
         sumption; and for three or four years had been  suffering a decay
         of health, and began to feel many of the distressing and unequivo-
         cal  symptoms of pulmonary disease, and began to think that he
         must necessarily fall a victim to that complaint.   His nephew Jo-
         seph Hines, was still further advanced; had a  very bad coughs-
         raised  much blood from his lungs:  and his friends had little hope
         of his surviving many months.  They have both been restored to
         good health by following my advice.
           Mrs Merit H. Smith, of New-York, had been long and most
         distressingly affected with sick-head-ache, and subject to frequent
         turns of excessive bleeding  at the lungs, so that she was often
         brought extremely low, and  apparently near to  death.   She has
         recovered excellent health on my regimen. 
94
   Henry  R. Piercy,  of New-York, after  being afflicted  for
 many years with complicated complaints;  cholera  morbus; fever;
 pain in the breast; inflammatory rheumatism &c; has  been re-
 stored to excellent health by my system.
   William Mitchell, of New-York, was for many years pain-
 fully afflicted with vertigo and  confusion  of the head, to such an
 extent, at  times, as  to  unfit him for business.   Mis.  Mitchell
 from childhood, had  suffered extremely from  sick head-ache and
 other distressing  complaints, without being able to obtain any re-
 lief.  Their two daughters had  begun to be affected with nervous
 complaints, head-ache, &.c.   Their little son was laborinor under
 the symptoms of an advanced  stage of pulmonary consumption,
 when the whole  family adopted  my System, and  in a few months
 were all restored  to excellent health, which they still  continue to
 enjoy.  Before adopting this system of living, Mrs. Mitchell had
 never been able to eat strawberries in the smallest quantity, with-
 out being  made  distressingly sick by them;  now she eats  them
 with freedom, without the least inconvenience.
   Eleazer Partly, of New-York, one of the first Surgeon Den-
 tists in the United States, after enduring a miserably deranged
 state of health, and particularly a severe pain in the  breast, for
 more than  ten years, for which  he had in vain sought relief from
 the best medical skill of London and New-York, has been restored
 to the best  of health by the System which I teach.  In the same
 manner, Mrs.  Parmly has  recovered excellent  health, after seven
 or eight years sickness and suffering.
   John Burdell, of New-Yoik, a Surgeon  Dentist of great mer-
 it and  rising  reputation, has been  exceedingly benefitted by the
 System; head-ache, weak eyes, general debility, &c., all complete-
 ly removed.
   Mrs. Sarah Van  York, of the same  city,  had  endured a mis-
 erable state of health for many years; very weak; frequent turns
 of fainting away;  disease of the  liver;  pain in  the side ; incessant
 head-ache,  often extremely violent; general bodily anguish; dread-
 ful melancholy, &.C., all of which were enyrely removed, and ex-
 cellent and permanent health restored by the regimen  which 1
 prescribe.
   Nicholas Yan Heyniger, of New-York, was afflicted with
 impaired health for several years ; his sight was so much affected
that he could  not  read at all  by  candle light.   A few months' ob-
servance of my regimen, restored him to good health and perfect
soundness,  clearness and strength of vision.
   Many cases of  Piles of the most distressing and inveterate char-
acter, have been  reported  to me, as being entirely cured by the
simple  regimen which I  teach.   I regret that  I have not room to
give at length, all the interesting  statements which 1 have received;
fully believing that they are of the utmost importance to my suffer-
ing fellow creatures.                                  S. G. 
                                   95


                        [from the journal.]


            GRAHAM  MEETING  IN  PROVIDENCE.


  Pursuant to a public notice,  given by  a Committee appointed by Mr. Gra-
ham's class, a Meeting was held at Masonic  Hall, in Providence,  March 4,
1834, composed of a large number of individuals  of  both sexes, who  had at-
tended the Lectures of Sylvester  Graham, on The Science of  Human
Life, and who  approved of his system of instruction—at which Meeting, re-
solutions  reported by the  Committee, consisting of Rev. Thomas Williams,
James Scott and Stanford Newel, were unanimously adopted, as follows:

