TOXEMIA EXPLAINED   
REVISED EDITION  
 
THE TRUE INTERPRETATION  
OF THE CAUSE OF DISEASE  
 
HOW TO CURE IS AN OBVIOUS SEQUENCE  
 
AN ANTIDOTE  TO FEAR, FRENZY AND THE POPULAR  MAD 
CHASING AFTER SO -CALLED CURES  
 
 
By J. H. TILDEN, M. D.  
DENVER, COLORADO  
 
 
Copyr ight 1926, 1927, 1928, 1930, 1935  
By J.H. Tilden  
Denver, Colorado  DEDICATION  
 
   WHAT more can be asked by any doctor or layman than 
a philosophy of the cause of disease that gives a perfect 
understanding of all the so -called diseases? To know cause  supplies even the layman with a 
dependable knowledge of how to avoid building disease, 
and how to cure. When people know how to avoid disease 
they know an immunization that immunizes rationally. Dependable knowledge of what disease really is and its 
cause is man’s salvation; and when it can be had with no 
more effort than that required to read carefully and 
understandingly Toxemia Explained, there is little excuse 
for anyone, lay or professional, to live in ignorance of it. Knowledge is power. Kn owledge of how to have health 
gives greatest power. Few people know anything about the cause of disease. To 
them this book is dedicated and the freedom from medical 
superstition it will bring them. —J. H. TILDEN. Table of Contents  
 
Preface — 4 
Introduction to Toxemia — 14 
Toxemia Explained — 27 
Enervation Is General — 77 
Poise —88 
The Causes of Enervation – 113 
Retrospection — 140 
   A Few Suggestions — 142 
   Dr. Tilden’s Tensing Exercises – 147 
 
 PREFACE  
 
   FROM time immemorial man has look ed for a savior; 
and, when not looking for a savior, he is looking for a cure. He believes in paternalism. He is looking to get something 
for nothing, not knowing that the highest price we ever pay 
for anything is to have it given to us. Instead of ac cepting salvation, it is better to deserve it. Instead of buying, begging, or stealing, a cure, it is better to 
stop building disease. Disease is of man’s own building, 
and one worse thing than the stupidity of buying a cure is to 
remain so ignorant as to believe in cures. The false theories of salvation and cures have built man 
into a mental mendicant, when he should be the arbiter of 
his own salvation, and certainly his own doctor, instead of 
being a slave to a profession that has neither worked out its  
 
own salvation from disease nor discovered a single cure in 
all the age -long period of man’s existence on earth. We hear of diet cures, dietitians, balanced rations, meat 
diets, vegetable diets, and other diets —chemically prepared 
foods of all ki nds. The reading public is bewildered with hundreds of health magazines and thousands of health 
ideas. There are thousands writing on health who would not 
recognize it if they should meet it on the street. Fanaticism, 
bigotry, stupidity, and commercialism are the principal 
elements in the dietetic complex that is now belaboring the 
public. Cures are what the people want, and cures are what 
doctors and cultists affect to make; but at most only relief is 
given. The periodicity which characterizes al l functional 
derangements of the body lends color to the claims of cure -
mongers that their remedy has cured their patients, when 
the truth is that the so -called disease “ran its course.” The 
truth is that the so -called disease was a toxemic crisis, and 
when the toxin was eliminated below the toleration point, 
the sickness passed —automatically health returned. But the 
disease was not cured; for the cause (enervating habits) is 
continued, toxin still accumulates, and in due course of 
time another crisis appea rs. Unless the cause of Toxemia is 
discovered and removed, crises will recur until functional 
derangements will give way to organic disease. The entire profession is engaged in doctoring crises of 
Toxemia —curing (?) and curing (?) until overtaken wit h 
chronic disease of whatever organ was the seat of the toxin 
crises. THERE ARE NO CURES   
 
   Nature returns to normal when enervating habits are 
given up. There are no cures in the sense generally 
understood. If one has a tobacco heart, what is the rem edy? Stop the use of tobacco, of course. If the heart is worn out 
from shock, as we see it among gamblers, or among men 
who are plunging in the stock market, what will cure? Drugs? No! Removing the cause. Every so -called disease is built within the mi nd and body 
by enervating habits. The food and dietetic insanity that 
constitutes the headliner on the medical stage just now is 
causing the people to demand a diet that will cure them of 
their peculiar maladies. The idea prevails that some 
peculiar diet w ill cure rheumatism or any other disease. Diet or food will not cure any disease. A fast, rest in bed, and the giving -up of enervating habits, 
mental and physical, will allow nature to eliminate the accumulated toxin; then, if enervating habits are gi ven up, 
and rational living habits adopted, health will come back to 
stay, if the one CURED will “stay put.” This applies to any 
so-called disease. Yes, it fits your disease —you who write 
to find out if the Tilden system of cure applies to your case. Yes; cannot you realize that law and order pervades the 
universe? And it is the same from nebula to stone, from 
stone to plant, from plant to animal, from animal to man, 
from man to mind, and from mind to super -mind—God. To 
use a blanket expression: Law and ord er pervades the 
universe, the same yesterday, today and forever, and is the 
same from star -dust to mind —from electron to mind. Toxemia explains how the universal law operates in health 
and disease. One disease is the same as another; one man 
the same as an other; one flower the same as another; the 
carbon in bread, sugar, coal, and the diamond is the same. Yes, one disease can be cured (?) the same as another, 
unless the organ acted on by toxemic crises is destroyed. For example: If wrong eating is pers isted in, the acid 
fermentation first irritates the mucous membrane of the 
stomach; the irritation becomes inflammation, then 
ulceration, then thickening and hardening, which ends in 
cancer at last. The medical world is struggling to find the 
cause of canc er. It is the distal end of an inflammatory 
process whose proximal beginning may be any irritation. The end is degeneration from a lack of oxygen and 
nutriment, and, in degenerating, the septic material enters 
the circulation, setting up chronic septic poi soning called 
cancer cachexia. Disease is a common expression of universal enervation. An understanding of physiology and pathology necessitates 
a firm grip on evolution as expressed in biology; or 
reasoning will go astray occasionally. Modern cu res and immunization are vanity and vexation; 
they are founded on the foolish principle of reasoning from 
effect, is disease, to cause. The organ which is suffering 
from many crises of Toxemia is discovered —it may be 
ulcer of the stomach, then the ulcer is  cut out; it may be 
gallstone, then the stone is cut out; it may be fibroid tumor 
of the womb, then the tumor or womb is cut out. The same 
may be said of other effects —the medical armament is 
turned loose on a lot of effects. This is accepted by the 
public  mind as efficient treatment of disease, when in fact it 
is a stupid removing of effects. And that is not the worst of 
such blundering. The operators have not the slightest idea 
of the cause of the effects they so skillfully remove. In other derangem ents the same lack of knowledge of 
cause prevails. In the treatment of deficiency diseases, the 
lacking element is supplied from the laboratory; but 
nothing is done in the line of restoring the organ to 
normality. Why? Because medical science has not 
disco vered why organs fail to function properly; and until 
this discovery is made, scientific blundering will continue. THE WORLD NEEDS THE SCIENCE OF SURGERY   
 
