p. 239 | Tea and Coffee

Pacific Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Oakland, California · Aug 2, 1877

Tea and Coffee.

WHY THEIR USE IS UNHEALTHFUL.

(Continued.)

HOW TEA AND COFFEE ARE INJURIOUS.

The evils which result from the use of tea and coffee are attributable to three distinct causes, each of which we will briefly consider.

1. The most prominent and characteristic effects of the use of tea and coffee are those which are occasioned by the peculiar poison which they contain, together with tannic acid, an irritating drug. Acting as poisonous, or medicinal, agents (as the terms are really synonymous,) they produce a great variety of morbid effects, which will be more fully noticed further on.

2. In drinking tea and coffee, or any other beverage, with the meal, the processes of digestion are greatly interfered with in at least three different ways.

a. The food is rinsed down the throat without proper mastication, so that it is introduced into the stomach in a condition quite unfit to be acted upon by the gastric juice, as it is quite essential that the digestive fluid should come in immediate contact with the most minute particles of the food in order to fully perform its function. As the stomach cannot perform the work of comminution which the teeth are especially fitted to do, a large proportion of the food either passes on at once as waste material, or lies in the stomach souring, and thus preventing the digestion of the remainder of the food, and irritating the delicate membranes of the organ. Drinking tea, coffee, or any other beverage with meals, is the great cause of hasty eating, and imperfect digestion. One other result of hasty mastication is the imperfect insalivation of the food, which is a very serious deficiency, as the saliva is a very important digestive fluid, and its absence imposes an extra task upon the other juices employed in digestion.

b. By the introduction into the stomach of a large quantity of fluid, the gastric juice is so diluted that it is rendered utterly incapable of digesting the food with which it comes in contact.

c. In order to remedy the evil last mentioned, the absorbent vessels of the stomach are set vigorously at work to absorb and carry away the surplus liquid, so that the work of digestion may be carried on. This is a task which involves both a serious delay, and the imposition of a large amount of unnecessary work upon the stomach, the natural result of which is exhaustion, enervation, and ultimate permanent weakening of that important digestive organ.

3. The unnatural temperature at which tea, coffee, and all similar beverages are usually drunk, is very injurious to health. By the great heat, the teeth are injured, and the delicate nerves of taste are rendered insensible. But the greatest injury is done the stomach, the delicate walls of which are relaxed and weakened, so that they cannot act upon the food in their naturally prompt and vigorous manner.

The morbid effects of tea and coffee are manifested upon both the physical constitution and the mental organization of the person addicted to their use.

ALLEGED BENEFITS OF TEA AND COFFEE CONSIDERED.

These have been slightly touched upon already, but we will now consider them more fully. Perhaps the first thing we hear in favor of the use of tea and coffee is from some sallow, weak, nervous lady who, when questioned on the subject, declares she cannot possibly live without her daily tea and coffee, for—

THEY SOOTHE THE NERVES.

How do they soothe the nerves? Do they furnish the requisite material for repairing the worn and exhausted organs? No. They only temporarily excite them, so that their real condition is for a time obscured; but when their evanescent effect has vanished, the nerves are in greater need than before of being soothed, and each application of the remedy makes the evil worse. This is the reason why we seldom find a confirmed tea-drinker who is not troubled with nervousness. It is also equally true that the great majority of sufferers from this disease are tea-drinkers. In hundreds of instances these nervous tea-drinkers have fully and speedily recovered their health by abandoning their use of the article. This is a sure and simple remedy.

TEA AND COFFEE ASSIST DIGESTION.

“My stomach is so weak,” says a tea-drinking dyspeptic, “that a cup of good, strong tea is necessary to enable me to digest my meal.” Yes; this is doubtless the case; and if you continue the practice you will find after a time that two or three cups will be necessary to enable you to dispose of your dinner satisfactorily. Then if you persevere in the habit, in spite of the admonitions of your best medical adviser, nature, you will shortly find it quite impossible to swallow a sufficient quantity of the beverage to make your stomach perform its work. Then you will begin to realize the fact that goading an organ into action is quite a different thing from encouraging and promoting its healthy activity by supplying it with healthful, nourishing food.

Do not be deceived by momentary sensations. Consider the ultimate effects, and you cannot fail to be convinced that instead of promoting digestion, tea and coffee are most effective disturbers of that function. How they interfere with digestion has already been explained.

TEA AND COFFEE RELIEVE HEADACHE.

How invariably the unsuspecting lady resorts to a cup of tea to relieve the distress occasioned by that common malady, sick-headache! Yes; and how invariably that same sick-headache returns! Who ever heard of a person who was permanently cured of sick-headache by tea-drinking? Such a thing would be impossible. Tea and coffee are among the prime causes of sick-headache, although they afford temporary relief, just as tobacco and alcohol are prolific causes of tremors, but yet appear to steady the trembling nerves for a short time.

TEA AND COFFEE SUPPLY THE PLACE OF FOOD.

Many people who are largely addicted to the use of the articles will prefer a cup of strong tea or coffee to a hearty meal of nourishing food. Indeed, it is a general custom with the English peasant to reduce his bread fare one-half that he may be able to procure a cup of tea to accompany the remainder. Dr. Arlidge, of England, has recently called attention to the fact that the women of the working-classes in that country have carried this practice of substituting tea for food to such an extent that they are beginning to manifest the most unmistakable evidence of narcotic poisoning. Tea silences the demand of the system for food, but it does not in any respect replace it, as may be seen by the weakened energies and the attenuated forms of those who use it largely.

TEA AND COFFEE INCREASE MENTAL VIGOR.

Those who make this claim mistake mental activity for mental strength. A greater error could not be made; and yet this fallacious notion is very popular. See the poor victim of delirium tremens trembling with fright at the fantastic and threatening shapes which his excited fancy portrays. His imagination was never so active in health. Now it makes him see forked tongues darting at him from every corner, and converts every shadow into a monster. Who will venture the assertion that his mind is stronger now than when in health? Listen to the ravings of the patient during the delirium of fever; the mind is certainly active, but it cannot be said to be strong; for strength is only consonant with health.

When the brain is stimulated to unnatural activity by tea, coffee, tobacco, alcohol or any other stimulant, it makes violent attempts to accomplish whatever task may be imposed upon it. But the calm, deliberate action of the mind is impossible. The highest efforts of genius can never be exhibited under such circumstances. Is it argued that some of our greatest mental workers, as Voltaire and Jonson, were users of tea or coffee, we would, in answer, call attention to the nervousness, irritability and irascibility, which notably characterized the last years of the life of each of these men. Here we see the legitimate results of the use of tea and coffee, and it is very probable that had these men been more nearly correct in their habits of life, they would have achieved even greater success than they did.

TEA AND COFFEE CORRECT THE INJURIOUS EFFECTS OF POOR WATER.

When no other reason can be offered for the continuance of a bad habit, this one is frequently presented. Its absurdity makes it almost insusceptible of candid consideration. How strange that the addition of a poison to water already bad enough should improve it! The assertion is wholly without foundation in fact, and never would have been advanced as an argument by tea-drinkers except for the lack of any better. Two poisons are always worse than one unless they neutralize each other; but no such chemical properties are claimed for tea or coffee.