The time of partaking the heartiest meal, and the number of meals required for the best nourishment, are much discussed questions. Many people maintain health upon one meal each day; others have adopted the "no breakfast plan," claiming to enjoy life more perfectly with two meals, while the majority demand the customary three meals.

The same diversity of opinion exists regarding the time for eating the heartiest meal. The old-fashioned mid-day dinner is being displaced by the six o'clock dinner; a few dieticians even advocate that the day should be begun with the greatest supply of food - thus serving dinner soon after sunrise, and retiring upon a nearly empty stomach.

While plausible arguments are presented to sustain each system of serving repasts, custom and habit, rather than special law, underlie them. For the purpose of regulation it is necessary to adopt some method of eating, and cultivate the habit of living in harmony with it, but the mind should be broad enough to see that some other plan, as devoutly followed by another, may serve the same purpose. Most people make the sad mistake of indulging three full meals - all their capacity will permit - three times a day, besides many lunches between, to gratify a craving abnormal appetite.

Because the normal stomach should digest, or pass on, all its contents in three or four hours, and a large part of the purpose of regular eating is to arouse the action of the life principle, to supply vitality from the subjective side of the being, to harmonize with that furnished by food, two light meals in which self-control, or judgment, is especially cultivated, and one hearty more spontaneous indulgence, produce the best results for health and long life. While the time of the hearty meal depends much upon circumstances and kind of labor, the six o'clock dinner of proteid foods, is the most perfectly utilized by the system, as the time of greatest growth and repair of the body is during sleep. The mind is then relaxed from the tension of care, thus permitting the energy to be directed to the work of digestion and construction of cells.

Energy and heat producing foods are more needed for breakfast and luncheon, to fulfill the demands of labor.

As an indication of how views and customs change with the advance of scientific discoveries, one has but to realize that only a short time ago so eminent an authority as Liebeg advocated that food for heat and energy must be transposed into tissue before being oxidized and utilized for work. It is fully established now, by many scientists, that the carbohydrates - elements of food for heat and energy - are burned or oxidized in the system, being used directly for labor and bodily warmth.

By referring to the table of the chemical composition of food it will be seen that the kinds predominating in the carbohydrate element are most suitable for breakfast and luncheon, while the heavy proteid foods are more appropriate for dinner, thus making this arrangement natural and convenient.

Many imagine that in adopting new regimes very radical changes are required; that entirely different things or conditions are most desirable. This may be so in isolated cases where only one phase of life is involved, but it is not best with entire systems of living which effect the mental, moral, and physical status. Nature does not permit a complete deterioration of any course of habitual living. Enough good may always be found to serve as a foundation for better regulation and more substantial growth. Radical changes that are adopted for a time, then cast aside as impractical, are "fads," even though they may involve a great and vital principle. Permanent and scientific changes in race development are so gradual that they become woven into the woof of life, thread by thread. The whole structure is stronger and more enduring by the new being blended with the better texture that has already been tried by experience, than it possibly could become by beginning entirely anew, whenever mistakes are discovered, hence the regulation of the present system of diet, that can easily be made to conform with the highest demands of science, according to the present development, will afford better results than entirely new systems.

For breakfast a few selections from the following list of foods serve- the best purpose, the amount needed being regulated by the kind of labor. As a rule very little food is required in the morning:

Carbohydrates For Working Energy. Fruit

Cereals - cooked or uncooked with milk. Bread - unfired bread, light bread or toast with cereals. Hot biscuit, corn-bread, gems, or unleavened bread when cereals are omitted.

Honey or natural syrups, as cane and maple. Fats are supplied by cream and butter. A very little proteid easily digested, in addition to that in bread and cereals.

Eggs - slightly cooked. Nuts - a very few. Cheese rare-bit. Milk.

Liquids

Hot water with lemon juice as a blood purifier.

Hot milk with egg for weakness.

Sweet milk or water - only one glass. For luncheon wise selections may be made from a little different list. Luncheon should be cold most of the time to save labor and encourage the use of natural food like fruit, nuts and milk.

Fruit.

Nuts.

Salads.

Bread - cold light whole wheat bread, or unfired bread.

Potatoes with milk.

Rice.

Soups.

Soups from vegetables.

Cheese dishes.

Cream or milk dishes. Cheese and nuts furnish plenty of proteid for lunch while heat and energy elements predominate yet are simply prepared. Water, milk - one cup, furnishes liquid.