   If mutilation (unnecessary surgery) is required in nine 
hundred and ninety -nine cases to p erfect the skill required 
in the thousandth case, the question of the need of high -
class surgery must be answered by the mutilated or 
vandalized class. Is war necessary? What would be the answer of the 
7,485,000 who were killed in the late World War, if the 
question were submitted to them? Estimate $5,000 as the 
man-power loss for each man; then the world lost 
$37,425,000,000 in this one item alone. Surgery costs the 
world, in vandalizing the bodies of men, women, and 
children, as much every year. Is i t worth that much for all 
the real good it does? Why is so much surgery thought to 
be necessary? Because of the ignorance of the people, egged on by a science -mad or selfish profession. It is more 
spectacular to operate than to teach people how to live to 
avoid chronic disease and operations. ARE PALLIATIVES EVER NECESSARY? It is doubtful if the palliation which doctors and cultists 
give is worth the disadvantage that the sick habit taught the 
patients by their doctor brings them. The drug habit taught the thousands certainly 
overbalances any relief given. Drugs to relieve pain are 
never necessary. Twenty -five years in which I used drugs, 
and thirty -three in which I have not used drugs, should 
make my belief, that drugs are unnecessary and i n most 
cases injurious, worth something to those who care to know 
the truth. YES, VENEREAL DISEASES CAN BE CURED  
WITHOUT DRUGS   
 
   I make no exception of syphilis, and stand ready to 
demonstrate the truth of what I say at any time and 
anywhere to a committee of doctors. Nature cures —nature can eliminate syphilis, or any type 
of infection, if all enervating habits are given up and a 
rational mode of living adopted. STIMULANTS ARE SUBTILELY UNDERMINING   
 
   So insidious in their action ar e all stimulants that the 
unwary are surprised by finding themselves more or less 
slaves to them when they are not conscious of using them 
to excess. The coffee headache is an example. A time comes when 
it is not convenient to get the usual breakfast cup. A 
dullness or languid feeling appears three or four hours after 
breakfast, that cannot be accounted for until some friend 
suggests that perhaps it is due to missing the coffee; but the 
victim is not convinced until he proves it true by trying it 
out several times. Some develop a headache, and still 
others are troubled with gaping or yawning and a feeling of 
oppression, due to heart enervation brought on from the use 
of coffee. At first stimulants gently remove awareness —remove tire 
and actuate the  mind and body. It should be obvious to reasoning minds that borrowed activity must be paid for 
sooner or later. Using nerve -energy in excess of normal production 
brings on enervation. Few people waste nerve -energy in 
one way only. Food is a stimulant . Overeating is 
overstimulating. Add to this excess one or two other 
stimulants —Coffee or tobacco —excessive venery, 
overwork and worry, and one subject to that amount of 
drain of nerve -energy will become decidedly enervated. Elimination falls far short of requirements; consequently 
toxin accumulates in the blood. This adds a pronounced 
auto-toxin stimulation to that coming from overstimulating 
habits, and completes a vicious circle. This complex stands 
for a disease -producing Toxemia, which will be permanen t 
except as toxin crises —so-called acute diseases —lower the 
amount of toxin, again to accumulate and continue until the 
habits that keep the body enervated are controlled. Perfect 
health cannot be established until all enervating habits have 
been eliminate d.     
 
DEFINITION of Toxemia and crises of 
Toxemia: —In the process of tissue building —
metabolism —there is cell building —
anabolism —and cell destruction —catabolism. The broken down tissue is toxic and in 
health —when nerve energy is normal —it is 
eliminated from the blood as fast as evolved. When nerve energy is dissipated from any 
cause —physical or mental excitement or bad 
habits —the body becomes enervated, when 
enervated, elimination is checked, causing a 
retention of toxin in the blood or Toxemia. This acc umulation of toxin when once 
established will continue until nerve energy is 
restored by removing the causes. So -called 
disease is nature’s effort at eliminating the 
toxin from the blood. All so -called diseases are 
crises of Toxemia. Introduction to Tox emia  
 
   THE medical world has built an infinite literature without 
any (except erroneous and vacillating) ideas of cause. Medicine is rich in science, but now, as well as in all past 
time, it suffers from a dearth of practical ideas. The average 
doctor is  often educated out of all the common -sense he 
was born with. This, however, is not his fault. It is the fault 
of the system. He is an educated automaton. He has facts —
scientific facts galore —without ideas. Ford has mechanical 
facts—not more, perhaps, than  thousands of other 
mechanics, but he joined them to an idea which made him a 
multimillionaire. Millions have facts, but no ideas. Thousands of doctors have all the scientific data needed, 
but they have not harnessed their science to common -sense 
and philo sophy. Without a clear conception of cause, cure must remain 
the riddle that it is. The late Sir James Mackenzie —while living, the greatest 
clinician in the world —declared: “In medical research the 
object is mainly the prevention and cure of dise ase.” If 
cause is not known, how is prevention or cure possible —as, for example, by producing a mild form of smallpox or other 
so-called disease by poisoning a healthy person by 
introducing into his body the pathological products of said 
disease? Certainly  only pathological thinking can arrive at 
such conclusions. Vaccines and autogenous remedies are 
made from the products of disease, and the idea that disease 
can be made to cure itself is an end -product of pathological 
thinking. This statement is not so in congruous after we 
consider the fact that all search and research work to find 
cause by medical scientists has been made in dead and 
dying people. As ridiculous as it may appear, medical 
science has gone, and is still going, to the dead and dying to 
find c ause. If prevention and cure mean producing disease, surely 
prevention and cure are not desirable. If prevention can be 
accomplished, then cures will not be needed. At the time of his death, Mackenzie was laboring to 
discover prevention. A more w orthy work can not be 
imagined. But the tragedy of his life was that he died from 
a preventable diseases he could have cured the disease that 
killed him if his conception of cause had been in line with 
the Truth of Toxemia —the primary cause of all disease. In spite of Mackenzie’s ambition to put the profession in 
possession of truth concerning prevention and cure, he died 
without a correct idea of even in what direction to look for 
this desirable knowledge’ as evidenced by such statements 
as: “Our pro blems being the prevention of disease, we 
require a complete knowledge of disease in all its aspects 
before we can take steps to prevent its occurrence.” There 
is the crux of the whole subject. It is not disease; it is cause 
“in all its aspects” that we ne ed to know before we can take 
steps to prevent “disease.” Mackenzie stated the following 
concerning diagnosis:  
 
