Grizzled Wisdom

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Old Books

Public-domain books read slowly and taken seriously: what the old doctors, farmers, merchants, and philosophers knew about health, money, and how to live before the experts forgot it.

Reading Salisbury, Part 8: Starving on a Full Stomach

Eighth in a series working slowly through “The Relation of Alimentation and Disease” by James H. Salisbury, M.D. (1888). Chapters XVI–XIX: the diarrhoea that emptied the army camps, and the men who ate constantly and wasted away. The book is free; the link is at the bottom.

Reading Salisbury, Part 7: The Disease Nobody Could Hear

Seventh in a series working slowly through “The Relation of Alimentation and Disease” by James H. Salisbury, M.D. (1888). Chapters XI–XV: the four stages of consumption, the years when the patient feels fine, and why the stethoscope came too late. The book is free; the link is at the bottom.

Reading Salisbury, Part 6: The Soil and the Seed

Sixth in a series working slowly through “The Relation of Alimentation and Disease” by James H. Salisbury, M.D. (1888). Chapters VI–X: consumption, the germ found six years before he published, and the part of his theory that survived it. The book is free; the link is at the bottom.

Reading Salisbury, Part 5: Feed and Starve

Fifth in a series working slowly through “The Relation of Alimentation and Disease” by James H. Salisbury, M.D. (1888). Chapters IV and V: the two-to-one ratio, the long slide from a bowl of beans to a tumor, and the whole book in two verbs. The book is free; the link is at the bottom.

Reading Salisbury, Part 4: Two-Thirds Carnivorous

Fourth in a series working slowly through “The Relation of Alimentation and Disease” by James H. Salisbury, M.D. (1888). Chapter III, where he finally turns to food: what man is built to eat, and a doctor in Rio who was supposedly 193. The book is free; the link is at the bottom.

Reading Salisbury, Part 3: Less in the Garret, More in the Kitchen

Third in a series working slowly through “The Relation of Alimentation and Disease” by James H. Salisbury, M.D. (1888). Chapters I and II: worry, willpower, a breathing exercise with a nonsense explanation, and why he thought athletes die young. The book is free; the link is at the bottom.

Reading Salisbury, Part 2: Something We Are Doing Every Day

Second in a series working slowly through “The Relation of Alimentation and Disease” by James H. Salisbury, M.D. (1888). Part 1 covered the Preface. The book is free to read; the link is at the bottom.

Reading Salisbury, Part 1: The Old Wisdom We Threw Away

First in a series working slowly through “The Relation of Alimentation and Disease” by James H. Salisbury, M.D. (1888). The book is free to read; the link is at the bottom.