Your great desire is to live a long, useful life, all the while looking and feeling far younger than your years. Certainly this is a goal worth aiming at. But are you prepared to abide by the Commandments? Because everything worth attaining has a price. And the price of a long, youthful life is planned diet. No more haphazard eating; no more pandering to a finicky appetite; no more plundering your body's health with indifferent and unwise selections of ''substandard" foods.

At first, the careful and judicious selection of youth-pro­tecting foods will be a novelty you'll enjoy. But after that may come the danger period when the novelty provided by a new regimen begins to wear off, and you are tempted to lapse into the "oh, it's too much trouble" kind of defeatist thinking.

Yet I promise you that once you have successfully weathered this period of temptation to return to the old haphazard way of eating, you'll subconsciously begin accepting, or rejecting, each food on the basis of its contribution to your youthfulness and long life, with the same skill as that exercised by a trained nutritionist. Instinctively, you will avoid the old "gooey" meals with which you formerly insulted your body.

The food commandments I am going to lay down for you are those that will afford you taste pleasures and adventures in good eating the like of which you have seldom enjoyed before.

While this book was still in the planning stage, I came across a published interview with Dr. Charles E. Dutchess, medical director of an Eastern research laboratory, and a scientist long interested in proper nutrition as the only way to attain a healthy, long life. His "six general rules" parallel so closely the health teachings to which I have devoted my life that I was elated to find a medical scientist speaking out firmly on the subject of "eating to stay young." If you are already forty or over, Dr. Dutchess was quoted as saying, it is even more important to protect your body mechanism against the wear and tear of age. And at fifty and sixty, and beyond, the six rules become still more vital.

The rules, in brief, with which Dr. Dutchess (as well as all nutritional scientists) earnestly seeks to acquaint the public call for "plenty of lean meat, eggs, milk, vitamins and essential minerals, obtained from a broad selection of meats, fruits and vegetables."

Let's take these six general rules—commandments I have called them—one by one, in detail, as they pertain to your goal of attaining a long, youthful, enjoyable life.

FIRST COMMANDMENT—HIGH-GRADE PROTEINS IN ABUNDANCE

The protein story has been developed rather fully for you in the preceding chapters, so there is no need to repeat at length the fact that protein is essential for feeding, repairing and rebuilding your muscles, nerves, tissues, glands and vital organs. In short, your body is made of protein and needs liberal quantities of protein foods to keep it operating with­out serious breakdowns (disease).

In case of illness or convalescence, protein is the re-builder of your health. It hastens the healing of severe burns or fractures; it builds up bodily resistance by increasing the germ-killing power of the blood; it supplies the lasting energy so essential to the body's recuperative powers in fight­ing disease.

Life insurance companies have an unsentimental, dollars-and-cents interest in keeping you well and alive for a long time. For that reason they issue series o£ pamphlets and booklets loaded with sane advice on how to avoid illness and early death. I quote from one o£ these pamphlets directed at the forty-and-over group:

"An ample, nutritious diet is as important to adults as to growing children. Learn to like and to choose foods that are good for you. Well-balanced meals o£ vegetables, meats and fresh fruits are health-building meals. The impression that people in the older ages should avoid eating meat is entirely erroneous. In fact, some diseases are due to lack of protein which is contained in such foods as meat, eggs, milk and cheese."

The pamphlet then goes on to say that "older people die (aside from accidents and senility) only from blood disorders, cancer, circulatory disorders (heart disease, kidney disease or stroke) or infections.1'

Let's see what nutritional science has been doing to fight these "disease enemies of your youth."

First, we'll take blood disorders. One of the most common of these in persons past forty is anemia. (See Chapter 18.) The paleness which has come to be associated with growing older is often nothing except a visible symptom of nutritional anemia. There's no reason why a person shouldn't possess a healthy, glowing complexion in later years, provided his blood is rich with red coloring matter. But healthy blood cannot be formed without protein any more than it can be maintained without the minerals iron and copper. Hemo­globin, the red coloring matter in the blood, contains no less than 14 different amino acids (proteins combined in as many as 576 different groupings). You can't build good red blood on tea and toast.

Because nutritional anemia is so widespread among all sugar-and-starch eaters, but more particularly in those per­sons past forty, I want to dwell a moment on this blood dis­order which, in itself, does not kill, but which paves the way for more serious diseases. And I might add, as an aside right here, that although anemia may not kill you, it certainly does murder your youthfulness, for without pep and enthusiasm you can neither look nor feel young. And who can remain youthful while staggering under the growing burden of anemia fatigue}

Anemia at any age, and particularly after forty, cannot be shrugged off as "not serious," for anemia in middle life is an ailment that can shorten your years of useful, vigorous living. And certainly the mind of a person suffering from nutritional anemia is not equipped to cope with the bewildering personal adjustments that often must be faced, and accepted, after the fourth decade. If you suspect that you may be anemic, go at once to a reliable laboratory and have a blood count taken.

