Valere Aude: Dare to Be Healthy, Or, The Light of Physical Regeneration. Louis Dechmann

      DEDICATION

       Table of Contents

      "Dispel this cloud, the light of Heaven restore;

       Give me to see, and Ajax asks no more!"

      (Pope)

      To you of that great voiceless multitude,

      "THE PEOPLE"—

      You whose bewildered cry is still for light; whose silent tragedy our well beloved Longfellow could so well portray:

      "O suffering sad humanity!

       O ye afflicted ones, who lie

       Steeped to the lips in misery,

       Longing, and yet afraid to die,

       Patient, though sorely tried!"

      To you and your needs this brief epitome of a coming greater work is given as a fitting Christmas offering—

      "LET THERE BE LIGHT!"

      It is the cry which despairing, deluded humanity, in the darkness of its frenzied ignorance, has flung back hopelessly to heaven since first the spirit of an Infinite Intelligence brooded upon the race. It is the appeal of man's immortal unity to the All-Father, from age to age, for knowledge sufficient for its hourly needs, since ever, back in the far dim ages of the earth, primeval man, beetle-browed, furtive and fashioned fearsomely, first felt the faint vibration of a Soul; and, like an awakened giant, that chief of human faculties, a Mind took form which, pressing on along the uncertain way, has scaled the giddy heights of knowledge where genius, enthroned, does battle with an envious world of shams and greed and venal prejudice. Led by the resistless pulse of power it follows still that "banner with a strange device: Excelsior!";—for, ever onward yet it wends its way where'er the devious pathway trends, whose troubled, varied course is time, whose bourne is in eternity.

      But where seek we, then, the answer to a cry so shrill, that smites the high face of heaven from a world in pain?

      Shall we seek it where false learning leads us in the quest?—Ah no.

      It comes, not in the crash of Sinai's thunders with the rockings of a riven sphere, as in the allegoric stories of a puerile past.

      Softly it falls—yes, almost fearfully—from the fervid lips of some lone world-neglected persecuted man—some patient toil-worn son of science, whom Genius loves to call her own—though, haply, to the schools, to fortune and to fame unknown. One whose transcendent, superconscious mind has dared, Prometheus-like, to snatch from heaven the fire of the immortal gods and offer it in benefits to all mankind.

      Thrice happy he upon the sensory surface of whose open mind such seeds of knowledge and of wisdom fall, and happy the land where one and all may dare to warm chill hands and hearts before its sacred flame; that halcyon land, the Ultima Thule of our fond imaginings, wherein true freedom reigns; wherein the legalized tyranny of the chartered libertines of a so-called learned profession shall be finally relegated, in common cause to the limbo of a sordid and degraded past. For these are they who seek to maintain a strangle-hold on science, who paralyze the arm of individual research and, even in this advancing age, still block the path of progress and of peace, of universal freedom and equality of intellect, to all beyond the narrow limits of their own elect.

      Thus then, to the free fraternity of the open mind I dedicate this brief resumé of the product of long years of study and of toil, steadfastly believing that therein is found the missing dimension for their urgent need, suited alike to all who hold that to maintain the health of body and of mind is a worthy object for enlightened man. To you, mothers of the land, who recognize your duty, towards God and to the State, to rear your children healthy, strong and good to look upon. To all whose keener common-sense looks upon Nature, the Creator, as logically therefore, the healing power also. To all endowed with wit to understand the obvious truth that, not by poisonous drugs is healing wrought, but by such reasonable help as man's intelligence