A CAUSE OF DYSPEPSIA.

King Country Chronicle, Volume VI, Issue 454, 6 April 1912, Page 6

A CAUSE OF DYSPEPSIA.

Because it is the stomach's function to digest food we. usually assume that when our digestions are deranged something is wrong with the food. One writhing in the gripe of dyspepsia harks hack to what he has eaten. It was that hot buttered toast, or those pork chops, or that Welsh rarebit, or that veal pie, etc. Really none of those wholesome dishes has caused the distress ; the condition of the stomach was alona responsible. When the stomach grows accustomed to doing little it soon becomes incapable of much. Soldiers who, during a long campaign, have subsisted on "snacks" at frequent intervals, are unable for some time afterwards to digest properly a fair meal.

On the other hand it is extraordinary what a healthy human stomach, popularly supposed to be a delicate organ, will stand in the way of an excess of food and drink. The case may be cited of a man, seventy years old, who looks to be not over sixty. He is vigorous, physically and mentally, with a remarkably clear complexion tinged with the fresh pink of health. He declares that he has never suffered from indigestion, although for the past fifty-five years he has averaged about ten glasses of beer daily. Should this paragon of intemperate champions live to the age of a hundred years, doubtless he will ascribe his long life to his beer, though, as a matter of fact, he would be merely a phenomenal example of wonderful resistance to a deleterious habit. WORRY KILLS DIGESTION. If, then, food, unless it be grossly unwholesome and exqpssive, does not, except in comparatively few cases, ;ausc stomach trouble, what does cause it ? The answer, according to Mr. J. E. Flint, is : Neurasthenia—which, translated, is nerve exhalation. Habitual nervous tension will in time affect any one's digestion. The part that the nerves play in the digtstive processes has been oftea demonstrated by Claude Bernard and others. If the two nerves to the stomach (the pneumogastric and the sympathetic) be divided in a dog while the animal is digesting a full Tieal, the stomach walls, which before had been tense, immediately relax, the flow of gastric juice is arrested and the sensibility of the orx&n abolished. Again, it has been . : ound that artificial diabetes can be produced by vigorous stimulation with a galvanic battery of the branches of the pneumogastric entering the liver. The stimulation increases the liver's normal sugar-forming capacity to such an extent that sugar appears in the blood and kidneys—which is diabetes. Now, intense inxiety may, by irritating the hepatic nerves, cause a true diabetes in the same way as did. the electric current, whence worry is recognised by physicians as a potent cause of that grava disease. Next, as to the effect of nervous worry on the condition of the stomach proper. All emotional excitement and enxiety affect the stomach. Sudden had news will often induce nausea and loss of appetite. The Chinese are excusable for thinking the stomach the seat of the soul, for there the effects of fear, dread or grief, are first felt. We all have experienced that ".sinking" sensation at the stomach under any depressing emotion. Habitual worry harms by constantly keeping the nerves in an abnormally excited state, and this reacts unfavourably on all organs, but particularly on the stomach, which is made to secrete an undue amount of acid, thereby causing pain, cramps, and nausea. How sensitive the nerves are to the stimulation of even slight emotion is shown by the blush which a mere thought can bring to the cheek.

THE PHILOSOPHY OF LIFE,

So—what is our remedy ? Rest

and quiet for the nerves only, says Mr. Flint. Continue to eat all you wish of wholesome food and talse exercise in the open air—but stop worrying. Study and learn the philosophy of life. Remember that we can live only in the pressnt, which is ever becoming; past, aid that the past can never hurt us. Remember also, that most of oar prospective troubles never happen. If a misfortune actually occurs, thank God it is no worse and consider that others have to withstand greater. Recollect, too, that the mind magnifies every ill or blessing by dwelling on it, therefore thinl: little of what ill befalls, and much of what comfort remains. Be friendly with the weather .instead of railing at it. Avoid choi'eric criticism of everything and everybody ; it is an acquired and unnatural habit. Look for the good in the evil a round you, and you will be nstcnishci at how much good there is. No doubt you have noticed that cranks unusually thin and dyspept r 4\, while tlv, good-natured are well nourished an 1 have excellent digestions. "A merry heart doeth good like a medicine, but a broken spirit drietb the bones."— "Popular Science Siftings."