Western Reserve chronicle. [volume] (Warren, Ohio) 1855-1921, 1855-11-07

threatened with an early siege, it repairs
arranges, disposes every thing within it.
self. The new stores it daily receives
are employed in fully equipping, in
strengthening, in rebuilding and in main
tanning every part in the greatest per-
fection and efficiency. This period of
internal invigoration lasts ten or fifteen
years more, when old age begins.
"And what marks the beginning Of
old age? In youth and manhood we
perform a usual daily amount of physical
or mental labor; but we are able TO DO
more. Let an emergency arise and we
find within us reserve of strength which
enables US to accomplish far heavier la
bors we double or triple our exertiOns.
we accomplish the usual work, aud after
a little rest we are as strong as ever
Old age has come on when we can no
longer do this; when the natural strength
is barely sufficient for the daily work,
when anything unusual fatigues, and ex-
raordinary efforts sensibly injure the
health. When the reserve of strength is
exhausted, the age of decline has fairly
begun. 1t is by drawing upon this nat
ural store OF reserved strength, through
excess in living, faster than it can be
naturally repaired, that manhood is
shortened, and old age too often prema-
turely entered.
"And, besides, old age is distinguish
ed by this, that it brings with it a gene
raj weakening of the whole body. Il is
not the lungs, or the heart, or the nerves,
or the muscles thai lose their tone, and
become incapable of unusual or prolong-
ed exertion. Local disease may weaken
one organ. while all the other remain
sound and vigorous as ever. But old
age impairs all alike. Each, so to speak,
has consumed its treasured stores of sur
plus strength, and, living as it were from
hand to mouth, is barely able to accom-
plish the daily task which the bodily
movements impose upon it.
"Yet old age does make itself felt
more, in every individual, upon some
one organ than upon all the others
There is a weak member in every man. S
body. All parts are not alike strong
and healthy in any ofus. On this weak
member old age tells most sensible and
hence in one man the decline of strength
first distinctly manifest itself upon the
lungs. in another upon the stomach, and
in the third upon the heart. And as the
excessive weakening of any one organ
inAuences-hampers, W. may say, and
obstrcts-all the rest, it may happen
that this weakness, original or acquired,
of one important organ may suddenly
arrest life altogether when old age ar,
rives. As penalty for the excessive
use which has impaired that organ, old
aye may be barely reached before the
whole machinery of life spontaneously
stops and is arrested at once"
That comparatively few men reach
ninety or a hundred years is true, bu
that is because of the interference of dis
turbing causes. Most Of men die Of di
sease; OnlyG small number die Of old age
In our artificial life, the moral is NOR,
frequently sick than the physical man. Ii
a calmer moral atmosphere, entire live:
would be more frequently spent. al
most ALL says Button, spend their live!
in fear and contention, and most mel
most Frenchmen, of course, he means
die of chagrin.' Among savage tribe
it Ii the same. Few die a natura
death. All die by accidents, by hunger
by wounds, by the poison of serpenls, b.
epidemic diseases, etc. That few real
ly reach their hundredlh year, therefore
experience repeats, is no proof that sucl
is not the natural term of human life.
Button investigated the subject ply
siologicalIy. He writes as follows:
The total duration of life may be esti
mated TO a certain degree by that of tn
duration of an animaPsgrowth.
Man increases in height up to his six
teenth year, and yet the full develop
ment in size of all parts of the bod,
are moi completed till the thirieth year
The dog attains its full length in on
year, and only in the second year com
Pleies lis growth in bulk and size Man
who takes thirty years tOgrow, lives nine
ty or hundred years. The dog, whicl
grows only during two or three years
lives only ten or twelve; and it is tn
same with most other animals
This passage contains tie germ of a
idea which it afterward developes NOR
clearly. 'rhe duration of life in a horse,
he says, 'as in other species of an
! imalS, is roPOrlionate to the length o
J time during which it grows. Man, VIII
: takes fourteen years to grow, may liv
six or seven times as long; that is, nine
ty or a hundred years. The horse
which completes its growth in four year:
may live six or seven times as long tha
: is, torwenty or thirty years
And again, as the stag is five {
S six years in growing, it lives also seve
J., times FIVE or six; that is, to thirty fiv
y or forty years