Here are a few of the more common symptoms of anemia: A gradually increasing fatigue and loss of vigor; pale, green­ish, sallow skin, turning to pasty white (especially the ear lobes) as the disorder progresses; dull-looking eyes with a pronounced blue-white cast to the whites; dry, luster less hair; brittle, flattened, indented fingernails and toenails; a tender, burning, slick, beefy-red tongue, and sore mouth; dizziness; shortness of breath; and palpitation of the heart (brought on because the blood hasn't enough oxygen-carry­ing hemoglobin to properly nourish the heart muscle).

Let me point out that unless anemia is checked as rapidly as possible, your heart ultimately will be damaged.

If a blood count reveals that your blood contains too few red cells and has a low percentage of hemoglobin (that is, it is not red enough), then you should act at once to restore your blood to normal. How? By immediately converting to high-protein meals (those containing lean meat, liver, kidney, heart, dark meat of poultry, oysters, eggs, cheese, milk and seed cereals like millet, sunflower and sesame seeds); by eat­ing generously of iron-rich apricots, molasses (not necessarily the bad-tasting blackstrap variety, since pure cane and sor­ghum syrups are also rich in iron), prunes, raisins, whole grains, beets, parsley, radishes, citrus fruits and pineapple, to mention but a few of the foods with the highest iron content. As a safety measure, your doctor will probably also prescribe a mineral supplement containing organic iron to rebuild your blood to normal as quickly as possible.

As an added iron tonic which you can prepare for yourself at home, buy some unsulphured apricots (usually found only in health food stores). If apricots can't be had, then the next best fruits in order are dried peaches or raisins. Put a hand­ful of the fruit in a glass, cover with lukewarm water, stir, then let stand overnight. Next morning stir the mixture again, drain off the water into another glass, adding to it one tablespoonful of a pure cane or sorghum molasses. Pre­pare and drink this iron tonic several times a week (the fruit should also be eaten), then eat at least a handful of iron-rich, hulled sunflower seeds each day.

Because women, especially those nearing or passing through their menopause, tend to be far more anemic than men, this homemade tonic might well be used as a morning "pick-me-up" three or four times a week, while the sunflower seeds could form their between-meal confection.

Up to this point I have been speaking exclusively of simple, iron-deficiency anemia which comprises about 95 per cent of all anemia cases. But there is another type of blood dis­order called pernicious anemia that was inevitably fatal until some twenty years ago. Even now, unless diagnosed during its early stages and treated immediately, pernicious anemia can be a killer disease. The most important thing I can im­press upon you about pernicious anemia is the urgent need for an early diagnosis. Don't neglect the symptoms which, in their early stages, may resemble those of simple iron-defi­ciency anemia outlined above. If taken in time, pernicious anemia is entirely controllable through the use of liver extract and the new wonder vitamin B-12 (a member of the B-complex family), supplemented with meals planned around high-grade protein foods and those rich in iron.

Another blood disorder is the inability of the blood to clot, meaning that a slip of the razor, or a kitchen knife, may cause death from loss of blood. Blood-clotting agents called pro·` thrombin and fibrinogen are manufactured by the body from the food we eat, the principal nutrients used being protein and vitamin K. (This vitamin is supplied by green leafy vegetables, tomatoes, liver, eggs, rice bran and soybean oil.) The greatly lowered death rate from bleeding wounds among American fighters in World War II has been attributed to the high-protein meals fed all branches of the service.

Edema, or waterlogging, is one of the commonest symptoms of a severe protein deficiency. Actually, this condition stems from a blood disorder, since the extremely delicate balance of water in bloody tissues is chiefly dependent on blood pro­teins. It is the duty of blood proteins to maintain sufficient pressure on the inside of the blood vessel walls to counteract the pressure from the tissues outside the walls. In this way, provided the blood protein is up to normal, the water in blood cannot escape into surrounding tissues and cause the body to become waterlogged. Not so many years ago, this condition was called "dropsy" and was a blood condition that caused untold needless suffering until nutritional science discovered that high-protein diets both prevented and helped clear up this potentially serious ailment.

Cancer, the second of the killer diseases among the older age bracket, has been discussed rather fully from a nutritional standpoint in Chapter 7. Exhaustive laboratory studies seem to provide evidence that high-calorie, sugar-and-starch diets nourish the cancerous cells, thereby permitting them to com­pete with healthy cells, and to gradually reach the final stage when they kill off the healthy cells. The danger of cancer striking in any body, at any age, is too grave to invite it through wrong eating. Be wise now. Replace heavy starch meals with a low-calorie, high-protein diet, and lessen the chances of cancer ever putting its deadly finger on you.

