TEA and COFFEE by Daniel H. Kress, M. D.

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · Apr 7, 1914

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 41, No. 13.

TEA and COFFEE

By Daniel H. Kress, M. D.

Our Modern Beverages

THEY HAVE NO FOOD VALUE—ACT AS A WHIP, USING UP OUR RESERVES, BUT SUPPLYING NO POWER — CONTAIN A SLOW, INSIDIOUS POISON By DANIEL H. KRESS, M. D.

THE use of stimulants is becoming almost universal. For the future welfare of the race, it seems important that the injury resulting from their use should be clearly understood by all.

The word "stimulant" is derived from a Latin word meaning to goad or to urge on. A stimulant acts as a goad or a whip. It urges one on to do that which he feels disinclined to do.

By some, alcoholic beverages are employed for this purpose. Others, who are acquainted with the injurious nature of alcohol, resort to stimulating beverages against which there exists no popular prejudice.

WHEN FEELING AMBITIONLESS

When a person feels a lack of energy, or feels ambitionless, a cup of tea or coffee appears to impart new life. This has naturally led to the belief that beverages that are capable of exerting such decided effects must in some way impart energy. Yet they possess practically no nutrition. For instance, it would require all the nutritive properties contained in five hundred cups of tea to sustain a man for a period of twenty-four hours.

Stimulants can in no sense be termed foods, and can never take the place of food. They do not impart energy nor build up or repair tissue. Man derives energy from food, not from stimulants.

ASSISTED BY THE WHIP

The fact that stimulants are everywhere sought is evidence that the vitality of the race is at a low ebb. It is not well, however, for one who lacks energy, to resort to stimulants. The tired, worn-out horse, attempting to draw a heavy load, may be assisted with a whip, and may appear greatly improved and strengthened thereby.

The whip does not impart energy. It dissipates or draws upon the little that nature would wisely have reserved for other and more important purposes. All the energy we possess can not be expended in mental or muscular work. The organism needs to hold in reserve a certain amount for the heart, to enable it to pump the stream of life through the system. Some of the energy must supply the digestive organs, so that they may be able to digest the food. The function of the liver, the kidneys, etc., must also be sustained by it. To draw upon the supply held in reserve to carry forward the important work of these organs, must sooner or later result in serious injury, for upon their proper function the health of the body depends.

ENERGY GRANULES

The brain cells of a healthy individual are well filled with what are known as energy granules. After a hard day's work, instead of being plump and well filled, they possess only a few of these granules.

When the brain cells are in this state, mental and physical effort should cease, and the needed rest and sleep should be taken to enable the cells to be recharged. It has been observed, however, by users of stimulants, that when this feeling of fatigue occurs, a cup of tea or coffee apparently answers the same purpose as rest, for it imparts a feeling of strength, and causes the tired feeling to disappear. The cup of tea adds no energy granules to the exhausted cells. It merely enables one to utilize for muscular or mental effort the few remaining energy granules.

UNNATURAL AND DESTRUCTIVE METHODS

The habitual users of these beverages never afford an opportunity for nerve cells to become fully stored with energy. Fullness of life is therefore never experienced by them. Users of these beverages awake in the morning feeling tired, unrefreshed, and exhausted. They feel that they could much better dispense with breakfast than with the accustomed morning cup. Several hours are required for food to digest, and for the energy stored up in it to be liberated, while the cup of tea or coffee affords an immediate supply of energy by drawing upon the partially depleted nerve cells.

WORKING ON BORROWED CAPITAL

It is evident that the slave of these beverages is carrying on business on borrowed capital and must eventually become a mental and nervous wreck. The modern use of such stimulants no doubt accounts in part for the many nervous diseases and the rapid increase of insanity.

A POISON IN REALITY

The real constituent that is responsible for the stimulation experienced by the tea and coffee drinker is an alkaloid or poison, and is almost identical with others that we frown upon. Thein is derived from the tea leaf, caffein from the coffee-berry, theobromin from the cacao seed, strychnin from the seed of nux vomica, morphin from the poppy. These all act upon the nervous system in such a manner that one dose invites the second, the second invites the third, and the third demands the fourth. Thus these habits become fixed, and we do not realize that we are slaves to them until an effort is made to abandon them.