For dinner it is already customary to select substantial foods in which the body building element predominates, yet are well proportioned with heat and energy to sustain the action of the organs for growth and repair. The following list is natural and scientific so far as material is concerned, but great care must be exercised to protect the life of the cell:

Soup or fruit juice for stimulent Nuts, eggs, or cheese.

Beans Or Peas

To alternate with nuts, eggs or cheese, as meat substitutes. Bread - white wheat or corn-bread. Potatoes or rice for starch. Salad for bulk, and relish. Fruit artistically prepared for dessert. Chocolate, or milk - small cup for beverage.

By keeping this general outline of the standard foods and their uses in mind, all other combinations may be grouped around it for variation, yet system and regulation be maintained. To accomplish any particular thing the mind must feel confident that the best possible course to attain success is being pursued. Thoughtlessness and carelessness lead to chaos. If dinner dishes of meat and beans are served for breakfast, or syrup and coffee for lunch, it is hard to cultivate a habit of regularity preventing excessive eating. A little girl who was given cake, candy, nuts and meat on Thanksgiving morning, and a still greater variety of things at noon, while preparations were being made for a feast at six o'clock dinner, expressed herself as being "all mixed up." Constipation and headache the next day were the natural consequences, while if system and simplicity had been maintained the enjoyment would have been greater with no bad result. The whole world is "mixed up' regarding food substances and becomes more entangled in the meshes of complicated injurious cooking with each succeeding generation, while the art of good plain cooking is being lost. A young girl learns to make cake, pie, and candy in preference to learning to prepare potatoes and beans, or bread and salad.

It is possible to endure any kind of combination occasionally, but the fussed-up dishes become tiresome, while substantial foods become more pleasing when depended upon almost entirely. Reasonable diversity is a necessity, as too much of any one kind of food, no matter how nutritious or simple, if clogged in the system generates a poison peculiar to itself. A great pleasure is often lost in this way and parents should guard children from excesses. It is-not kindness to over indulge them.. All disagreement of wholesome food can be traced to its excessive use at some time, even though it may be generations back. After one has been sickened by honey, milk, strawberries, melons, or any kind of food, its future use tends to reproduce the same poison, unless the system is held positive to it repeatedly, until the anti-toxin is generated to counteract it.

When systematic living is begun late in life, but little can be accomplished by advising or scolding, as stubborness, rather than a desire for better conditions, is easily aroused. The mother should make changes from dead or devitalized foods to natural vital kinds that are pleasing, so gradually the family is not aware of it. No child will object to fruit and nuts taking the place of mince pie or plum pudding. No man will miss meat for breakfast if given appetizing dishes made from eggs, nuts, with cereals, bread and fresh fruit. The changes may be made every other day at first, and in many cases fruit, bread and milk are all that is desired for breakfast.

It is not difficult to substitute a dinner in which every cell is living, and all the products of nature natural and sustaining, in place of one which, under the old custom, would have been largely useless as body building food. For instance, a menu of hard fried steak, over-baked baker's bread, boiled rice, boiled beans, stewed cabbage, mince pie, and apply butter would supply no tissue building cells, while a menu of poached eggs, corn bread, simmered rice, slowly baked or simmered beans, cabbage salad, nut and fig cake, and fresh apples provides heat, energy and fat in better proportion than the first menu, as well as being rich in proteid to rebuild the body cells, holding it positive to the encroachment of old age. Well selected food is a matter of knowledge rather than of greater expense or labor.

System is a product of civilization. Animals and barbarians live spontaneously depending upon instinct to guide them to preserve life. The thought of "the greatest good," or of the best results from well planned methods, has not yet been awakened. Only a short time ago spiritual and intellectual development were largely spontaneous. A philosopher called those who desired knowledge around him, imparting his individual ideas - for better or for worse. Religious and general educational instruction was given in a similar manner; pupils could select one subject and reject another, being guided only by taste or whim.

The great advantage of systematic work in the public schools, as well as in the kindergartens and Sunday schools, is apparent to all. No child is capable of directing his course in life from infancy.

In time the physical development will be as carefully considered and as perfectly systematized as the moral and intellectual. The whims of a child are no more reliable in selecting the best food, or the proper exercise for his highest culture, than in selecting the best book or the best companions. Systematic eating, exercising and breathing, to yield a perfect body, is also a necessary foundation for the best spiritual and intellectual development; hence, instruction in this line should be a prominent feature of every school course, as well as being practically applied in the home by the parents.