Infection is another of the principal causes, listed by the insurance company pamphlet, that bring death to older per sons. Every one of us is ceaselessly exposed to attack by bacteria, viruses and other toxic agents. Yet if you are properly nourished, these lethal bodies seldom get the oppor­tunity to pull off their dirty work. What holds them in check?

Nature provided you with antibodies, a first-line defense against infection. These antibodies are formed of protein. Your resistance to disease germs, and to various other toxins, actually rises or falls according to the amount of high-protein foods you eat. Dr. Paul R. Cannon of the University of Chicago declared that a high level of resistance to disease can be maintained only on meals containing ample proteins.

Experiments have disclosed that in persons placed on a high-protein diet as many as 100 times more antibodies show up in the bloodstream within the short period of one week.

If you're not equipped by correct diet to resist infections, then you certainly can't hope to live a long time, or to look and feel younger than your years. Infectious diseases, even if they don't kill you, leave their mark on a body trying to remain youthful.

The fourth of the killer diseases, circulatory disorders, I shall discuss fully under the Sixth Commandment.

SECOND COMMANDMENT—MINERALS WITHOUT FAIL

Minerals rank with protein as the most neglected, hap­hazardly obtained nutrients in our American diet. And more especially in the diets of persons past forty. One of the "three starvations of later years," spoken of frequently in nutritional reports, is mineral starvation. (The other two ''starvations" in older bodies are protein and vitamin B-complex.)

Protein and minerals are so closely linked that to advise you to eat plenty of protein, without stressing the need for equal care in obtaining a full quota of minerals, would be to tell only half the Eat-and-Grow-Younger story.

A report made this year to the National Academy of Sciences by a research team headed by Dr. Cannon emphasizes that the minerals potassium, phosphorus and magnesium are essential in the diet for proper use of all body-building protein foods. This research team discovered that omitting potassium from the diet could lead to eventual congestive heart failure. Dead tissue developed within the heart muscles six days after potassium was taken out of the diet. But when potassium was restored to the diet, the body muscles began to rebuild, and the dead tissues in the heart healed. In other words, with potassium again present, protein could resume its appointed task of repairing and replacing body cells.

Protein and minerals are the chief actors in the nutritional drama, while vitamins play a secondary, although essential, role (vitamins, the front-page news of the past decade, are now recognized as being solely activators, that is, substances needed to set other substances into action). To neglect any of these three food elements is to wreck the nutritional drama. Yet to star vitamins over protein and minerals is an equally unsound practice. You can't repair your body cells with vitamins alone, nor can you expect vitamins to do the nutritional work of minerals.

Each of the three food elements—protein, minerals, vita-mins—has its own specific task in preparing your body for a long, youthful life. If I seem to emphasize protein and minerals more than I do vitamins, it's only because I feel certain the vitamin story is well enough known not to need detailed repetition in this book.

On the other hand, I'm afraid the mineral story has been too often pushed into the background by "sensational" vita­min news. Yet today, more than ever before, nutrition ex­perts are turning to mineral therapy. The final report of the New York State Joint Legislative Committee on Nutrition for 1947 contains an article by Dr. C. Ward Crampton, noted authority on diseases of older persons, in which he .states: "The foremost nutritional defects in the mature and aging are calcium, iron and protein. Seventy-five per cent of the men of sixty suffer a lack of one or more. On the other hand, many suffer dietary excesses, notably carbohydrates and pos­sibly cholesterol."

Dr. Crampton goes on to report that the American diet is more deficient in calcium than in any other food element. Our ordinary menu is calcium-poor. (You'll find the menus prepared for you in Part II especially designed to correct this widespread lack of calcium.) This calcium deficiency accumu­lates, becoming increasingly serious as the person grows older.

Calcium is so important an ingredient of your blood that your bloodstream will attempt to maintain its calcium level, even though it has to rob other body parts of their vitally needed calcium. That is why, in many older persons, the bones, robbed of their calcium by the blood, become more fragile, resulting in easily fractured arms, legs and hips. It is also why calcium-starved heart muscles and brain cells often give up the struggle to maintain normal functioning in bodies that are comparatively young in years.

Your nerves, your heart, your teeth, your brain cells, your blood—all need sufficient calcium to remain healthy, and to function as nature intended.

Commenting that "calcium poverty is one common cause of aging that can be corrected," Dr. Crampton prescribes a grain of calcium lactate for each year of your age, taken in three doses three hours after each meal.

An inexpensive and convenient way to obtain added calcium in the diet is through the use of powdered skim milk. This dry milk provides needed calcium and protein, along with iron, copper, manganese, cobalt and other trace min­erals—less the fats which are wisely limited during the later years. (For more on the nutritional values of powdered skim milk see Chapter 11.)