   But it appears to be unlikely that in the present 
state of medicine there would be any great 
dissimilarity in the proportions of diagnosed an d 
undiagnosed eases in many series of investigation 
such as we have made. The proportion depends, not 
on the skill or training of individual practitioners, 
but on the unsatisfactory state of all medical 
knowledge. The similarity of the statistical records 
from the institute and from private practice goes 
far to support this view. In spite of the additional 
time given at the institute to the examination of 
cases which are undiagnosable in general practice, 
and the assistance given by the special 
departments —clinical groups —in their 
investigation, they remain profoundly obscure, 
although we know that it is from among them that there will gradually emerge the cases of advanced 
organic disease and the end -results which form so 
large a proportion of the inmates o f hospital wards. And the tragedy is that many of them suffer from 
no serious disabilities, and might, but for our 
ignorance, be checked on their downward course. Isn’t this about as sharp a criticism of medical 
inefficiency as Tilden has ever made? This brings vividly to mind the statement, made only a 
short time ago, by Dr. Cabot, of Boston, that he himself 
was mistaken in his diagnoses about fifty per cent of the 
time—that he had proved it by post -mortems. Such a 
statement as this, coming from a  man of his standing, 
means much. To me it means that diagnosis is a 
meaningless term; for, as used, it means discovering what 
pathological effects —what changes —have been brought 
about by an undiscovered cause. Diagnosis means, in a few 
words, discovering effects which, when found, throw no 
light whatever on cause. Again I quote Mackenzie: “The knowledge of disease is 
so incomplete that we do not yet even know what steps 
should be taken to advance our knowledge.” This being 
true, there is little excuse  for laws to shut out or prevent 
cults from practicing less harmful palliations. How many  reputable physicians have the honesty of Sir James 
Mackenzie? In spite of Mackenzie’s high and worthy ambitions, he 
could not get away from the profession’s ste reotyped 
thinking. The early symptoms of disease he declared held 
the secret of their cause, and he believed an intense study of 
them would give the facts. But functional derangements are 
of the same nature and from the same universal cause that 
ends in al l organic so -called diseases. All so -called diseases 
are, from beginning to end, the same evolutionary process. The study of pathology —the study of disease —has 
engaged the best minds in the profession always, and it 
surely appears that the last word m ust have been spoken on 
the subject; but the great Englishman believed, as all 
research workers believe, that a more intense and minute 
study of the early symptoms of disease will reveal the 
cause. There is, however, one great reason why it cannot, 
and tha t is that all symptom -complexes —diseases —from 
their initiation to their ending, are effects, and the most 
intense study of any phase or stage of their progress will 
not throw any light on the cause. Cause is constant, ever present, and always the same . Only effects, and the object on which cause acts, change, and the change is most inconstant. To illustrate: A catarrh 
of the stomach presents first irritation, then inflammation, 
then ulceration, and finally induration and cancer. Not all 
cases run true to form; only a small percentage evolve to 
ulcer, and fewer still reach the cancer stage. More exit by 
way of acute food -poisoning or acute indigestion than by 
chronic diseases. In the early stages of this evolution there are all kinds of 
discomforts:  more or less attacks of indigestion, frequent 
attacks of gastritis —sick stomach and vomiting. No two 
cases are alike. Nervous people suffer most, and some 
present all kinds of nervous symptoms —insomnia, 
headaches, etc. Women have painful menstruation and 
hysterical symptoms —some are morose and others have 
epilepsy. As the more chronic symptoms appear, those of 
the lymphatic temperament do not suffer so much. As the 
disease progresses, a few become pallid and develop 
pernicious anemia, due to gastric or int estinal ulceration 
and putrid protein infection; in others the first appearance 
of ulcer is manifested by a severe hemorrhage; others have 
a cachexia and a retention of food in the stomach, which is 
vomited every two or three days, caused by a partial 
closing of the pylorus. These are usually malignant cases. To look upon any of these symptom -complexes as a 
distinct disease, requiring a distinct treatment, is to fall into 
the diagnostic maze that now bewilders the profession and 
renders treatment chao tic. It should be known to all discerning physicians that the 
earliest stage of organic disease is purely functional, 
evanescent, and never autogenerted so far as the affected 
organ is concerned, but is invariably due to an extraneous 
irritation (stim ulation, if you please), augmented by 
Toxemia. When the irritation is not continuous, and toxin is 
eliminated as fast as developed, to the toleration point, 
normal functioning is resumed between the intervals of 
irritation and toxin excess. For exampl e: a simple coryza (running at the nose —cold 
in the head), gastritis or colonitis. At first these colds, 
catarrahs, or inflammations are periodic and functional; 
but, as the exciting cause or causes —local irritation and 
Toxemia —become more intense and cont inuous, the 
mucous membranes of these organs take on organic 
changes, which are given various names, such as irritation, 
inflammation, ulceration, and cancer. The pathology 
(organic change) may be studied until doomsday without 
throwing any light on the ca use; for from the first irritation 
to the extreme ending —cachexia —which may be given the blanket term of tuberculosis, syphilis, or cancer, the whole 
pathologic panorama is one continuous evolution of 
intensifying effects. Germs and other so -called ca uses may be discovered in 
the course of pathological development, but they are 
accidental, coincidental, or at most auxiliary —or, to use the 
vernacular of law, obiter dicta. The proper way to study disease is to study health and 
every influence favora ble or not to its continuance. Disease 
is perverted health. Any influence that lowers nerve -energy 
becomes disease -producing. Disease cannot be its own 
cause; neither can it be its own cure, and certainly not its 
own prevention. After years of wanderi ng in the jungle of medical 
diagnosis —the usual guesswork of cause and effect, and 
the worse -than-guesswork of treatment, and becoming 
more confounded all the time —I resolved either to quit the 
profession or to find the cause of disease. To do this, it was  
necessary to exile myself from doctors and medical 
conventions; for I could not think for myself while listening 
to the babblings of babeldom. I took the advice found in 
Matt. 6:6. According to prevailing opinion, unless a doctor 
spends much time in medic al societies and in the society of other doctors, takes postgraduate work, travels, etc., he 
cannot keep abreast of advancement. This opinion would be true if the sciences of medicine 
were fitted to a truthful etiology (efficient cause) of disease. But, since they are founded on no cause, or at most 
speculative and spectacular causes, as unstable as the sands 
of the sea, the doctor who cannot brook the bewilderment 
of vacillation is compelled to hide away from the voices of 
mistaken pedants and knowing  blatherskites until 
stabilized. By that time ostracism will have overtaken him, 
and his fate, metaphorically speaking, will be that of the 
son of Zacharias. An honest search after truth too often, if not always, leads 
to the rack, stake, cross, or th e blessed privilege of 
recanting; but the victim, by this time, decides as did the 
divine Jew: “Not my will, but shine, be done;” or, as 
Patrick Henry declared: “Give me liberty or give me 
death!” The dying words of another great Irishman is the 
wish, no d oubt, of every lover of freedom and truth:  
   That no man write my epitaph; for, as no man 
who knows my motives dares now vindicate them. let not prejudice or ignorance asperse them. Let 
them and me rest in peace, and my tomb remain uninscribed, and my mem ory in oblivion, until 
other times and other men can do justice to my 
character. When my country takes her place among 
the nations of the earth, then, and not until then, let 
my epitaph be written. (Emmet). The truth is larger than any man, and, until it is 
established, the memory of its advocate is not important. In 
the last analysis, is not the truth the only immortality? Man 
is an incident. If he discovers a truth, it benefits all who 
accept it. Truth too often must pray to be delivered from its 
friends. I must acknowledge that I have not been very courteous 
to indifferent convention; and the truth I have discovered 
has suffered thereby. It has always appeared to me that the 
attention of fallacy -mongers cannot be attracted except by 
the use of a club or shillalah; and possibly my style of 
presenting my facts has caused too great a shock, and the 
desired effect has been lost in the reaction. That I have discovered the true cause of disease cannot be 
successfully disputed. This being true, my e arnestness in 
presenting this great truth is justifiable. When I think back over my life, and remember the 
struggle I had with myself in supplanting my old beliefs 
with the new —the thousands of times I have suspected my 
own sanity —I then cannot be su rprised at the opposition I 
have met and am meeting. My discovery of the truth that Toxemia is the cause of all 
so-called diseases came about slowly, step by step, with 
many dangerous skids. At first I believed that enervation must be the general  
cause of disease; then I decided that simple enervation is 
not disease, that disease must be due to poison, and that 
poison, to be the general cause of disease, must be 
autogenerated; and if disease is due to an autogenerated 
poison. what is the cause of that autogeneration? I dallied 
long in endeavoring to trace disease back to poison taken 
into the system, such as food eaten after putrescence had 
begun, or from poisoning due to the development of 
putrescence after ingestion. In time I decided that poison ing 
per se is not disease. I observed where poisoning did not 
kill; some cases reacted and were soon in full health, while 
others remained in a state of semi -invalidism. I found the 
same thing true of injuries and mental shock. It took a long 
time to devel op the thought that a poisoned or injured body, 
when not overwhelmed by Toxemia. would speedily return to the normal, and when it did not, there was a sick habit —
a derangement of some kind —that required some such 
contingency to bring it within sense -percep tion. To illustrate: An injury to a joint is often complicated 
with rheumatism; the rheumatism previous to the injury 
was potentially in the blood. Just what change had taken place in the organism which, 
under stress of injury or shock of any kin d, would cause a 
reaction with fever I could not understand until the 
Toxemic Theory suggested itself to my mind, after which 
the cause of disease unfolded before me in an easy and 
natural manner. And now the theory is a proved fact. After years of pe rplexing thought and “watchful waiting,” 
I learned that all disease, of whatever nature, was of slow 
development; that without systemic preparation even so -
called acute systemic diseases could not manifest. In a few words: Without Toxemia there can be  no 
disease. I knew that the waste -product of metabolism was 
toxic, and that the only reason why we were not poisoned 
by it was because it was removed from the organism as fast 
as produced. Then I decided that the toxin was retained in 
the blood, when ther e was a checking of elimination. Then the cause of the checking had to be determined. In time I 
thought out the cause. I knew that, when we had a normal 
nerve -energy, organic functioning was normal. Then came 
the thought that enervation caused a checking o f 
elimination. Eureka! The cause of all so -called diseases is 
found! Enervation checks elimination of the waste -products 
of metabolism. Retention of metabolic toxin —the first and 
only cause of disease! Those who would be freed from the bondage of medi cal 
superstition should study “Toxemia Explained.”  
 