   1.   Resolved, That the Lectures which Mr. Graham has delivered in thia
city, have not merely equalled, but  highly exceeded  the  expectations we had
formed respecting the nature, the objects  and importance of his System.
   2.   Resolved, That while we are deeply sensible  of the  misapprehensions
and misrepresentations that exist in respect to Mr. Graham, and  his objects and
sentiments, among persons who have not  had  an  opportunity or an inclination
lo obtain information on  these subjects; yet, we are persuaded, that  the senti-
ments and practices which  he inculcates in his '• Lectures  on the Sci-
 ence  of Human Life," accord with the fundamental principles  of physi-
ology, and the laws of our nature, resulting from our compound and wonderful
existence.
   3.   Resolved, That in our judgment,  the System which Mr Graham scien-
tifically and experimentally illustrates and enforces, is essential  to the continu
ance and prevalence of the reformation which has  happily commenced and
 rapidly advances, with the progress of knowledge and virtue, liberty and hap-
piness, among'mankind.
   4.   Resolved, therefore,  That we cheerfully contribute  our testimony, to
 sustain and extend  the reputation  of Mr. Graham, as a Public Lecturer on
the Science of Human  Life, from a deep solicitude that  our fellow men
 may receive as extensively as possible, the benefits which his  instructions are
calculated to produce, in reference to their material, mental and moral capaci-
 ties, obligations, interests and enjoyments.
   5.   Resolved, Ihat  in acknowledgment of the benefits we have received
 from the Lectures of Mr. Graham, we are desirous of presenting to  him some
 proper and permanent testimonial of our  esteem, friendship, and cordial appro-
 bation of his character and conduct, as they have  been publicly and  privately
 exhibited, during his residence in this city.
   6.   Resolved, That we are persuaded that happy results will aiise  from a
 candid and rational experiment of  the System  which  Mr.  Graham enforces; of
 the good effects of which, in the economy of human life, there are many living
 and grateful witnesses.
   7.   Resolved, That  the preceding resolutions  be signed  by the  Chairman
 and Secretary of this meeting, and presented to Mr. Graham, and  also that
 they be published.

   A Committee was appointed to carry the fifth resolution into  effect,  by ap-
 propriating, under instructions, the amount subscribed.
 1                                             S.  NEWEL, Chairman.
   VVM.  S. PATTEN, Secretary.

   At an Adjourned Meeting, holdnn at Masonic Hall, March 15, 1834, a beau-
 tiful  silver Fruit Basket, and an elegantly bound copy of  Dr. Noah Webster's
 quarto Dictionary, were presented to Mr. Graham, in fulfilment of  the above
 fifth resolution. 
INDEX.
    Animal food—effects on students, p. 17.
    Asthma;  p. 20, 61.
    Bilious complaints; p. 4S, 53, 93.
    Coffee and Tea—their effects; p. 17, 47, 43.
    Diet—directions for invalids—Introduction; p. 7.
    Debility—general—nervous  derangement—disorder—melancholy; p. 14, 21,
           23, 32, 42, 44, 50, 62, 64, 75.
    Dyspepsia; p. 37, 52, 67, 74, 88, 84.
    Diarrhoea; p. 43, 88.
    Ives—disordered—impaired vision; p. 26, 28,30, 32, 33, 47, 48, 63, 76, 86,
           94.
    Fits—epileptic, &c; p.  65, 66, 81, 82.
    Gravel; p. 91.
    Head-ache—sick head-ache; p. 13, 33, 37, 47, 50, 52, S3, 93, 94.
    Hip complaint; p. 41.
    Individual peculiarities—Water; p. 17, 20. Vinegar; p. 50. Strawberries; p .94.
    Liver complaint;  p. 28, 80, 34, 94.
    Nose-bleed; p. 48.
    Pain in the side; p. 24, 33, 36, 85, 86, 87, 04.
    Palpitations—disorders of the heart; p. 46, 49.
     Pulmonary disease—bleeding at the lungs, &c; p. 25, 28, 35, 54, 57, 75, 86,
           93.
    Pain in the breast; p. 85, 94.
'• Piles; p.  94.
    Rheumatic complaints;  p. 32, 33, 57, 60, 94.
    Swooning or fainting away; p. 94.
    Vertigo—dizziness of the head; p. 26, 27, 35, 53, 63, S2, 86, 94.
    Weakness in the breast; p. 86.
  Note.—Many complaints are specified in the original communications, of a
very important character, which may not properly be  published in a work of
this kind,  About fifty more communications,  equally interesting, remain on
hand unpublished; and a great number of individuals  in  the  different places
where 1 have lectured, have been as much benefitted as any named in this
work, who have not yet formally reported their  cases.  It is very desirable,
and hereby particularly requested, that all who  have been greatly benefitted by
adopting what is popularly  called "The  Graham  System,"  should, in
the manner  of the'  foregoing communications,  make out  a particular and full
statement  of their case.  1 he cause of humanity demands this, and they ought
not to withhold their testimony.  If any one feels a particular delicacy in re-
gard to having his or her name published,  let a request be made  accordingly,
and it shall  be obeyed; but let not the testimony he withheld.   Such facts are
public property.                                                  S. G.