Even though you obtain ample calcium in your diet, quite unknowingly you may be allowing certain foods to rob your body of this vital mineral. Beet greens and spinach contain oxalic acid which deprives the body of its calcium; but you can eat turnip greens, kale and dandelion greens with full assurance that you are not upsetting the balance of this valuable mineral in your body. In fact, dandelion greens— that springtime dish of your childhood—have a high calcium and vegetable protein content which make them an excellent spring salad.

Also, don't indulge in cocoa or rhubarb too freely, since both of them have a high oxalic acid content, and by fre­quent use of these two foods you run the risk of lowering your calcium reserves.

It is Dr. Crampton’s belief that a deficiency of iron is nearly always present in the * 'uncared-for person in the higher-age brackets." He says that the typical person of sixty is anemic, iron-poor and body-poor, unnecessarily so. And this condition is worse in those persons who are following some unwise diet because of "dyspepsia" or "indigestion." Insufficient hydrochloric acid in the gastric secretions is a common cause of iron poverty in the older body. (See Chap­ter 18.)

Minerals that regulate everything in the human body from "sight to sex" are lacking in a vast acreage of the croplands that spread across our country. Agricultural scientists are accumulating more and more evidence that a wide variety of human ills are caused by the poor nutrition furnished by foods grown in mineral-starved soils. Dr. K. Starr Chester, head of a staff of farm researchers, has announced that numer­ous studies show the soil in nearly every state lacks one or more trace elements—cobalt, copper, zinc, manganese, boron.

All food grown on mineral-poor soil (and the soil on American farms is estimated to have lost from 50 per cent upwards of its mineral contents in the past fifty-five years) is dangerously inadequate in iron, calcium, phosphorus, sodium, potassium, magnesium and sulphur.

For this reason, I cannot say to you with confidence that such-and-such a vegetable or fruit will provide you with this, that or the other mineral. I can tell you that a certain food should provide certain minerals. But, strictly speaking, the only way I know of at the present time (until some of our high authorities and conservation experts wake up and make obligatory the preservation and restoration of minerals in the farm and garden soils of our nation) to give you fool­proof advice on minerals is to recommend the use of a reli­able mineral concentrate, provided you are in doubt about the mineral content of the foods available to you. The mul­tiple-mineral concentrate is the best way to use a mineral supplement to the diet.

In whatever way you choose to obtain your full daily quota of minerals, for the sake of the restored youthfulness and the long life you so ardently desire, don't neglect these vital food elements. They are minute-to-minute essentials to your health.

THIRD COMMANDMENT—VITAMINS IN THEIR RIGHTFUL PLACE

The constant need for vitamin-rich food in your diet is an oft-told tale, and one which I shall not repeat here, since it is covered fully in my previous books. Yet there are two facts about vitamins which you may not know, and which deserve to be included here.

The first little-known fact about vitamins is that proteins and vitamins work together. The chemical agents called enzymes, that do the greatest part of the digestive work for your body, are all made of protein (at least those which have been analyzed successfully so far). Certain of these protein enzymes actually take part in your body's use of its vitamins, while certain vitamins affect the body's production of pro­tein enzymes—a sort of "mutual aid society."

In other words, you can't expect the vitamins in your food (or the vitamin supplement you take) to give you all the benefits you expect from them, unless you also provide your body with ample quantities of protein foods each day. Nutri­tional science has learned that successful vitamin therapy depends upon the presence of adequate high-proteins in the diet. Some biochemists even go so far as to declare that niacin (an important member of the vitamin B-complex group) is actually formed from an amino acid (protein) in the first place. Thus, you learn that your vitamin needs should always begin with a high-protein diet.

Under ideal conditions, the carefully planned Eat-and-Grow-Younger menus given in Part II should provide you with sufficient vitamins, provided (1) that the greatest care has been exercised in the picking and marketing of the foods before reaching your table, (2) that after arriving in your kitchen, all the foods have been given expert care in preparation and cooking in order not to destroy or waste most of the highly soluble or easily destroyed vitamins, and (3) that all vegetables, fruits and grains have been grown on mineral-rich soil, for it must be remembered that foods grown in mineral-deficient soil may also be poor in vitamins.

Even the trace minerals have a direct effect on the vitamin content of a crop. For example, plants deficient in boron will also contain little vitamin C. Only when the good earth is mineral-rich can it produce food plants containing all the nutrients vital to the health of the men and animals that feed on them. Much of the meat and poultry that should be a rich source of the various vitamins in the B-complex group, riboflavin especially, in reality contain inadequately varied amounts of these food elements, because the animals and fowls were fed on plants and grains which, in turn, were mineral-starved from being grown on depleted soils.

