Excretion: By far the most important item to attend to in regard to the body is the waste pipes, including the colon, the bladder, and the pores. Most diseases have their origin in the colon. I would see to it that it was thoroughly cleaned every day. In addition, I would drink plenty of water, and would take some form of exercise every day that would induce perspiration. Most of my sicknesses have come from self-poisoning, and I would make it my main care to eliminate the waste.
Exercise: I would, if I were twenty-one, take up some daily system of exercise that would bring into play all the voluntary muscles of the body, and especially those which from my occupation tend to disuse. I would devote half an hour to an hour daily to this purpose.
Excess: I would take no stimulant of any kind whatsoever. Whatever whips the body up to excess destroys the efficiency of the organism. Hence I would not touch alcoholic drinks in any form. If one never begins with alcohol he can find much more physical pleasure and power without it. The day of alcohol is past, with intelligent people. Science has condemned it as a food. Business has banned it. It remains only as the folly of the weak and fatuous.
I would drink no tea or coffee, as these are stimulants and not foods. Neither would I use tobacco. The healthy human body will furnish more of the joy of life, if it is not abused, than can be given by any of the artificial tonics which the ignorance and weakness of men have discovered.
If I were twenty-one, all this!
IV
IF I WERE TWENTY-ONE I WOULD
TRAIN MY MIND
I would realize that my eventual success depends mostly upon the quality and power of my brain. Hence I would train it so as to get the best out of it.
Most of the failures I have seen, especially in professional life, have been due to mental laziness. I was a preacher for years, and found out that the greatest curse of the ministry is laziness. It is probably the same among lawyers and physicians. It certainly is so among actors and writers. Hence, I would let no day pass without its period of hard, keen, mental exertion so that my mind would be always as a steel spring, or like a well-oiled engine, ready, resilient, and powerful.
And in this connection I would recognize that repetition is better than effort. Mastery, perfection, the doing of difficult things with ease and precision, depend more upon doing things over and over than upon putting forth great effort.
I would especially purge myself as far as possible of intellectual cowardice and intellectual dishonesty. By intellectual dishonesty I mean what is called expediency; that is, forming, or adhering to, an opinion, not because we are convinced of its truth, but because of the effect it will have. A mind should, at twenty-one, marry Truth, and “cleave only unto her, till death do them part, for better, for worse.”