Rensselaer Republican, Volume 19, Number 21, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 January 1887 — The Anti-Fat Craze. [ARTICLE]

The Anti-Fat Craze.

•So the Lancet heads an article which begins with these words: “There is inconceivable folly in the fear of fatness.” We think the editor fails to recognize one prominent cause of this fear, especially among women, viz., ,its supposed detraction from beauty of form. English women, with their tendency to embonpoint, may have a different standard; but here, where the tendency is rather in the opposite direction, we are confident that the controlling feeling against being fat is an a_sthetic one. This makes many persons indifferent to considerations of health—just as, for the sake of imagined beauty, some women are ready to eat arsenic, or use dangerous cosmetics, or go half clad, or to lace their chests at the expense of the vital organs. In this country, at least, apart from this consideration, we do not think there would be any craze on the subject. Still, there is truth in what the Lancet says. The fear is more or less prevalent that fat persons are specially liable to “fatty degeneration” of the heart, one of the most dangerous of diseases. Now, there may be a large and troublesome accumulation of fat around the heart, but this a wholly different thing from fatty degeneration. In the first case the fat is outside the heart, and the heart may be as sound and Vigorous a 3 ever; in the second case, the very substance of the heart is, more or less extensively changed.to fat.

It may be thought that tho former may cause the latter. Says the Lancet: “There is not the least physiological connection between them. As a matter of fact, what is known as fatty degeneration occurs Qiore fre juently in those persons who are lean than in those who are fat.” But may we not get rid of a superabundance of fat, whether as a burden or as a deformity ? In rare cases the tendency to fat is the result of disease which may be remedied by intelligent treatment. Generally, however, some people incline to fat, as others dp to thinness, and would be fat on any safe diet. Of course, one may reduce his fat by a starvation process; or, what is equivalent, by drastic drugs, but the result must be temporary. Still, it must be admitted that, as a general thing, food rich in fat, starch, and sugar may increase the tendency to fatness, while food of the opposite character may, to a greater dr less degree, hold the tendency in check. — Youth’s Companion.

The Rapidity of Progress Toward Health, Even when a good remedy for disease is selected, depends in some measure upon the manner in which it is taken Irregular, interrupted doses can afford no fair test of the efficacy of any medicine, however salutary. Taken in proper doses at prescribed intervals, a reliable curative will offect the object of its use. Among remedies’ which, systematically and- persistently used, accomplish thorough and lasting cares, and prevent the recurrence of periodic disease, Hostettor s Stomach Bitters ranks specially high. In cases of dyspopsia, debility, rheumatism, fever and ague, liver complaint, inactivity of the kidneys and bladder, constipation and other organic ma'udies. it is a tried remedy, to which the medical brotherhood have lent their professional sanction, and which, as a tonic, alterative and household specific for disorders o: the stomach, liver ana bowels, has an unbounded popularity.