Fruits and vegetables may appear fresh and green in the market, yet be grossly lacking in vitamins, and minerals as well. Nearly half of all farm lands and truck gardens are occupied by tenant farmers who are far more interested in immediate profits than they are in improving the landlords' soil, or in sending to market foods containing all the minerals and vitamins you and I need for maximum health.

Therefore, unless you grow your own fruits and vegetables on organically, non-chemically fertilized soil—or can pur­chase them from farms and gardens containing carefully enriched soil to your certain knowledge—there is every possibility you are not obtaining in your food all the vitamins and minerals needed to keep you looking and feeling young.

It is easy to say "Get your daily vitamins in your foods." The realistic fact is that our foods just do not supply all the vitamins (and minerals) that we should have.

We are living in an atomic age. Our defense program is geared to high explosives, our production lines are miracles of speed. And our food has "gone modern" to keep pace. It is now being shot out of cannons, super-refined and shaped and coated with highly intriguing artificial preparations. Some of the products have been so highly transformed they are hard to recognize as food.

The case against nutritionally poor "refined" food—(which has very unrefined manners once it is inside your body)—is growing daily.

Commercial corn meal is one case in point. By the time it reaches your kitchen, it has been largely deprived of its natural vitamin and mineral food values. It has been proved that chickens fed on such refined corn meal die in less than fifty days.

When it has been robbed of its natural vitamins and min­erals, food is no longer "food" in the true sense of the word. I wish I could tell you to eat your meat, eggs, dairy products, fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and seed cereals with every assurance that your body would be supplied with sufficient vitamins to keep it healthily youthful—and leave the subject at that. But I cannot.

We who buy our food at the market, or who eat most of our meals away from home, are at the mercy of today's mineral-starved, eroded, artificially fertilized, overcultivated soils— to say nothing of all the vitamin-ignorant cooks.

For that reason, in addition to good eating, the safest course is to supplement your Eat-and-Grow-Younger program with a reliably manufactured vitamin-mineral concentrate. There are many good brands available.

But be sure that the vitamin-mineral formula you decide on is really complete. It stands to nutritional reason that the more complete the formula, the more you get for your money —and the better vitamin-mineral insurance you will have. A formula that I personally find thoroughly satisfactory is called Nutri-Time. You might look into it for your own use. It is available in most health-food stores.

Should you take "single" vitamins along with the all-inclusive formula? That depends. Suppose you have de­veloped some deficiency-condition that needs immediate attention. You've seen your doctor and he has advised you to take one or more single vitamins to correct that deficiency. (It might be more vitamin A for night blindness; more vitamin C for spongy, bleeding guns; more vitamin E for heart disorders, and so on.)

But the use of a single high-potency vitamin which your doctor recommended is usually for a given period of time— three to six months, depending on individual response. After the specific deficiency has been overcome, it's no longer necessary to use single vitamins in such high potency. The aim then is to take a vitamin-mineral food supplement that will maintain the body's optimum intake of all vitamins to prevent some future deficiency. And that is where a formula like Nutri-Time can be so helpful to you. You use the com­plete vitamin-mineral formula every day of your life as a protective food supplement.

Carefully planned meals, plus added vitamins in concen­trated form, provide the only way I know of whereby you can make certain that vitamins are "adequate" in your diet. And adequate they must be, if you don't want your Eat-and-Grow-Younger program to bog down at the very start.

FOURTH COMMANDMENT—A MINIMUM OF CARBOHYDRATES

The nutritional folly of gorging yourself on starchy and sweet foods was fully discussed in Chapter 7. But I want to make sure that you do not confuse natural carbohydrates with the artificial, devitalized carbohydrates that find their way into American stomachs in such appalling quantities— white breads, cakes, pastries, spaghetti, macaroni, noodles, white rice, processed corn meal, dry cereals (many cooked cereals, too), candies, colas and other carbonated beverages.

A minimum of carbohydrates means: Eliminate all those artificial starches which bear small resemblance to the carbo­hydrates found in natural foods.

Compare the sweetness and flavor of an apple or an orange with that in a piece of candy sweetened with highly refined white sugar crystals, containing absolutely no vitamins or minerals, and colored and flavored with chemicals taken from coal tar.

Compare the flavors and the health benefits of succulent vegetables with that of pure-starch macaroni.

Compare the nutritive sweetness of fruit juices or milk with that of artificially flavored, colored and carbonated soft drinks.

There is no comparison.

Natural carbohydrates nourish and revitalize your body, since they are sources of minerals, vitamins and some pro­teins. But all that the highly advertised artificial carbohy­drates can do for you is to lead you directly toward a pre­mature old age.