 
 
 Toxemia Explained  
 
   NO ONE on the outside of the medical profession knows 
so well as doctors themselves the great need of more 
knowledge of what disease really is. Never in the history of 
so-called medical science has there been so much research 
work done as in the past decade; but with every new 
discovery there follows very closely on its heels the stark 
and stalking nemesis that chills the honest and earnest 
researchers to the bone —the inevitable w ord Failure. Why 
inevitable? Because, back in the beginning of man’s 
reasoning on the subject of his discomforts, his pains, and 
his sicknesses, he made the monstrous mistake that 
something outside of himself —outside of his own 
volition —had wished him harm . Man being a religious 
animal, he early thought he had in some manner offended 
one of his many deities. The history of how man evolved 
the idea of disease being an entity is too long to do more 
than allude to it in a book of this kind. Any of the old 
mythologies may be referred to by those who are curious 
enough to look the matter up. That man is still saturated 
with centuries of mythological inheritance was brought out 
vividly when the germ theory was introduced. It answered 
the instinctive for demoniacal  possession! At last man’s search for the demon —the author of all his woes —had 
been rewarded, and a satisfactory apology could be made to 
his conscience for all his apparent shortcomings. However, 
seventy years of vicarious atonement for man’s sins by the 
demon germ are waning, and reason be praised if the 
microbe is the last excuse that man can make for his sins of 
omission and commission before the throne of his own 
reason! Medical science is founded on a false premise —namely, 
that disease is caused by extraneous influences, and that 
drugs are something that cures or palliates discomfort. The 
term “medical” means pertaining to medicine or the 
practice of medicine. Anything used in a remedial way 
carries the idea of curing, healing, correcting, or affo rding 
relief, and this doctoring is all done without any clear 
understanding of cause. The words “medical,” “medicine,” “disease,” and “cure” 
have become concrete in our understanding, and shape our 
thoughts and beliefs. And so arbitrary are these bel iefs that 
new schools and cults are forced to the conventional 
understanding. They may declare that an impinged nerve is 
the cause of any pathology. But they do not trouble 
themselves to find why one impinged nerve creates a 
pathology and another does not. The psychologist does not trouble himself to explain why 
worry in one subject causes disease and in another it does 
not; why hope in one subject cures and in another it does 
not; why negation does not always cure; why faith does not 
always cure; beggi ng the question by declaring that there 
was not faith enough, etc. No fool is a bigger fool than the 
fool who fools himself. Why should not all new schools of thought be found 
harking back to their mother -thought —I say, why not? So 
long as the idea th at disease is a reality, an individuality, an 
entity, is firmly fixed in the mind, even those in research 
work will be controlled and directed in their labors by the 
conventional understanding. That is why every wonderful 
discovery soon proves a mistaken b elief. There is no hope that medical science will ever be a 
science; for the whole structure is built around the idea that 
there is an object —disease —that can be cured when the 
right drug —remedy, cure —is found. It is my intention to portray the c ommon, every -day 
foibles of scientific medicine so that the people may see the 
absurdities concerning disease and cure which they are and 
have been hoodwinked into believing by the blare of 
science. Then I shall describe the only worked -out rational explan ation of the cause of so -called diseases, hoping, by 
contrasting the old and new, to start a few to thinking and 
building new brain -cells, which in time may supersede the 
old and conventional. Until Toxemia was discovered and elaborated by myself 
into a medical philosophy there was no real medical 
philosophy. The cause and cure of disease is and has been a 
medley of guesswork and speculation which has 
confounded the best and most industrious medical minds in 
every generation. Today, as never befor e, the brightest minds in the 
profession are delving into research work, endeavoring to 
find the efficient cause of disease. But they are doomed to 
disappointment; for they fail at their beginning. Why? Because all the work that has ever been done in searc hing 
for cause has been along the line of critical study and 
examination of effects; and certainly reasoning minds 
cannot believe that an effect can be its own cause. No one 
believes in spontaneous generation. The remnant of this 
belief was annihilated by Pasteur’s discovery of germs as 
the cause of fermentation —a discovery so profound that it 
created a frenzy in the medical world; and, as in every 
epidemic of frenzy, mental poise was lost. The importance 
of the germ as a primary or efficient cause of disea se was accepted nolens volens,  willy nilly. Everyone was swept off 
his feet. As in all sudden gushes in change of belief, it was 
dangerous not to agree with the mob spirit; hence opposing 
or conservative voices were suppressed or ostracized. The germ frenzy was fierce for two or three decades; but 
now it is a thing of the past and will soon be, if not now, a 
dead letter. Cause of disease is being looked for everywhere, and no 
less a personage than the late Sir James Mackenzie, in 
“Reports of the S t. Andrews Institute for Clinical 
Research,” Volume I, declared: “The knowledge of disease 
is so incomplete that we do not yet even know what steps 
should be taken to advance our knowledge.” At another 
time he wrote: “Disease is made manifest to us only by  the 
symptoms which it produces; the first object in the 
examination of a patient is the detection of symptoms, and 
therefore the symptoms of disease form one of the main 
objects of our study.”  
 
