CHAPTER IV.
"On life's vast ocean diversely we sail, Reason the card, but passion is the gale."
There are more diseases contracted, more unhappiness created during life, and early decay occasioned, by politeness and pride than by whisky and tobacco combined. Total-abstinence advocates will assert that drink kills more than all other causes. What would they think if we should say, if he is a reformed drinker, that it was out of pure politeness that he quaffed his first glass.
Politeness is the cause of disease in many ways, of which the following are a few:—
A friend—only in name—will stop you in the first corner of the street and insist on telling you a good(?) joke about Brown, Smith, or Jones. He takes you by the lapels of the coat, holds you to windward for twenty minutes in a breeze blowing twenty-five miles an hour, although this lays you up with a cold for a week, and thus plants the first seeds of consumption. You will be too polite to tell him that your health will not permit you to be so exposed. As a remedy for this class of attacks, if a man insists on saying anything more than "How do you do" or "Good-bye," I should invite him into the nearest hall-way or around the corner to leeward, entirely out of the draft. If this does not seem feasible, I would bid him "Good-day."
Another case of excessive politeness is when a gentleman or lady continues chatting ten minutes in the hall after he or she must go immediately. Then at the door after they have walked out, you, in dressing-gown and slippers, stand on the cold marble step in a driving fog for twenty minutes more, to hear the latest gossip—too polite to slam the door in their faces, or excuse it as an accident.
But the politeness that kills faster than any other is that of the consumptive, bronchially-affected, or catarrhal patient. He will sit at the table, or in company, and, out of pure politeness, swallow the mucus and other impurities that arise in his throat—too polite to use a cuspidor or excuse himself by withdrawing to another room or the open air, and clear his throat. A great many people are accustomed to expectorate into their handkerchiefs. This is a baneful practice. Just as soon as that gets dry which they have thrown up from their lungs, innumerable microbes of deadly effect escape and do extensive harm. Avoid this habit and use the cuspidor or step out-of-doors. It is not unreasonable to believe that 50 per cent of all the consumptives would recover if they would, by care and cleanliness, see that no particle of mucus once away from the lungs should ever go back down the throat, and observe other points regarding apparel and cleanliness mentioned in the first part of this work.
We have already devoted some space to what we should and should not do. All that, however, is but a small part of a life which will continually experience health, happiness, and longevity. We trust you do not simply read these statements not intending to test their value. It is not unlikely that many of you from your course or line of business will find it eminently difficult to absolutely follow our instructions. Be that as it may, come as approximately as you can, and there will positively result an improvement in your physical condition, a progression in your happiness, and a realization of longevity. The remainder of this chapter will be occupied by a program, or rather set of formula of what is necessary to aid you in keeping well, living long and happily.
Keep your bowels open and regular in action. This you can do, if irregular or constipated, by taking a few drops of water in your right hand every morning and rubbing the bowels in a circular motion from right to left, until a friction is produced and the moisture gone. From six to ten separate passages of the hand over the bowels is usually sufficient, and the object will be accomplished. Each day this is repeated; in a very short time you will be all right in this particular, and will not require even this effective medicine. You must be aware that a score of maladies are kept at bay by the regularity of the bowels. This fact cannot be too strongly impressed on mankind in general. It is very seldom indeed that you come upon a man who is well with a bad digestive apparatus; but, again, he who possesses a strong stomach and is moderate and regular in eating is almost invariably characterized with a vigorous constitution. Disease finds no place to locate upon or in him. There is no doubt the American people eat too fast, and that is why so many die so soon. The system is worn out when it should be ready to do its best work. If all the men and women in this country would eat 50% slower they would live 25% longer. Of this we have no doubt—nor do you, reader.