The philosophy of eating. By Albert J. Bellows, M.D.

PREPARATION OF THE EARTH FOR MAN.

11

And after all this preparation the world was not fitted
for man till ages more of time were consumed in raising
the hills and the mountains, so that the ocean might
be formed and dry land appear, and mists, condensed
into rain and dews, be collected in brooks and rivers,
to carry the waters back to the ocean, to be again
evaporated, and a supply be insured, and the atmosphere prepared with its due proportion of oxygen and
nitrogen. And when all the fourteen necessary elements were prepared in the water, and the atmosphere,
and the soil, and laws instituted by which they should be
forever at his command and forever perpetuated, then
man was made; and then, that he might never fail to
be supplied with everything he should need, God gave
him "dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the
fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth
upon the earth," which, with " every herb bearing seed
which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree
in which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed," should all
contain the necessary elements, so that any one of them
would sustain life.
Having thus bountifully provided for every contingency of climate or circumstance, he gave man a test
by which he could select that which would be appropriate and reject that which would be injurious —that
article which contained the proper elements rightly
organized and adapted to his condition at any time,
the appetite would demand and the palate and stomach
receive gratefully and pleasantly; while that which was
not organized according to this plan, or had afterwards