Half your planned campaign to regain your youthful ap­pearance and energy will be won when you throw artificial, devitalized sugars and starches out of your daily eating. Then reward yourself for this commendable step by turning instead to the delicious, health-building sweets I have provided for you in Part II. With these recipes for sweets you can "dissipate," and still not wander from the path of good nutrition.

FIFTH COMMANDMENT—REDUCE WITH REASON

Everyone is pretty well agreed these days that overweight shortens your life—and certainly it prevents your looking and feeling as young as you would desire. Nothing is more aging or more inimical to a youthful appearance than obesity.

Therefore, if you are seriously overweight, begin a sane reducing program at once—for the sake of your health, as well as your youthful appearance. (See Part II for menus planned by calorie count that allow you far more food, and of a better quality, than you ever dreamed would be included in a reducing diet.)

But you must reduce with reason. This means eating high-protein meals. High-protein foods not only stimulate your thyroid gland into producing more of the hormone that keeps the body weight normal but also provide you with the energy and satisfied appetite that keep a reducing program from turning into a prolonged torture of weakness and gnaw­ing hunger.

Protein has the power of stimulating greater use of energy by the body. Because of its specific dynamic action protein yields about 30 per cent more energy than would be expected from the actual quantity of food eaten. That is, 100 calories of protein food actually yields from 130 to 140 calories of food energy. From this you can readily appreciate that the thrifty, health-wise dieter will spend his calories on protein, the food that gives him the most energy for the quantity consumed.

But the overweight person who foolishly invests his day's calories in fad reducing diets—bananas and tomatoes, or rice and pineapple juice, to name but two of the popular reduc­ing regimens—will soon find himself bankrupt, that is, undernourished and under-energized. Further, i£ he remains too long on one of these lopsided diets, he may actually under­mine his health, to say nothing of having a hard time losing more than a few pounds—the hard way.

It has been my experience that the high-protein dieters are actually so well satisfied by their nutritious meals that they yield far less to the temptation of fattening foods than do those dieters who undertake an unwisely planned regimen. Protein foods satisfy the appetite in fewer calorie amounts; that is an added reason why high-protein foods are musts in the diet of the past-forty person who must watch his weight.

A high percentage of all obese persons are also anemic. This may come as a surprise to you, since no doubt you've been accustomed to thinking of anemia in the terms of thin, undernourished persons. But you can be overweight and undernourished at one and the same time!

Starchy foods, the mealtime mainstay of most obese per­sons, satisfy the appetite and dull the desire for the nourish­ing high-proteins and the mineral-and-vitamin-rich green vegetables and fresh fruits. The sweets fiend will slight his salad and meat course to settle down in blissful enjoyment over the taste thrills of his rich dessert. Maybe even indulge himself with a second or third helping. And the more starchy foods he eats, the more undernourished and anemic he be­comes—and the fatter.

So merely because you may be well-padded with surplus flesh is no guarantee that you are red-blooded and healthy. Usually, the opposite is true.

If you should reduce to safeguard your health, and to look and feel younger, then by all means start doing so immediately. But first make sure that you actually are over­weight, since ideal weight is not emaciation, as too many of the ladies seem to believe. Then, after you find you really weigh more than is good for your health and your appear­ance, follow the carefully worked-out reducing regimen pro­vided in Part II.

SIXTH COMMANDMENT—YOUNG ARTERIES ABOVE ALL ELSE

Arteries are seldom mentioned these days without the com­panion words "hardening" and "cholesterol." A lot of mis­conception has arisen from half-understood reports issued by physicians and medical laboratories on the need to "limit the diet" to avoid hardening of the arteries (arteriosclerosis), the condition which sometimes leads to a heart seizure or to ruptured blood vessels in the brain.

To clear up some of the potentially harmful misconcep­tions that have sprung up around "cholesterol and hardening of the arteries," let me explain what cholesterol really is.

Cholesterol is a fat-like substance evidently vital to human life, since it is found in every living cell. It also abounds in the liver, the adrenal glands (in the cortex, or outer layer, of these glands), in the brain and in the nerves. Biochemists are frank to admit that they are still far from understanding very much of the mystery surrounding this fatty substance. Yet it has been noted that cholesterol does have a close bio­chemical relationship to vitamin D, to the bile acids produced in the liver for digestion of fats, to the hormones secreted by the cortex of the adrenal glands and to the hormones produced by the sex glands of both sexes.

Since cholesterol occurs in such abundance in all living matter, we know that it's essential to the body. We also have established beyond all doubt that the body can manufacture the cholesterol it needs. Further, we know that under normal conditions excess, unwanted amounts of this fatty substance can be destroyed in the body.

But the most important thing for you to remember about cholesterol is this: The consumption of heavy starches causes deposits of cholesterol to form in the body, mainly in the arteries.

