p. 253 | Health and Temperance by Kate Upson Clark

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Apr 20, 1888

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 14, No. 16.

Health and Temperance.

By Kate Upson Clark

THE IMMORALITY OF SICKNESS.

THE head of a well-known seminary used to say to her pupils: "The time will come when men will be fined and imprisoned for being sick. In this age of intelligence and light, it is a crime to be sick." In a country and a race where hereditary weakness, dense ignorance, and unavoidable accidents are responsible for a large portion of the illness suffered, this excellent lady's sweeping prophecy will not come true at present. But, leaving out of sight the classes named, is she so very far out of the way? Among us who read and think, and are supposed to understand something of the laws of our own bodies, is there not a vast number of ailments which we might avoid perfectly well—except for blameworthy carelessness, or wrong indulgence of appetite, or silly fear of the criticisms of our "friends"?

A lady remarked, not long ago, that she had not been ill for years but that she could trace her trouble to some trivial risk which she ran with her eyes open. "I admit," she said, "that I, and I only, am to blame for those ill days which cause so much trouble to my friends, and so much wear and tear of nerve and body to myself. My Maker gave me a fairly good constitution, enough intelligence so that I know what I ought to do, and strength of purpose enough so that, if I choose, I can control myself—and yet, with all these advantages, I am silly and wicked enough to bring illness upon myself sometimes."

A prominent and respected citizen of one of our inland towns had a very nice pie for dinner the other day, and was helping himself to a second piece, when his daughter said, "Take care, father, or you will surely bring on one of your headaches."

"I declare," he said (as we have all heard people say sometimes under similar circumstances), "this pie is so good that it's worth a little trouble. I've got to have another piece, anyway."

He was laid up for three days afterward, and paid for three visits from the doctor during their painful course. Was not that man directly to blame for all the trouble he made others as well as himself?

Dr. Johnson says: "Every man is a rascal as soon as he is sick." It is sure that, with the exception of some of earth's Heaven-inspired saints, most of us do lose what little virtue we possess under the spell of wearing pain, the consciousness that our business is going awry, and the other trials attendant upon illness. Our sanitary experts declare that the vast majority of the crimes committed in the world are due primarily to bad food, or to hunger. It is a well-established fact that very many men and women acquire the drinking habit from the craving of the stomach, which there is no nutritious food to satisfy. A thoroughly sane mind can exist in only a thoroughly sane body.

In view of the facts here presented, which are only types of hundreds familiar to us all, we are forced to admit that by exercising the faculties with which a kind Providence has endowed us—our intelligence, our self-restraint—we may avoid by far the greater part of the physical ills which our flesh is heir to. Since these ills bring trouble to our families, from the actual exertions they are forced to make; cause expense which we can often ill afford to bear; presumably shorten our lives, and make us less able to do useful work and bear hard strains in the future; and, above all, strengthen the always strong enough tendency in human nature to center its thoughts in self rather than in higher and altruistic channels—since these things are so, most of our little illnesses become absolute immoralities in us, and we should hate them sincerely, and shun them by every means in our power.—Kate Upson Clark.