Worcester daily spy. [volume] (Worcester [Mass.]) 1850-1888, 1857-12-11
IL, / 9 } z.

A WORKING CoNsTITUTIoN.-It is O very
common mistake that strong, or working
man must have red face, full habit and a
large frame. Ability to do or to endure, as we
have often had occasion to intimate, depends
much more on compaetness of fibre than in
bulk. Good qualities and healthy conditions
OF organic structure are what gives real pow.
er. Mere size is Of secondary consideration,
The London Times, in an article on The
Fhyslque OF man of Genius" well illus
trates this point:
1t is old times again to have Lord Brough-
am addressing a Mechanics Institute. He is
on his own ground there and is monarch of
all he surveys. What he saws of himself is
perfectly true al am myself, and have been
all my life, working man." and therefore,
on that ground as well, no other man has
greater right to address the operatives of Man
chester There is perhaps no man living of
whom more teats of labor and triumphs over
the frail physique of humanity are recorded
than OF Lord Brougham. Legends of this sort
have gathered round him like Hercules
There IS legend that he worked six contin-
uous days.. e., l44 hours without sleep,
that be then rushed down to his country lodg-
ings, slept all Saturday night, all Sunday, all
Sunday night. and was walked by his valet on
Monday morning, to resume all the RESPONSE
bilities of life, and commence the work of the
next week.
man must, of course, have a superhuman
constitution who can do, we will not say this
particular feat which is perhaps mythican, but
feats of this class, and probably the greatest
of our great men is quite as much a body af-
fair as a mental one. Nature has presented
them not only with extraordinary minds, but
what has quite as much to do with the mat
ter-with wonderful bodies What can a
man do without constitutional working
constitutions He is laid on the shelf from
the day he was born. For him no munifcent
destiny reserves the Great Seal to the Rolls
of the Chief Justiceship, OF the leadership of
the House of Commons, the Treasury or the
Admiralty, or the Horse Guards, the Home
office or the Colonies. The church may
promise him, for it does not signify to the
Church whether a man does his work or not,
but the State will have nothing to do with
the poor CONSTITUENCIES wretch. He will not
rise higher than Recordership or Poor Law
Board.
But" somebody will ask, "has that pale,
lean man, with face like parchment, and
nothing on his bones, constitution" Yes
he has-he has a working constitution, and
ten times better one than you, my good
friend, with your ruddy face and your strong
muscular frame. You look, indeed, the pic
ture of health, but you, have, in reality, only
sporting constitution, not working one.
You do very well for the open air, and get on
tolerably well with fine healthy exercises,
and no strain on your brain. But try close
air for week-try confinement, with heaps
of confused papers and books OF reference,
blue books, law books, or dispatches to get
through, and therefrom extract LIQUID and
transparent results, and you will find your
self knocked up and fainting, when the pale
lean man is if not "as fresh as daisv,
which he never is, being of the perpetualty
cadaverous type-at least as unaffected q bit
OF leather, and not showing the smallest sign
of giving way. There are two sorts of good
constitutons-good idle constitutions and
good working ones. When nature makes a
great man she presents him with the latter
gift. Not that we wish to deprive our great
men of their merit. A man must make one
or two experiments before he finds out his
constition, A man of spirit and mettle,
makes the experiment, risks himself and runs
the risk, as soldier does on the field. The
battle Of life and death is often fought as
really in chambers or in an office as it is on
the field. A soul is required to make use Of
the body, but great man must have soul as
well as a body to work with. Chas. Butler,
Sir William Molesworth, and others, are in
stances of men whose bodies refused to sup
port their souls, and were therefore obliged to
give up the prize when they had reached 1t.
And how many hundreds or thousands-if
one did but know them-perish in ali early
stage, before they have made any way at
all, simply because, though they had SPLEEN
did minds, they had very poor bodies Let
our lean, cadeverous friend, then, when the
laural surmounts his knotty parchment face,
thank Heaven for his body, which, he may
depend upon it, Is always as great treasure
as his soul. Nature may not have made him
handsome man, but what does that signify
She has made him strong one.-Ne,oark
A1yertiSer