Laboratory animals—dogs and rabbits—were taken off their natural diets of meats and green, leafy foods. Instead they were fed on the ordinary human diet containing quan­tities o£ artificial starches, plus fatty foods. Within an aston­ishingly short time, the arteries of these starch-and-fat fed animals were found to have become ''hardened," that is, deposits of cholesterol had piled up in the arteries, overlaid with deposits of calcium sent by the blood in an attempt to "heal" the damaged artery. For that is exactly what happens to a hardened artery—it becomes brittle and less flexible be­cause of the deposits of cholesterol and calcium that keep piling up on the inner arterial wall. Yet when their natural diets were restored to these laboratory animals, their arteries stopped "hardening." Moreover, it was noted that some of the cholesterol and calcium deposits on their arterial walls were being reabsorbed.

Dr. Daniel C. Munro, one of the pioneers in the low-starch, high-protein diet, reports he personally has observed that dogs—meat-eaters by nature—will develop hardening of the arteries and arthritis after starchy foods are given them in considerable quantities.

Today, some medical scientists place the blame for too much cholesterol in the blood on foods that actually are valuable sources of nutrition—cheese, egg yolk, liver, gland meats, butter, cream and vegetable oils. Diets are being pre­scribed that greatly restrict the use of these excellent foods. Also prohibited are pork, pies, rich cakes, cookies and all fried foods—none of which, of course, should be given a place in any diet. Nothing, however, seems to be said about white bread, devitalized cereals, white rice, macaroni and similar pure-starch items.

Now let's check into the practical wisdom of these "low-fat" diets currently being prescribed indiscriminately for persons suspected of having "hardened" arteries.

Fats, the same as carbohydrates, are used by the body to supply heat and energy. Right at the start, we begin to realize that the average American diet is top-heavy with two food elements—fats and carbohydrates—both with the same nutritional function, that of providing heat and energy. Carbohydrates, when too plentiful in the diet, usurp the natural function of the fat foods, thereby allowing the fats to be deposited instead of being burned for energy. The fats you eat must be used for energy; otherwise they are "hoarded" in the tissues and in the arteries.

It's wrong to give fats a "black eye." Our bodies need fats, and most of this need is supplied by the fats our body de­rives from meats, eggs and vegetables. But our health also demands a small, though steady, supply of ready-formed fats such as those found in butter, cream and vegetable oils. (We all have read of the pitiful condition of a fat-starved nation as the result of a famine or the holocaust of war.) Food fat is essential for supplying a proper amount of the body fat that protects us from shock, checks our loss of heat by radiation and promotes the mobility of our bodies. It is only when fats are eaten to excess, or when they are combined with high-carbohydrate meals, that they pile up in all those unwanted and dangerous places—around the waist, in the liver, around the heart and on the inner walls of the arteries.

It's not difficult to understand that when you eat a high-starch meal which also includes a quantity of fat, you are overfueling your body. If you've ever flooded the carburetor in your car with too much gasoline, or choked out the fire in your furnace by piling on too much coal, you can readily understand that overfueling is something to be avoided. Unburned gasoline floods out the carburetor in your car, unburned coal clogs up the grate in your furnace and un­burned fats pile up on the walls of your arteries.

By eliminating all high-starch foods (which incidentally supply very little, if any, of the essential minerals and vita­mins), you can force your body to call upon its liberal de­posits of fat for needed heat and energy. This is the same principle that underlies a reducing diet—make the body burn its fat deposits instead of keeping it refueled each day with oversupplies of energy-producing carbohydrates.

Whenever a person either is fasting, or is placed on an all-protein diet, the fat and fatty acid (cholesterol) content of his blood immediately jumps way up—far higher, indeed, than when he is eating carbohydrates and fat foods. This marked increase of fat and cholesterol in the blood has but one meaning: When the body receives no carbohydrates, those "goldbricking" fats are called out of their hiding place in the arteries and put to work. Since there are no sugars and starches to provide energy, the stored deposits of fat in the arteries—in the tissues, as well—are mustered into the bloodstream to supply the body with heat and energy.

Strangely enough, the amount of cholesterol found in the blood of persons known to have severely damaged arteries is quite low. The only apparent explanation for this is that when cholesterol from our food is being properly utilized, it circulates freely in the bloodstream to the points of the body requiring it. But when carbohydrate foods are continually "subbing" for cholesterol, this fat sneaks off to pile up on the artery walls.

Isn't it more logical to eliminate the artificial, high-starch foods in the diet—foods that we can live very nicely without and be far healthier for the omitting—than to take away certain valuable foods like eggs, cheese, butter, liver and gland meats, and vegetable oils which are rich sources of urgently needed vitamins and minerals? I'm encouraged to see that some of our more conservative medical men aren't quite ready to accept the theory that hardening of the arteries can be either cured or prevented merely by omitting these fat-containing foods from the diet.

