METABOLISM TREATMENT OF THE PROSTATE. 
By Ephraim Cutter, M.D., LL.D. 
WEST FALMOUTH, MASS. 
Reprinted from The Medical Bulletin, December, 1906. 
“Metabolism is the act or process by 
which, on the one hand, the dead food is 
built up into living matter, and by which, 
on the other hand, the living matter is 
broken down into simpler products within 
a cell or organism: the sum of the ana- 
bolic or constructive (assimilation) and 
the catabolic or destructive (decomposi- 
tion) process.”—Standard Dictionary. 
Metabolism goes on all the while in the 
body systemic. It relates to food, and 
hence the propriety of this article. One 
difference between life and death is that 
we live from the assimilation of food, sup- 
plying the decomposition of our tissues, 
while in death we have decomposition with- 
out assimilation; anabolism and catabolism 
in life, catabolism in death. To be sure, 
hair grows after death as an exception. 
But hair is an appendage dispensable with- 
out death to the whole colony of cells, or- 
gans, and tissues we call the body systemic. 
But here is a general fact of physiology, 
that our tissues as a whole, with some ex- 
ceptions, are dying and being removed all 
the while, and that they are being replaced 
all the while by the food which the Stand- 
ard Dictionary calls dead. The process 
is so subtle and delicate that we know but 
little of it ourselves. How strange that 
the temples in which our souls live are all 
the time dying and being born again! This 
is generally understood by physiologists, 
some of whom say that it takes seven years 
to renew a person, i.e., every seven years a 
man has a new body whose eternal ego he 
has never seen, while his temporal temple 
completely changes. Without going into 
this part of our subject, the writer would 
say that there is evidence of the complete 
metabolism of our temples (bodies) once 
in seven months. Again, the unwritten 
conventional idea of the medical profession 
in its large sense is that metabolism is 
confined to healthy structures and has 
nought to do with the abnormal structures, 
with tumors or with enlargements. There 
is evidence that metabolism rules abnormal 
structures, tumors, and enlargements as it 
does healthy structures. But you cannot 
disassociate metabolism from food. Meta- 
bolic changes invest the diet with the great- 
est importance. The diet should not be 
overlooked. If we look to catabolism as a 
sort of natura naturans surgery, we can see 
what a great advantage it has over oper- 
ative surgery—no danger to life, no blood 
lost, no needful tissue removed, save by the 
noiseless, spectacularless, wonderful cata- 
bolism, the restoration being made by the 
food if it has the elements to make up the 
losses. Quite a number of years ago, in 
the American Journal of Obstetrics, was 
published a list of uterine fibroids thus re- 
moved by metabolism. Several of these 
cases live now in health. The writer then 
suggests that prostates (which anatom- 
ically are the analogues of the uterus), 
when enlarged or fibroidly or cancerously 
degenerated, should be treated metabolic- 
ally likewise. If the personal allusion can 
be pardoned, he has a case in himself (this 
shows confidence). The feeding must be 
done so as to have standard blood and 
urine, and “natura naturans” does the cure 
satisfactorily, as “we doctors don’t cure 
anything.” In agriculture we say we raise 
squashes, but it could not be without God’s 
help. So of diseases. Paul may plant, 
but God gives the increase. 
Ashburton Cottage, West Falmouth, Mass.