(1794-1851)
Sylvester Graham, is generally considered the founder of the National Hygiene movement. He was America’s first crusader for healthful living in diet, exercise, sleep, bathing, clothing, and sexual, emotional and mental expression. His mastery of anatomy and physiology guided his advocacy of vegetarianism and abstinence from alcohol and tobacco. His great monumental treatise, his Lectures on the Science of Human Life published in 1839 became a leading text on health reform.
“It is requisite, that the physician should well understand the physiological powers and laws of the body; in the second place, that he should understand the nature of the disease, and in the third place, as a general rule, that he should fully and clearly ascertain the cause of the disease. For, as Hippocrates justly observes, the man who attempts to cure a disorder without knowing the cause, is like groping in the dark as a blind man.“
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