Most people appreciate that thorough mastication of their food is desirable in the interests of health—that it is good for the teeth and that it helps the digestive processes—but very few appear to know why, and, in everyday life the act of mastication receives little or no consideration.

The physiology of digestion has often been dealt with, so in this chapter the subject of mastication will be approached from a somewhat different angle.

Look at a cube—say a cube of sugar. It has six surfaces. If we cut through the three dimensions of the cube we shall have eight smaller cubes each of which will have six surfaces—48 sur­faces in all (8 cubes by 6 surfaces). Now, let us divide each of these eight cubes into eight still smaller ones. The result is 64 cubes, each with six surfaces, making a total of 384 surfaces. If each of these 64 very small cubes could be divided further into eight cubelets, we should have 512 cubelets, with no less than 3,072 surfaces. If the process of sub-division were continued, the number of exposed surfaces would increase until the original cube of sugar, which had only six surfaces, was reduced to the granulated state, with many thousands of open surfaces. Never­theless, the volume of sugar remains exactly the same as that of the original large cube.

Now, let us see what all this has to do with mastication.

Put the whole cube of sugar into your mouth, but do not crush it with your teeth. The saliva can reach only six surfaces, and so the sugar will take a long time to dissolve completely. But if the same cube is crushed (or masticated), then the saliva may attack simultaneously the many hundreds of surfaces that have been exposed to its penetrating action.

Crushing sugar with the teeth—especially hard, boiled sweets, is certainly not to be encouraged, nor is it necessary, because the mere act of sucking will, in due time, dissolve it.

The example of the sugar does, however, illustrate why it is of the utmost importance to create, through chewing, as many surfaces as possible, so that the saliva, and eventually the gastric juices, can act upon the tiny particles of solid food more quickly and easily than if large chunks of food had to be dealt with.

In passing, it may be mentioned that starches and ordinary sugars are, or should be, largely predigested in the mouth by the saliva. The more we chew, therefore, the better can the saliva do its work before the food is swallowed. Protein, on the other hand, is digested in the stomach by the action of hydrochloric acid. Why need we bother, then, about chewing meat, for ex­ample? Remembering the example of the sugar cube, it will be obvious that by biting into the meat we break it down into par­ticles, and the tinier these particles become under the grinding action of the teeth, the more surfaces will be exposed to the action of the gastric juices when the food reaches the stomach. Also, the mixing of the saliva with the meat particles "liquefies" the bolus, or mass of masticated food, so that swallowing is greatly facilitated; this, of course, applies to all kinds of foods.

If it is difficult to visualise the action of the juices upon the protein in the stomach itself, the following simple, if somewhat crude, experiment will illustrate the process.

Place a two inch cube of meat into a glass jar containing hydrochloric acid. Mince up another two inch cube of the same meat and put it into another glass jar, also containing hydro­chloric acid. The quantity of protein is the same in both jars, but it is clear which portion will be "digested" more easily and in the shorter time. In the first case the acid will have to work its way through the mass of compact meat, whereas in the second the minute particles offer less "resistance" to attack by the acid because of the vast number of surfaces exposed to its action.

Now, let us see how the act of mastication affects the salivary glands, teeth, gums, and tonsils.

On each side of the face there are three glands, making six in all. (These are the glands that become affected in mumps). Their job is to secrete what we know as saliva, which, as has al­ready been mentioned, acts upon the starches and sugars of our food.

Some people complain that they cannot eat unless they drink at the same time, because the mouth is too dry. This dryness is brought about over the years because, as a result of insufficient mastication, the salivary glands are not given the necessary stimu­lus to secrete. If such people, instead of drinking with their meals, would persevere with chewing until the food becomes almost a fluid, the salivary glands would soon become fully active once more and would produce a copious flow of saliva. Further­more, a keener taste would develop, thus affording a greater en­joyment of every morsel of food.

Teeth and gums need exercise. This results not only in strengthened jaw muscles, but in an increased circulation of the blood to the teeth, gums, and facial muscles. A better drainage of the tonsils is also effected, and there may even be a lessening of some types of noises in the ear and an improvement of catarrhal deafness.

Deep down in his nature, modern man is no less aggressive than his primitive brothers. The aggressive instinct is natural, because it is an instinct, and in a civilized community it may be turned to very good account. The "go-getters," and those who accomplish and construct things in life, evidence the aggressive instinct, sometimes very forcefully, in specialized ways, but un­fortunately such people are usually hurried eaters, especially those who are unpleasantly aggressive in their behavior. Gastric and duodenal ulcers, etc., are recognized to-day to be due to excessive worry and consequent nervous tension. One of the best correct­ives of this condition is concentrated mastication. Also, there is no better means of overcoming chronic constipation, other things being equal, as well as many other ills of the body and the mind.

Those who suffer from repressed and suppressed aggression may find a natural outlet in biting hard on their food. There is a great satisfaction to be derived from getting your teeth into things, both actually and figuratively. So bite ... bite ... bite your food; keep on biting hard with the full consciousness focused upon the act. Not only will you arise from each meal with an easy, satis­fied feeling in the body, and experience a clarity of mind, but you will be more or less freed from noxious aggression, especially when things go wrong.

The practice of chewing with concentrated attention requires discipline, to begin with, but with repetition the habit becomes firmly established. Such discipline also strengthens the will.

Impatience and confused, illogical thinking may be effectively lessened by the simple exercise of refraining from putting any further food into the mouth until the preceding supply has been chewed to a pulp.

The disciplinary act of emptying the mouth of food between one bite and the next will make it easier to deal more effectively with many other situations that may arise. Undue mental and physical tensions may be obviated, or at least reduced, by this practice, with the result that fears, too, will be lessened in intens­ity. The tension is literally transformed into a healthy form of aggression by the act of attacking one's food.

Thorough mastication, then, has far more to it than the mere breaking down of food into tiny particles for easy digestion.

Conscious direction of the act of eating, so that one is fully aware of the process, constitutes an unusual yet natural method of developing quite a few desirable qualities, and is an effective way of releasing, naturally and harmlessly, emotions that might otherwise remain pent-up, to be let loose, perhaps in a flood of anger and even in violence in an unguarded moment.

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