Swiss Believes in the Abstinence of Salt and Water.

A courious-looking man of strange habits and with a mission that is even stranger, has just arrived in London from Ascona, on Lake Maggiore, Switzerland. He has taken up his residence in the vicinity of Colney Hatch Lane, N., and he believes that in abstinence from salt and water lies the secret of long life.

Herr Joseph Salomonson, the gentleman in question, wanders about the North London highways wearing a cassock of brown corduroy encircled at the waist by a girdle. His long brown, wisp hair, unincumbered by hat hides his collarless neck, and a ragged-edge beard droops over the open part of his gown. His feet are incased in sandals, and at times he carries a staff, that reaches to his shoulders. Altogether his appearance is reminiscent fo figures in Scriptural illustrations.

Herr Salomon’s object is to try to induce Londons’s 6,000,000 inhabitants to refrain from eating salt and drinking all manner of liquids, even water. He himself, so he asserts, has not taken any kind of liquids since Sept. 1. 1901, and he has eschewed salt for a longer period.

At Ascona he has established a colony of devoted disciples, male and female, who do likewise. Moreover, they work in a primitive state of absence of attire, separated by wooden partitions; and when the weather permits, they even sleep in this state on the bare ground. Herr Salomonson appreciates the difficulty of this part of his programme being carried out in London. “But”, he explained the other day, “there ar plenty of suitable sites within an hour’s railwy journey from the city.”

He saw no reason, however, why London should not at once abandon the eating of salt and the drinking of liquids. “Salt”, he averred, “is the beginning of all evil. It is ruinous to the body, damaging to the soul and destructive of the intellect. Water or any other form of liquid is a mere burden to the stomach and has no value at all.”

In short, Herr Salomonson, who is a man of considerable, intelligence, believes that oif people followed his example there would be no sickness. During the twenty-six months that ni drop has passed his lips he has lost in weight 62 pounds, but feels many years younger and much stronger.

“There is not a sound man in the world”, he declared, “and yet people who eat salt and drink water live to be as old as 90 or even 100. When we live a natural life I see no reason why we should not attain to 200 or 250 years. I believe in the ages mentioned in the Bible, and I believe we should live as long in these days if we lived on the lines intended for humanity. That is my mission here.” – London Mail.

The Bethel News (Bethel, Maine), 10. Jahrg., 28. September 1904, Nr. 19, S. 3. Online

Derselbe Text erschien auch in:

Norwood News, 27. Jahrg., 12. April 1904, Nr. 7, S. 7 (Online).