96
Testimony Studies on Diet and Foods
she needs things as comfortable and convenient as you can make
them, things to make her work as easy as possible. But you have
viewed matters from a wrong standpoint. You have thought that almost
anything which could be eaten was good enough if you could live upon
it and retain strength. You have pleaded the necessity of spare diet to
your feeble wife. But she cannot make good blood or flesh upon the
diet to which you could confine yourself and flourish. Some persons
cannot subsist upon the same food upon which others can do well,
even though it be prepared in the same manner.
You are in danger of becoming an extremist. Your system could
convert a very coarse, poor diet into good blood. Your blood-making
organs are in good condition. But your wife requires a more select diet.
Let her eat the same food which your system could convert into good
blood, and her system could not appropriate it. She lacks vitality, and
needs a generous, strengthening diet. She should have a good supply
of fruit, and not be confined to the same things from day to day. She
has a slender hold of life. She is diseased, and the wants of her system
are far different from those of a healthy person.
Testimonies for the Church 2:537-538
But what about an impoverished diet? I have spoken of the impor-
tance of the quantity and quality of food being in strict accordance with
the laws of health. But we would not recommend an impoverished diet.
I have been shown that many take a wrong view of the health reform,
and adopt too poor a diet. They subsist upon a cheap, poor quality
of food, prepared without care or reference to the nourishment of the
system. It is important that the food should be prepared with care,
that the appetite, when not perverted, can relish it. Because we from
principle discard the use of meat, butter, mince pies, spices, lard and
that which irritates the stomach and destroys health, the idea should
never be given that it is of but little consequence what we eat.
There are some who go to extremes. They must eat just such
an amount and just such a quality, and confine themselves to two or
three things. They allow only a few things to be placed before them
or their families to eat. In eating a small amount of food, and that
not of the best quality, they do not take into the stomach that which
will suitably nourish the system. Poor food can not be converted into