Dr. Munro cites the case of a man in his seventies, a liberal carbohydrate-eater, who suffered an attack of coronary thrombosis (a heart block caused by hardened arteries). This diagnosis was confirmed by an electrocardiogram read by leading heart specialists. The patient was then placed on a high-protein, low-carbohydrate diet which he followed to the letter. Two years later—when normally he would have ex pected to become a total invalid, i£ not deceased, because of his serious heart condition—an electrocardiogram showed no sign of thrombosis. And seven years later he was still free of this highly dangerous heart condition.

The only explanation of this almost phenomenal better­ment in an extremely serious arterial condition is that the low-carbohydrate diet forced his body to clear out the fat deposits in his more-than-seventy-year-old arteries to pro­vide him with heat and energy, replacing the denied high-carbohydrates as energizers. Meanwhile, the high-protein foods in his diet set about immediately repairing the damage previously inflicted on the arterial walls by the calcium and fat deposits.

I have not the slightest hesitancy in declaring that it's my belief that this patient would not have shown this astonishing recovery if he had been put on a diet restricting "eggs, cheese, butter, cream, glandular meats and vegetable oils,” and allowing him unrestricted carbohydrates.

Dr. Cramp ton is frank to admit in his report to the New York State Joint Legislative Commission on Nutrition that "when patients are put on a low-cholesterol diet, the yolks of eggs and butter eliminated, and animal fat, a probable source of cholesterol, reduced, some get better of their illness and their blood cholesterol is decreased; some do not re­spond." I am willing to wager that those who "do not respond" are those who keep right on eating low-protein, high-starch meals.

My advice to you on "eating to keep your arteries young" would be only half complete if I were to neglect reporting the encouraging results being obtained in hundreds of cases of hardened arteries treated with choline and inositol—two members of the well-known vitamin B-complex family.

(Dr. Dutchess reported that, in addition to choline and inositol, the B-vitamin pyridoxine and a food protein called methionine—one of the 10 essential amino acids described in Chapter 5—are necessary in the diet to help prevent cholesterol from becoming lazy and settling down in the arteries.)

Choline, z. £at-dissolving agent, is a wonderful aid in pro­moting normal distribution of food fat throughout the body in the proper storage places provided for fat (under the skin is one such place). In other words, choline helps food fats to find their normal resting places in the body, thereby pre­venting the stockpiling of fat in undesirable spots, notably in hardening arteries and in a fat-clogged liver.

Choline, inositol and pyridoxine, as members of the vitamin B-complex group, are found in most high-protein foods—lean beef and lamb, organ meats (liver, kidney, heart, brains, sweetbreads), eggs, whole milk, cheese and seed cereals—and in whole grains.

It seems wholly illogical to me that egg yolk, cream, butter, liver and other organ meats, which are rich sources of choline, inositol and pyridoxine—the vitamins that keep cholesterol in check—would be restricted in an experimental diet to prevent hardening of the arteries. Isn't it more reasonable to assume that nature put choline, inositol and pyridoxine in these valuable high-protein foods in order to assure the proper behavior of their cholesterol (an essential fat) in the human body?

A choline, inositol and pyridoxine deficiency results mainly from a diet low in protein, and high in fats and carbohydrates. This describes the high-carbohydrate, artificial, devitalized food diets that comprise more than 80 per cent of all Ameri­can meals.

If you want to avoid the circulatory disorders which rank among the chief killers past the age of forty, then my earnest plea to you is this: Starting with your next meal, put yourself for life on a high-protein, low-starch diet. And, above all, don't be panicked by half-understood published reports of experiments on arteriosclerosis into omitting certain high-protein foods which are among your richest sources of the fat-controlling B-vitamins, choline, inositol and pyridoxine. If for any valid reason you cannot consistently follow a high-protein diet, then I urge you to obtain supplemental daily amounts of a vitamin concentrate containing choline, inositol and pyridoxine. Otherwise, your intake of these fat-control­ling B-vitamins is likely to be inadequate to prevent the accumulation of cholesterol on the arterial walls.

Incidentally, choline is also found in the seeds of an herb known as fenugreek, a member of the legume family. As an added precaution against the stockpiling of fats in the liver and arteries, you might consider getting acquainted with this pleasant-tasting herb made into a mealtime or between-meal tea.

So now you have been given the Six Commandments For A Long, "Young" Life. I have dwelt at some length on each one of the six, realizing that you will want to keep referring to this chapter throughout the early days of your Eat-and-Grow-Younger program until you come to know the essentials of each Commandment by heart. For within these Six Com­mandments lies the nucleus of all dietary truth. They are the keystone of all your efforts to become a trim, radiant per-son, glowing with health and energy.

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