p. 541 | Health and Temperance

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Sep 3, 1885

FromThe Signs of the Times, Vol. 11, No. 34

Health and Temperance.

Living Too Fast.

As a business nation, we occasionally make very grave mistakes, not in the matter of mere dollars and cents, though a good deal may even be said on that subject; but in our endeavors to stand in the front rank as merchants and politicians, we draw too heavily on the bank of nature, and, in consequence, become bankrupt. An honest business man will hesitate before expending more than he earns; in fact, his prosperity is based on the maxim that receipts should greatly overbalance outlays; but in everything concerning health this judicious axiom is forgotten, and, as a result, we die of the American disease—nervous prostration. Man, in struggling against nature, has an opponent who makes no allowances for mistakes, an antagonist without spite, but also without pity. If moderation be observed, the antagonism is healthful, is productive of decent ambition; but the moment humanity rushes into excesses, it finds itself opposed by a power against which it is vain to struggle, over which it is impossible to triumph.

We boast of our energy, and with some reason, for we have no medium, even in trifles. As we destroy sleep by brooding over vast financial schemes, so we destroy health in the interest of real estate. We cannot eat a sandwich like the rest of the world, but gulp it down without mastication, for fear of losing a minute or two of valuable time. When an overworked stomach protests, when a weary brain gives unmistakable signs of exhaustion, the lesson is not read aright; the overburdened animal is not rested, but is forced into fresh activity by means of alcoholic poisons. Another law is, that we must never be seen without a cigar or drugged “fine cut” tobacco in our mouths. Moderation even in this luxury is discarded, and our blood, like our clothes, is tainted with nicotine. Perhaps it is impolite to refer to the quantity of saliva daily lost by a shrewd business man; but what society ignores, nature takes a strict account of, as evidenced in sunken cheeks, dry lips, and lack-luster eyes. We have read in novels that the rich East Indian uncle is compelled to stimulate his liver with curry to keep his digestion alive. The quantity of high-spiced articles consumed in this country would cause astonishment in the breast of even a Brahmapootra owner of a white elephant. If Peter Piper picked and ate a peck of pickled peppers, he would still in this respect be far behind the average American school-girl.

Knowing the life of our business men, it is not astonishing that so many die of nervous exhaustion, but the wonder is that any should be alive to tell the tale. The artificial requirements of American civilization are so many that, perhaps, some of our excesses are excusable; but that we should earn money we can never use, that we should struggle for positions we can hardly ever reach, or, if reached, at the expense of health, perhaps life, are problems that will tax even ingenuity to explain. Posterity is none the better for our gains, for it follows in the same footsteps, becomes afflicted with the same disease, dies the same death. Infants are inoculated with the mania for being “smart,” and learn book-keeping before they know the difference between right and wrong; youths become acquainted with the mysteries of tobacco and the intricacies of gambling before they are aware that they have either heart or brains. We are a fast nation in every sense of the term. Like the puff-ball, we grow from almost nothing to gigantic size in one night; and, like the puff-ball, having reached maturity, are good for nothing but to die. With amusements surrounding us on every side, we really do not know what enjoyment means; theaters are bores, only to be tolerated because they give us the opportunity of drinking brandy between the acts; ball-rooms are used as exhibition markets for our marriageable daughters, but have no other inducements for celibate elders; our very household fires are surrounded with only vacant chairs.

A feverish nervousness, begotten of our routine labors, makes us fretful, ill-natured, and dyspeptic. Everything is regarded from a business point of view; everything which has no direct bearing upon business is looked upon as of trifling value. We marry as a speculation, live for money, and die that our names may be used as synonyms of remarkable business tact. All is sacrificed for business; life itself is only another name for rise and fall in stocks; and so we go on, day by day accumulating money, day by day burning away our physical energy, day by day deadening our nervous sensibility, until exhaustion and a tombstone complete the unity of the tragedy. We have already lost many of our distinguished citizens through the American disease, and unless we are content to live more moderately we shall lose many more. As it is, life is short enough, and pleasures few and far between. If we cannot all be great, we can at least be indifferently sensible, and not willfully burn out the candle of life by lighting it at both ends.—Boston Globe.