Page:Linda Hazzard - Fasting for the cure of disease.djvu/33

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Death from starvation frequently occurs when the body is overfed. The purpose of food is that of nourishing body tissue, a purely mechanical process for use in growth and rebuilding. In the event that, through errors in digestion, organic defect, or fault in the functions of absorption and assimilation, tissue waste is not replaced as broken down, starvation and death result. If any one of these conditions exists, the more food supplied, the less resistance to disease succeeds, since energy is then directed towards the elimination of food products that cannot be utilized because of physical inability in the ultimate processes of growth. Exhaustion and, after a time, death occur.

Death from starvation cannot take place in a fast when organic disease is absent. In every animate body a reserve supply of nourishment is held in the interstices of tissue cells. The brain and the nerves are directly