The Sun as a Healing Agency
EXPOSURE to the sun draws to the surface of the body and fixes in the skin a large amount of blood by dilating the blood-vessels. The average chronic invalid is suffering from too much blood somewhere. If he has too much blood in his brain, he suffers from insomnia; if there is too much blood in the lungs, he has chronic bronchitis; if there is too much blood in the region of the heart, he has dilatation of the heart or some other cardiac disease; too much blood in the stomach causes gastric catarrh, or in the intestines, intestinal catarrh; too much blood in the kidneys causes Bright's disease. A person does not suffer from any serious internal disorder while he has a perfectly healthy skin. A healthy skin is a guarantee of health throughout the body. One who has a diseased stomach will have a sickly skin; and one who has a sickly skin will have a diseased stomach sooner or later. When a person gets out in the sun and gets his skin well sunburned, a few days later his skin is darker in color than it was before. That brown color is due to the fact that there is more blood in the skin, and this means that the skin has become more active. This increased activity of the skin indicates increased activity of the entire body. The blood-vessels are dilated, and the blood remains in the skin. There will then be less blood in the brain, where there was too much before; or in the liver, which can now do its work better; or in the stomach, which can consequently digest better.—Selected.