 
THE VALUE OF SYMPTOMATOLOGY   
 
   Sir James, when living, wa s probably the greatest 
clinician of the English -speaking world; yet he had not outlived the medical superstition that disease is a positive 
entity, and that the way to find disease is to trace symptoms 
to their source. But if a symptom is traced to its so urce, 
what of it? A pain is traced to its source, and we find that it 
comes from the head. The head does not cause the pain. Then we find that there are symptoms of hyperemia —too 
much blood in the head. The pressure from too much blood 
in the head causes t he pain. Then pressure must be the 
disease? No. Then too much blood is the disease —
hyperemia? Certainly; too much blood in the head was a 
cause. What is it that causes congestion? We find that pain 
is a symptom. Pressure causes pain; it, too, is a symptom. Too much blood in the head causes pressure; it also is a 
symptom. Pain, pressure, hyperemia are, all three, 
symptoms. In time the walls of the blood -vessels weaken, 
and the pressure ruptures one of the vessels. Hemorrhage 
into the brain causes death from apoplexy. Is the ruptured 
blood -vessel the disease? No. Is hemorrhage into the brain 
the disease? No; it is a symptom. Is death from hemorrhage 
the disease? If the hemorrhage is not severe enough to cause death, 
but does produce some form of paralysis —and there can be 
many kinds —is paralysis a disease? Haven’t we been 
traveling along a chain of symptoms from headache to 
paralysis? We have not found anything to which all these symptoms point as disease; and, according to the 
requirements of Sir James Ma ckenzie, disease is made 
manifest to us only by symptoms. Here we have a chain of 
symptoms beginning with pain, ending in hemorrhage and 
death or paralysis, without giving us any indication 
whatever of cause as understood. Any other chain, namely, 
stomach symptoms, ending in pyloric cancer, will not give 
any more indication of disease at the various stages than the 
foregoing illustration. The first symptom we have of any chain of symptoms is 
discomfort or pain. In any stomach derangement we have 
pain, more or less aggravated by food. Catarrh follows, or 
more often precedes, it —or what we call inflammation or 
gastritis. Gastritis continues, with a thickening of the 
mucous membrane. A time comes when there is ulceration. This will be called a disease, and  is recognized as ulcer of 
the stomach; but it is only a continuation of the primary 
symptom of catarrh and pain. The ulcer is removed, but the 
symptom of inflammation and pain continues, and other 
ulcers will follow. This state eventually merges into 
induration or hardening of the pyloric orifice of the 
stomach. When this develops, there is more or less 
obstruction to the outlet causing occasional vomiting, and, 
on thorough examination, cancer is found. If we analyze the symptoms from the first pain a nd 
catarrh in the stomach, we shall kind the chain of 
symptoms running along. The first symptom to be noticed 
is pain. On examination, we find a catarrhal condition of 
the stomach; and this catarrhal condition is not a disease —
it is a symptom. Catarrhal in flammation continues, with the 
thickening of the mucous membrane, which finally ends in 
ulceration. Ulceration is not the disease; it is only a 
continuation of the inflammatory symptom. If the ulcer is 
removed, it does not remove the disease; it only remov es a 
symptom. These symptoms continue until there is a 
thickening and induration of the pyloris, which is called 
cancer. And yet we have not discovered anything but 
symptoms from beginning to end. By removing the cancer, the question of what the disea se 
is has not been answered. Cancer being the end -symptom, 
it cannot be the cause of the first symptom. Any other so -called disease can be worked out in the 
same way. Pain and catarrh are the first symptoms, as a 
rule, that call a physician’s or a pat ient’s attention to 
anything being wrong; and pain and catarrh are not the 
disease. When the cause of the pain is found, it too will be 
found a symptom and not a disease. And this will be true to 
the end. It is no wonder that diagnosticians become perp lexed in 
their search after disease, because they have confounded 
symptoms and disease. The fact of the matter is, it is 
impossible to put the finger on any ending of a chain of 
symptoms and say: “This is the disease.” In the beginning 
of this analysis we showed that headache, or pain in the 
head, is not a disease; and when we had finished we found 
that hemorrhage or apoplexy is not a disease —it is only a 
continuation of the primary symptoms. “Disease is made manifest to us only by symptoms which 
it produces.” This statement tacitly infers that there are 
diseases and symptoms, and that through symptoms we 
may find disease. When we undertake to trace symptoms to 
disease, we are in the dilemma of a mountain -climber who 
on reaching the top of one mountain,  finds other peaks, and 
higher ones, farther on and on. That Mackenzie had been baffled in his search for fixed 
disease is indicated in the following, which I quote from 
the reports mentioned before:  
 
   Many diseases are considered to be of a 
dangero us nature, and many attempts are made to 
combat the danger, with, however, no perception of 
its nature. This is particularly the case with epidemic diseases, such as measles, influenza, 
scarlet fever, and diphtheria. As a consequence, 
proposals have at dif ferent times been put forward 
to treat individuals who suffer these diseases upon 
some general plan, without consideration of the 
peculiarities of the individual case —and thus we 
get that rule -of-thumb treatment which is shown in 
the indiscriminate use of a serum or vaccine. During influenza epidemics there is always a cry 
for a universal method of treatment, and attempts 
are made to meet this cry in the shape of so -called 
specifics and vaccines. When a great authority declares that dangerous disea ses 
are combated without any perception of their nature —and 
that, too, in spite of the germ theory —it should be obvious 
to thinking minds that the germ theory has been weighed 
and found wanting. Yet, when something must be done, 
and nothing better has been  discovery, “serums and 
vaccines may be used indiscriminately.”  
 
   That the “rule of thumb” is the rule governing all thinking 
concerning symptoms, diseases, their cause and treatment, 
is so obvious that anyone possessing a reasoning mind, not 
camouflage d by scientific buncombe, should read as he 
runs. Medicine rests on a sound scientific foundation. Anatomy, physiology, biology, chemistry, and all collateral 
sciences that have a bearing on the science of man, are 
advanced to great perfection. But th e so-called sciences of 
symptomatology, disease, diagnosis, etiology, and the 
treatment of disease go back to superstition for their 
foundation. We see the incongruity of jumbling real science 
with delusion and superstition. Disease is believed to be an 
entity; and this idea is necessarily followed by another as 
absurd —namely, cure. Around these two old assumptions 
has grown an infinite literature that confounds its builders. TRUTH AS FAMOUS MEN SEE IT   
 
