er eight or
ten inches of the manikin, representing the lower portion of the
sigmoid colon, rectum, and anus, just as tightly as we should find it
closed in sufferers from chronically acute proctitis and colitis. Now
insert at the stomach portion of the manikin a generous amount of man's
usual mixture of foodstuffs and liquids, and repeat the supply three or
four times during the day (without any previous attempts at cleansing),
and then note the fermentative and putrefactive changes that take
place; the ensuing bacterial poisons and the great volume of poisonous
gases--all of which occasion squirming, twisting movements of the
manikin as dislocations here and there occur, as pouches and reservoirs
develop, as the walls become distended with gas and putrid substance;
and then, time elapsing, the usual foodstuffs are added to the foul
mass within! Now, if there is any pity in your soul, you medical man,
for the enfouled and deformed human manikin, you will want to wash it
out with cleansing water before its structure comes to an untimely end.
We medical men all know the numerous and grave symptoms exhibited by
one or more organs of the body, or by all of them, from the persistent
work of the deleterious gases and bacterial poisons on the system--a
work going on for years, finally placing the victim beyond medical aid.
All of us are agreed that the capacious gastro-intestinal canal should
be clean. What, I submit, is the best means of keeping clean this long,
large, tortuous, spacious, valved and flexed canal--a canal that
disease has here and there pouched, dislocated, bagged, reservoired; a
canal at whose lower end a great cesspool exists; that, like other
portions of the gut, is never empty and clean--what is the best means
but a flushing with copious amount of water?

Proctitis or colitis is a very serious disease; like a railroad injury,
it is found, on examination, to be much worse than appearances at first
indicated.

A physician who prescribes for a case of chronic constipation or
diarrhea without first examining the sufferer for proctitis and
colitis, is either ignorant or does wilful harm to his patient and
injury to his practice. The abominable, aboriginal and almost universal
custom at the present time of giving some physic to "cleanse" the
gastro-intestinal canal is in every respect a deplorable mistake for a
conscientious doctor to make.

Many persons suffering from chronic constipation drink very little