The Lancaster Gazette

For the Lancaster Gazette.
LAWS OF HEALTH.

Much is said of the fire of genius consuming the physical body. The student, the mere book man, is commonly regarded as one who, over taxing his mental powers, is contracting his days and preparing for himself an early grave. According to the popular idea, the mind contemplates him under the similitude of a sunken eye, thin visage, pale and wan, with sharp anxious expression of countenance, suffering various physical ills, as dyspepsia, general nervousness and hypochondria. Now to all this I must respectfully demur, keeping in mind only, as we proceed, that it is the abuse and not the use of any, or all of our faculties, which may become the subject of complaint.

The history of man, of whatever nation or age, or under whatever circumstances, proves most conclusively that to secure vigorous and healthy bodies, and to live out his scriptural term of three score and ten years, his brains must be used, and vigorously, but systematically and orderly. We admire and applaud the physical strength and activity of the Greeks, and ascribe it mainly to their gymnastic and other means employed by them to secure firm and enduring frames; and in our desire to come up to them, as physical beings, we employ means to imitate and copy their practices. But while we thus aspire to make Greeks of ourselves, we seem to forget that this very people attained almost the pinnacle of intellectual greatness. That in the arts and sciences, in political economy, and in the zeal and earnestness with which they entered into all the expressions of life, they arose above all contemporary nations. In other words, the Greeks worked with their brains, thus bringing out the highest type of the intellectual, the graceful and the physical.

But we would not have the mind occupied with low and groveling thoughts. Intellectual life is man's legitimate sphere; but thought must take hold of things above and superior to the present, to be life-giving and elevating ideas that lead out and expand and satisfy: so that, to have attained an advance, we can use our advantage as a stand point from which to take in wider and larger conceptions, and this, the mind, when once fairly on the highway to knowledge, finds ever increasing incentives and enjoyments.

The brain is a fountain of life and health from which is sent out through the nerves, which all concenter in it, life and health and invigorating influences, which give development to every part. Thus, agreeable and elevating thought not only keeps the whole machine in beautiful play, but actually becomes the direct means of restoring the lost equilibrium of the vital forces, by which disease is cured. Throw away your novels and pill boxes and read substantial and intellectual books; and let your mind contemplate the grandeur and majesty of God's visible and tangible works, and see if you do not improve in physical and intellectual health.

It is said that Sir Walter Scott dictated "Ivanhoe," one of the best of his works, during a harassing sickness, and that the vigor of mind he was compelled to employ to raise him to the regions of chivalry and splendor, actually restored him to sound health.

Intelligence and mental labor conduce to longevity. Few men have reached the age of Humboldt: but the life of Baron Von Humboldt was one of incessant, almost unremitting mental application. Great reformers and statesmen whose minds have been for a life long period called into constant and powerful effort in conceiving and carrying out principles and public measures, have usually reached a ripe old age. Wesley, Calvin, Luther, Clay, Webster, the Adamses, and many others familiar in history, but whose names would swell our article beyond newspaper limits, lived to their three score and ten and four score years.

The general diffusion of intelligence in modern times tends to longevity, as shown by prepared tables. The average term of life is longer in the nineteenth century than it was in the eighteenth; and was longer in the eighteenth than in the seventeenth. Divines, statesmen and attorneys live longer than laborers and agriculturalists. The term of life is more extended in the New England States, the land of thought and invention, than in England generally, or in the Western and Southern States. The fact is that men grow strong and sound by mental toil; while the thoughtless and slothful are usually greater physical sufferers, and find mostly premature graves.

But the intellect can be abused at the expense of the body. The reader will comprehend what we have been trying to say in this condensed article: but do not be afraid to think; do not fear that your mind may become too active.

ALPHA.