The Health Reformer by James White

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Feb 7, 1871

The Health Reformer.

By James White

This journal has an important mission to perform, a great work to do. The world is full of men and women who need reforming in their habits of life. And the present time, in some respects, is favorable to this work. As great changes in medical practice take place, the people lose confidence in drugs, the old-school practice goes down, and many of our public journals, which are circulated everywhere, speak of proper diet, bathing, exercise, and air, as the real reliances for health. Thus the superstitious confidence of the people in doctors' doses is being shaken, the ice is broken, and the way prepared to spread abroad the true philosophy of health, life, and happiness. Here is the mission and work of the Reformer.

The Reformer proposes to reach the people, with all their prejudices, and their ignorance of the laws of life, where they are. Said the eccentric Lorenzo Dow, “Prejudice is like a cork in a bottle. It will neither let anything out nor in.” If you wish to help a man, see that you do not excite his prejudices. If you do, you will find it harder to take errors out of him, and in their place, plant the truth within him. And on no subject are the people more sensitive than on that which involves the appetite.

Eve fell, through appetite. The crimes of men and women for nearly six thousand years, have come in consequence of the clamorings of their appetites and passions. And, in our day, when every other means fails to move men to works of benevolence for the cause of humanity and Christianity, one sure means remains, through which appeals may be made with assurances of success; namely, the appetite. Hence the church festivals of our day, where everything tempting to the appetite is offered to the crowd in the name of Christianity. It is of no use to deny the fact that the moral and intellectual are so far enslaved to the appetites and passions of men, that the most successful channel through which to reach their feelings of benevolence, is that of gluttony. Take care, then, how you approach men on subjects which concern the appetites.

Reformers should be right in theory, right in practice, and right in spirit toward those they would reform. The Health Reformer will labor to disarm the people of their prejudices, and, in the spirit of love and good-will, appeal to the people, and entreat them to turn and live. Its circulation must and will be extended. We call on all the friends of reform to help us in this work. The highest premium we have to offer you is the consciousness you may enjoy of having done your duty in this direction as a philanthropist. Send us new subscribers. Induce all you can to take the Reformer.

We now design to add eight pages to this journal, and do only our own advertising, which will give each number thirty-two pages of reading matter, instead of twenty. And we offer to all new subscribers the remaining numbers of the present volume, free; that is, on receipt of $1.00, we will send the Reformer to new subscribers until July, 1872, in all, sixteen numbers. We have on hand about two hundred copies of the last four numbers of the Reformer, containing an article on the rise and progress of health reform among Seventh-day Adventists. Those who order the Reformer, and wish these numbers, can have them without price, if they send their orders immediately. In this case, we shall furnish twenty copies of the Reformer for $1.00.

We shall leave no means untried to improve the Reformer, and we ask all those readers of the REVIEW who are the friends of health reform, to assist us in extending the circulation of the Reformer. This you can do by sending us the names and addresses of new subscribers. We hope our preachers, officers of our churches, and our brethren generally, will take a lively interest in the circulation of the Reformer.

JAMES WHITE.