   When a man’s knowledge is not in order, the  more of it he has, the 
greater will be his confusion. — (Herbert Spencer.) Confusion worse confounded is the only explanation that 
can be given of the theory and practice of medicine. Of 
course, it is hoary with age, and is one of the learned 
professi ons. With much just pride can the rank and file 
point to its aristocracy —its long list of famous dead as well 
as living physicians? What has made most of them famous? The same that has made others famous in and out of the 
professions —namely, personal worth  and education. Franklin was not a doctor; yet he was as great as any 
doctor, and could use his gray matter in advising the sick as 
well as those not sick. He appeared to have a sense -
perception for truth; and I would say that his discrimination 
is the lea ding, if not the distinguishing, trait that has 
divided, and always will divide, the really great from the 
mediocre majority. They are the leaven that leaveneth the 
whole herd of humanity —the quality of character that 
could not be found in all Sodom and Go morrah. There was another discriminating mind in the eighteenth 
century —another Benjamin, who also was a signer of the 
Declaration of Independence —Benjamin Rush, a 
physician, a luminary that brought distinction to medical 
science. He was larger than h is profession. He left seeds of 
thought which, if acted upon by the profession, would have 
organized medical thought and prevented the present -day 
confusion. He left on record such golden nuggets as:  
 
   Much mischief has been done by the nosological 
arran gement of diseases. . . . Disease is as much a 
unit as fever. . . . Its different seats and degrees 
should no more be multiplied into different 
diseases than the numerous and different effects of 
heat and light upon our globe should be multiplied 
into a pl urality of suns. The whole materia medica is infected with the 
baneful consequences of the nomenclature of 
disease; for every article in it is pointed only 
against their names. . . . By the rejection of the 
artificial arrangement of diseases, a revol ution 
must follow in medicine. . . . The road to 
knowledge in medicine by this means will likewise 
be shortened; so that a young man will be able to 
qualify himself to practice physic at a much less 
expense of time and labor than formerly, as a child 
would  learn to read and write by the help of the 
Roman alphabet, instead of Chinese characters. Science has much to deplore from the 
multiplication of diseases. It is as repugnant to 
truth in medicine as polytheism is to truth in 
religion. The physician wh o considers every 
different affection of the different parts of the 
same system as distinct diseases, when they arise 
from one cause, resembles the Indian or African 
savage who considers water, dew, ice, frost, and 
snow as distinct essences; while the phys ician who 
considers the morbid affections of every past of the 
body, however divers)fied they may be in their 
form or degrees, as derived from one cause, 
resembles the philosopher who considers dew, ice, 
frost, and snow as different modifications of water,  
and as derived simply from the absence of heat. Humanity has likewise much to deplore from this 
paganism in medicine. The sword will probably be 
sheathed forever, as an instrument of death, before 
physicians will cease to add to the mortality of 
mank ind by prescribing for the names of diseases. There is but one remote cause of disease . . . . These remarks are of extensive application, and, if 
duly attended to, would deliver us from a mass of 
error which has been accumulating for ages in 
medicine ; I mean the nomenclature of diseases from 
their remote causes. It is the most offensive and 
injurious part of the rubbish of our science. The physician who can cure one disease by a 
knowledge of its principles may by the same means 
cure all the disea ses of the human body; for their 
causes are the same. There is the same difference between the 
knowledge of a physician who prescribes for 
diseases as limited by genera and species, and of 
one who prescribes under the direction of just 
principles, tha t there is between the knowledge we 
obtain of the nature and extent of the sky, by 
viewing a few feet of it from the bottom of a well, 
and viewing from the top of a mountain the whole 
canopy of heaven. I would as soon believe that ratafia was intended  
by the Author of Nature to be the only drink of man, instead of water, as believe that the 
knowledge of what relates to the health and lives of 
a whole city, or nation, should be confined to one, 
and that a small or a privileged, order of men. From a  short review of these facts, reason and 
humanity awake from their long repose in 
medicine, and unite in proclaiming that it is time to 
take the cure of pestilential epidemics out of the 
hands of physicians, and to place it in the hands of 
the people. Dissections daily convince us of our ignorance of 
the seats of disease, and cause us to blush at our 
prescriptions.... What mischief have we done under 
the belief of false facts, if I may be allowed the 
expression, and false theories! We have assisted in 
multiplying diseases. We have done more —we have 
increased their mortality. I shall not pause to beg pardon of the faculty for 
acknowledging, in this public manner, the 
weaknesses of our profession. I am pursuing Truth, 
and while I can keep my eye fixe d upon my guide, I 
am indifferent whither I am led, provided she is my 
leader. Oliver W. Holmes, M. D., was a man who gave dignity 
and respectability to the profession. He was a literary man, 
and from his beginning to his end, was always larger than his profession. He once said: “I firmly believe that, if the 
whole materia medica could be sunk to the bottom of the 
sea, it would be all the better for mankind and all the worse 
for the fishes.” “Breakfast -Table Series” will be read by the 
intelligent peopl e of the future, who will know nothing of 
Holmes’ fight for women against the dirty hands of herd -
doctors and their consequences —puerperal fever. “AEquanimitas” will keep Osler in the minds of 
intelligent people “Osler’s Practice of Medicine” will be 
found only in the shops of bibliomaniacs. Such men as 
Osler keep the dead weight of mediocre medicine from 
sinking to oblivion by embellishing medical fallacies with 
their superb personalities and their literary polish. Throughout all the ages the fin est minds have sensed the 
truth concerning the cause of disease, and this has bulked 
large against medical insanities and inanities. A very striking picture of the medical herd was made by 
“Anonymous” in his essay on “Medicine” in “Civilization 
in the  United States.”  
 
   It has been remarked above that one of the chief 
causes of the unscientific nature of medicine and 
the antiscientific character of doctors lies in their inflate credulity and inability to think 
independently. This contention is support ed by the 
report on the intelligence of physicians recently 
published by the National Research Council. They 
are found by more or less trustworthy psychologic 
tests to be lowest in intelligence of all the 
professional men, excepting only dentists and 
horse -doctors. Dentists and horse -doctors are ten 
per cent less intelligent. But since the quantitative 
methods employed certainly carry an experimental 
error of ten per cent or even higher, it is not 
certain that the members of the two more humble 
professions have not equal or even greater 
intellectual ability. It is significant that engineers 
head the list in intelligence. In fact, they are rated 
sixty per cent higher than doctors. This wide disparity leads to a temptation to 
interesting psychological pro bings. Is not the 
lamentable lack of intelligence of the doctor due to 
lack of necessity for rigid intellectual discipline? Many conditions conspire to make him an 
intellectual cheat. Fortunately for us, most diseases 
are self -limiting. But it is natural f or the physician 
to turn this dispensation of nature to his advantage 
and to intimate that he has cured John Smith, when 
actually nature has done the trick. On the contrary, 
should Smith die, the good doctor can assume a 
pious expression and suggest that, despite his own 
incredible skill and tremendous effort, it was God’s 
(or nature’s) will that John should pass beyond. Now, the engineer is open to no such temptation. He builds a bridge or erects a building, and disaster 
is sure to follow any misstep in ca lculation or fault 
in construction. Should such a calamity occur, he is 
presently discredited and disappears from view. Thus he is held up to a high mark of intellectual 
rigor and discipline that is utterly unknown in the 
world the doctor inhabits. The  critic appears to think that “one of the chief causes of 
the anti -scientific character of doctors lies in their innate 
credulity and inability to think independently.” I presume 
he means that the doctors cannot think independently; for if 
medicine, scient ific or unscientific, could think at all, it 
might have thought itself out of its present -day muddle. The only thing that saves all physicians from the above 
indictment is that they are not examined on the cause and 
treatment of disease. If average ph ysicians pass low on 
“trustworthy psychological tests,” it does not speak very 
well for the higher education which put so many medical 
schools out of business a few years ago. But these 
psychological tests may be fitted to educational standards 
which are a ssembled with intelligence left out. Intelligence, 
like the cause of disease, is a force in nature that can be 
used under the proper environments; but it cannot be monopolized to the exclusion of all mankind. Gladstone in 
youth was passed upon by the psych ological test of his  
teacher, and pronounced incorrigible; yet at eighty -six he 
was wielding an ax and translating Virgil. SCIENTIFIC TESTS   
 
