Maintaining Health | Page 3

cease. Then people would live until their time came to fade away
peacefully and beautifully, as do the golden leaves of autumn or the
blades of grass.
Many dread old age because they think of it in connection with
decrepitude, helplessness and the childish querulousness popularly
associated with advancing years. This is not a natural old age; it is
disease. Natural old age is sweet, tolerant and cheerful. There are few
things in life more precious than the memory of parents and
grandparents grown old gracefully, after having weathered the storms
of appetites and passions, the mind firmly enthroned and filled with the
calm toleration and wisdom that come with the passing years of a well
spent life.
A busy mind in a healthy body does not degenerate. The brain, though
apparently unstable, is one of the most stable parts of the body.
We should desire and acquire health because when healthy we are at
our maximum efficiency. We are able to enjoy life. We have greater
capacity for getting and giving. We live more fully. Being normal, we
are in harmony with ourselves and with our associates. We are of
greater value all around. We are better citizens.
Every individual owes something to the race. It is our duty to
contribute our part so that the result of our lives is not a tendency
toward degeneration, but toward upbuilding, of the race. The part
played by each individual is small, but the aggregate is great. If our
children are better born and better brought up than we were, and there
is generally room for improvement, we have at least helped.
Health is within the grasp of all who are not afflicted with organic
disease, and the vast majority have no organic ills. All that is necessary
is to lead natural lives and learn how to use the mind properly. Those
who are not in sympathy with the views on racial duty can enhance
their personal worth through better living without giving the race any
thought. Every individual who leads a natural life and thinks to

advantage helps to bring about better public health. The national health
is the aggregate of individual health and is improved as the individuals
evolve into better health. National or racial improvement come through
evolution, not through revolution. The improvement is due to small
contributions from many sources.
The greatest power for human uplift is knowledge. Reformers often
believe that they can improve the world by legislation. Lasting reform
comes through education. If the laws are very repressive the reaction is
both great and unpleasant.
It takes about six months to learn stenography. It requires a long
apprenticeship to become a first-class blacksmith or horseshoer. To
obtain the rudiments of a physician's art it is necessary to spend four to
six years in college. To learn a language takes an apt pupil at least a
year. A lawyer must study from two to four years to become a novice.
A businessman must work many years before he is an expert in his line.
Not one of these attainments is worth as much as good health, yet an
individual of average intelligence can obtain enough knowledge about
right living during his spare time in from two to six months to assure
him of good health, if he lives as well as he knows how. Is it worth
while? It certainly is, for it is one of the essentials of life. Health will
increase one's earning capacity and productivity and more than double
both the pleasure and the duration of life.
Disease is a very expensive luxury. Health is one of the cheapest,
though one of the rarest, things on earth. There is no royal road to
health. If there is any law of health it is this: Only those will retain it
permanently who are deserving of it.
Many prefer to live in that state of uncertainty, which may be called
tolerable health, a state in which they do not suffer, yet are not quite
well. In this condition they have their little ups and downs and
occasionally a serious illness, which too often proves fatal. Even such
people ought to acquire health knowledge, for the time may come when
they will desire to enjoy life to the fullest, which they can do only when
they have health. Those who have this knowledge are often able to help
themselves quickly and effectively when no one else can.

I am acquainted with many who have been educated out of disease into
health. Many of them are indiscreet, but they have learned to know the
signs of approaching trouble and they ease up before anything serious
overtakes them. In this way they save themselves and their families
from much suffering, much anxiety and much expense. Every adult
should know enough