Rock Island daily Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1886-1893, 1888-11-19
SOUND MINDS AND BODIES.
The Old Maxim Called in Question-What
Healthy Invalid" May Do.

The Old Maxim Called in Question-What
Healthy Invalid" May Do.
1t is serious question whether, in these
day of health lifts, rowing machines, chest
weights and bean bags, rather exaggerated
ideas are not held out to the public as to the
spiritual benefits to be confidently relied on
from the diligent use of these. The old
maxim, "a sound mind in a sound body is
pretty severely put to its trumps when it has
to maintain lis dignity against practical
illustrations
OF course, the old Greeks and Romans, OF
whoever invented the saw originally, merely
meant that if man only had sound mind,
he could do great deal more with it II 1t
were in sound body. The modern bean
bag professors, however, can never content
themselves with so moderate statement as
this Tone up your muscular system, they
insist. and forthwith the whole Sermon on
the Mount will enter in and take possession Of
the soul Their favorite illustration is taken
| from the goings on of the baby. Who ever
| knew baby, they say, that nurses well and
sleeps well, to fret and cryi Well, that is
simply because he is a baby, little animal,
with a few physical wants Once satisfy
these, and the baby does not know enough to
ask for anything more.
But grown man is not baby. He may
be strong enough to digest food that would
distress an ostrich, to sleep like alternating
bear and to tramp forty miles on a stretch,
and still be a moody, rnorose, discontented
and querulous fellow. His mind cannot di-
gest the tough experiences of life, and his
irritable spirit never gets the mental sleep
and refreshment OF trust and peace IN a
higher power. One good healthy invalid
like Robert Louis Stevenson. with a sound
mind in a crazy rattletrap of body, has
more brace and invigoration in him than
scores of athletes who have sought their sole
spiritual instruction from dumb bells and
rowing machines With a quarter of lung
} he breathes in more tonic mountain air than
they with lungs like the bellows of forging
) shop. No man can abolish his ancestors. If
they bequeathei him dyspepsia, consump-
, tion or nervous exhaustion he will have tc
> fight it out on that line. But let him only
: say: ~ mean to make small capital wiz
a big fortune and ten to one he will get
S more genuine satisfaction and profit out Of
g life than thousands who conteInptuously dis
r miss him as not having body enough to sci
q up peanut stand on.
4 The naked fact is that sound men ant
horses are about equally rare. How TO makt
: the spawned and wind CALLED capable O.
= prancing and caracoling to the best advant
n age, is the practical question; and just her'
f is where the healthy invalids have theil
n blessed mission in the world. A mere physi
Q cal thread Of a man like Robert Loui
Stevenson, with his admiration for stout, olt
English admirals and heroes of every type
!, and who while perfectly entitled TO swath
: himself in fannels and drink catnip tea
t hates the whole race of winners and self cod
i dlers, touches the viking nerve in ever,
; reader Of his books who has sense of sham
!. enough in him to blush where he ought t
n blush. All over the land is the same stor,
It repeated. II half the great, hulking fellows
It who estimate the health of their minds b
d the vigor Of their bodies, would now an
t; then desert their rowing machines and pu
themselves under the spell of the sweetnes:
cheer and faith of some frail woman tied u
v in hard knot with rheumatism, they woul
feel that, with half the same amount c
IT spirit to the square inch of flesh, they ough
Is TO be able TO shoulder whole Alps of obstI
: cles, instead of whining over mole hills
If Boston Herald.