   People should not take too seriously to heart verdicts 
resting on scientific tests, where a very large part  of the 
integral is scientific assumption and presumption. The New 
York Life Insurance Company turned me down more than 
fifty years ago. “Anonymous,” whoever he is, writes well, and as that of 
an iconoclast, his style is quite fetching. But, to save h is 
bacon, it was well that he criticized from ambush; for he 
would make an excellent target. From my point of view, I 
find him as vulnerable as any Standard A type of 
professional men. He shows his medical length and breadth when he says: 
“Of all the dreadful afflictions that plague us, a few may be 
cured or ameliorated by the administration of remedies.” 
That was said by medical men now one and two hundred  years dead, and with no more aplomb than that of the 
doctors of today in the literary class of our “Anonymous.”  
 
   “Dreadful afflictions” do not “plague us.” If we are 
plagued by disease, it is of our own building; and all five 
need to do to get back to comfort and health is to quit 
building disease; then our subconscious self gets busy 
cleaning h ouse. “Anonymous” could not have made a statement that 
would have been more perfectly one hundred per cent 
fallacy. He says: “A few may be cured.” That is a mild 
statement coming from one of the ambushed Caesars of 
scientific medicine. I presume he me ans that there is a 
contingent possibility that a few can be cured. This is false; 
for “afflictions” or disease cannot be cured. Nature —our 
subconsciousness —has a full monopoly on the power to 
cure. Healing is nature’s prerogative, and she cannot, if she 
would, delegate it to doctors or to the academies of medical 
science. What a glorious legacy, vouchsafed by the powers that 
be! What a sad plight humanity would be in if medical 
commercialism had a monopoly on healing or curing the 
sick! It does very w ell, however, as it is vending its 
camouflage cures of all kinds. But when mankind awakens to a full realization of the truth that for all past time it has 
been buying a pretense of power of which it alone 
possesses a monopoly, old hoary -headed Aesculapius  will 
be unfrocked and thrown out of business —staff, snake, and 
all. “Anonymous,” fearing that the statements, “A few may 
be cured,” was too strong, added the modifying phrase “or 
ameliorated;” which, in medical parlance, means palliated, 
relieved, et c. This in reality is the whole truth concerning 
so-called remedies or cures. And when the truth is known 
that curing, or the power to throw off disease and get well 
is wholly within the subconscious and is personal, we will 
know that curing and palliating  by the administration of 
remedies —drugs, serums, vaccines, surgery, feeding to 
keep up the strength, etc. —are superfluous, meddlesome, 
and on the order of throwing a monkey -wrench into the 
machinery. After criticizing “Anonymous” for what we know, 
inferentially, that he stands for, we will quote the remainder 
of what he says concerning the treatment of the “dreadful 
afflictions that plague us.” He further declares:  
 
   And an equally small number improved or were 
abolished by surgical interference. Bu t, in spite of the relatively few diseases to which surgery is 
beneficial, the number of surgeons that flourished 
in the land is enormous. The fundamental 
discoveries of Pasteur, and their brilliant 
application by Lister, were quickly seized upon in 
Americ a. The names of Bull, Halstead, Murphy, the 
brothers Mayo, Cushing, and Finney are to be 
ranked with those of the best surgeons of any 
nation. In fact, we may be said to lead the world —
to use an apt Americanism —in the production of 
surgeons [and surgical p lants], just as we do in that 
of automobiles, baby carriages, and antique 
furniture. “A few diseases may be cured or ameliorated.” I say, 
never cured; and amelioration is a form of building disease. A delicate woman became my patient, after suffer ing 
from megrim for twenty -two years and taking more or less 
palliatives from twenty -two different doctors —a few 
widely known, one a neurologist of more than national 
fame; the majority of whom told her that there was no cure, 
but that, when she changed li fe, the headaches would cease. This was a “bum” guess; for she declared that her suffering 
had been greater the past two years, since her menstruation 
has ceased, than ever before. Just how much the 
psychological suggestion, made by fifteen or twenty 
docto rs, that she would not get well for a given time, had to do with prolonging her headaches, no one can tell. Drug 
palliation is always inclined to enervate and build Toxemia. This woman had been relieved by hypodermics of 
morphine —a fiendish treatment. Ther e should be a law 
against such malpractice. But the majority never handicap 
themselves with prohibitory laws. My prescription was: No more smoking in the home (the 
husband being an inveterate smoker); stay in bed; fast, take 
a tub bath and an enema ev ery night until a paroxysm of 
headache had been missed. The paroxysms had been coming weekly, beginning on 
Tuesday and leaving her prostrate until Friday. Orders were 
given for a hot bath to be given to full relief, even if it 
required an hour. The pa tient had only one paroxysm after 
becoming my patient, and that required three -quarters of an 
hour in a hot bath to relieve. The husband became very 
enthusiastic over the fact that his wife had been of her pain 
without drugs for the first time in twentytwo  years. My 
comment on his outburst of rejoicing was: “Your smoking 
and the doctor’s drugging were responsible for her 
unnecessary suffering during nearly a quarter of a century.”  
 
   Drugging pain of any kind checks elimination and 
prevents the human orga nism from cleaning house. In this case of megrim, every time an eliminating crisis developed’ 
the doctor slammed the doors of egress shut and barred 
them with morphine. My prescription reversed the order; it 
opened all the doors, with the result that she n ever had 
another headache after the one that the hot bath relieved. Of 
course, I tinkered with her eating and other habits 
afterward. People are never sick who have no bad habits. About the same time I advised another woman who had 
suffered weekly fro m paroxysms of megrim for sixteen 
years. Like the first case, she had been medicated by many 
doctors, and told she need not look for a cure until after the 
change of life. The woman, too, had one paroxysm after 
giving up drug palliation and making a few ch anges in her 
daily habits. There were two patients with a “dreadful affliction,” 
which was kept “dreadful” by a senseless and criminal 
medication —and that, too, by physicians holding degrees 
from class A colleges. I refer to these two cases to il lustrate what “Anonymous” 
means by saying: “Few diseases may be cured or 
ameliorated.” Megrim is not cured; and if doping, as these 
two cases were doped, is ameliorating, some other name 
should be used in designating the procedure. CRISES   
 
   According t o the Toxin Philosophy, every so -called 
disease is a crisis of Toxemia; which means that toxin has 
accumulated in the blood above the toleration -point, and 
the crisis, the so -called disease —call it cold, “flu,” 
pneumonia, headache, or typhoid fever —is a vi carious 
elimination. Nature is endeavoring to rid the body of toxin. Any treatment that obstructs this effort at elimination 
baffles nature in her effort at self -curing. Drugs, feeding, fear, and keeping at work prevent 
elimination. A cold is driven i nto chronic catarrh; “flu” 
may be forced to take on an infected state; pneumonia may 
end fatally if secretions are checked by drugs; we already 
know what becomes of headache; typhoid will be forced 
into a septic state and greatly prolonged, if the patient is not 
killed. The above illustrates how “a few cases may be cured or 
ameliorated.” But the story is different when the attending 
physician knows that every so -called disease is a complex 
of symptoms signifying a crisis of Toxemia —nature’s 
house -clean ing. And she —nature —can succeed admirably 
if not interfered with by venders of poison, who are 
endeavoring to destroy an imaginary entity lurking somewhere in the system, which is mightily increased and 
intensified by the venders’ cures or amelioratives. It is a real pleasure for the doctor who knows that he 
cannot cure anything, to watch nature throw off all these 
symptoms by elimination, if he is willing to do a little 
“watchful waiting” and “keep hands off.” The patient will 
he comfortable most of t he time, and will say, when asked 
how he is: “I feel all right; I am comfortable.” Patients 
never answer in that way when drugged and fed. Yes, when 
nature is not hindered by officious professional meddling, 
sick people can truthfully say, when well over a  crisis of 
house -cleaning: “I had a very comfortable sickness.” 
Nature is not revengeful. Great suffering, chronic and fatal 
maladies, are built by the incorrigibleness of patients, and 
the well -meaning but belligerent efforts of the doctors who 
fight the imaginary foe without ceasing. The people are so 
saturated with the idea that disease must he fought to a 
finish that they are not satisfied with conservative 
treatment. Something must be done, even if they pay for it 
with their lives, as tens of thousands  do every year. This 
willingness to die on the altar of medical superstition is one 
very great reason why no real improvement is made in 
fundamental medical science. When the people demand 
education —not medication, vaccination, and 
immunization —they will g et it. Is there nothing for a doctor to do? Yes, of course! He 
should enter the sick -room with a smile and a cheerful 
word, free from odors, and neat and clean; be natural, and 
free from affectations. He should not tell at how many 
confinements he offi ciated the night before, or how many 
thousands he has had in the past ten years. Professional 
lobbying is not appropriate in the sickroom. Patients should 
have confidence in their doctor; and if he does a lot of 
medico -political lying, the patient will kno w it, and it 
sloughs confidence. He should advise an enema daily —a stomach -wash if it is 
needed; something warm to the feet; perfect quiet; no food, 
liquid or solid, and positively no drugs, but all the water 
desired; a warm bath at night; a hot bath when necessary 
for pain, and as often as necessary to secure comfort. Rest, 
warmth, fresh air, and quiet are curative. Then the 
physician should educate his patient into proper living 
habits, so as to avoid future crises of Toxemia. When this regime i s carried out, and Doctor Nature is 
allowed full control, the pessimistic statement of 
“Anonymous” that “a few diseases may be cured or 
ameliorated” can be changed to read: All acute so -called 
diseases can be cured;  and the patient will stay cured if he 
will practice self -control concerning the enervating habits that brought on his crises of Toxemia. Where this is carried 
out faithfully, so -called chronic diseases will never be built. ALL DISEASES ONCE INNOCENT   
 
   Cancer, tuberculosis, Bright’s dis ease, and all chronic 
diseases were once innocent colds “ameliorated,” and 
which returned and were “ameliorated” again and again; 
each time accompanied by a greater constitutional 
enervation, and a greater constitutional toleration for toxin -
poisoning, req uiring a greater requisition of mucous 
membrane through which to eliminate the toxin. Research is being carried on vigorously in an attempt to 
find the cause of disease; the conception of disease being 
that it is individual. Here is where investigator s meet their 
Waterloo. All the so -called diseases are increasing 
symptom complexes due to repeated crises of Toxemia. They have no independent existence. As soon as Toxemia 
is controlled, they disappear, unless an organ has been 
forced by innumerable crise s to degenerate. Even organic 
change, when the organ is not destroyed, will be overcome 
by correcting the life and getting rid of the cause —crises of 
Toxemia. To find the cause of cancer, start with colds and catarrh, 
and watch the pathology as it tra vels from irritation, 
catarrh, inflammation, induration, ulceration to cancer. As well try to find the cause of man by ignoring his 
conception, embryonic life, childhood, manhood, etc. All symptoms of all so -called diseases have one origin. All diseases are one. Unity in all things is nature’s plan. Polytheism is gone, and everything pertaining to it and 
coming out of it must go. HERD -BELIEFS   
 
   Few realize man’s possibilities if his handicaps are 
removed —handicaps which are old beliefs a nd herd -
instincts. The Toxemic Philosophy is founded on the truth that 
there is no such thing as cure. In this it differs from all the 
so-called curing systems. Every pretense or promise of 
cure, in all lines of therapeutics, is false. This cannot be 
grasped by all minds until time for thinking has allowed the 
idea to soak in. Convention and superstition have the floor, 
and they are unwilling to sit down and listen to the other side. Many learn slowly, others not at all, and still others 
are put to sle ep mentally by truth. There are ox -cart minds in every generation. The recent 
episode at Dayton, Tennessee, should cure the enthusiasm 
of those who think the world has outgrown superstition. I 
have bucked up against medical superstitions of all kinds 
all my life, and I know that clear -thinking minds are as 
scarce as hens’ teeth. Many compliment me on my clear 
reasoning on medical subjects; but the moment I cross the 
border -line into their ethical, moral and theological 
preserves, they remind me of my t respassing in no 
uncertain terms. Even my own profession is quick to ink 
the waters of my reasoning by declaring that I am an 
infidel —a word that fills the elect with abhorrence. Who is 
an infidel?
Toxemia_Explained_by_John_Tilden.txt
Summarize the following text section accurately and concisely. Maintain specific details and numerical information, and use anti-repetition mechanisms:

        TOXEMIA EXPLAINED   
REVISED EDITION  
 
THE TRUE INTERPRETATION  
OF THE CAUSE OF DISEASE  
 
HOW TO CURE IS AN OBVIOUS SEQUENCE  
 
AN ANTIDOTE  TO FEAR, FRENZY AND THE POPULAR  MAD 
CHASING AFTER SO -CALLED CURES  
 
 
By J. H. TILDEN, M. D. DENVER, COLORADO  
 
 
Copyr ight 1926, 1927, 1928, 1930, 1935  
By J.
The author argues that all so-called diseases are caused by enervating habits and that the focus should be on removing the cause of the disease, rather than treating the symptoms.
What is the author's main argument in the book "Toxemia Explained"?
The author believes that there are no true cures, and that the focus should be on removing the cause of the disease, rather than trying to treat the symptoms.
What is the author's stance on the concept of "cures"?
The author is highly critical of the medical profession, stating that they are ignorant, incompetent, and controlled by superstition and commercialism. He believes that doctors are not equipped to provide true knowledge and that the people should take control of their own health.
What is the author's view on the role of doctors and the medical profession?
The author defines disease as a process, not an entity, and states that it is the result of enervating habits and the accumulation of toxin in the blood.
What is the author's definition of disease?
The author argues that diet and food will not cure any disease, and that it is essential to eliminate the cause of the disease by giving up enervating habits and adopting rational living habits.
What is the author's perspective on the role of diet and food in curing disease?