The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1891-07-10
THE TECHNIQUE OF REST.
Indemnity Demanded by Nature for
Wasted Force.

Wasted Force.
Our muscular strength is the means
though which we act, but that by which
we act is something behind the for
mer which we call nerve force. Dis
titled by the mysterious alchemy of
life from the food we eat, from the
sunshine and the air, it is the life we
live. 1t spans, as it is, the impossible
gulf between matter and spirit which
forms the despair of the physcologist.
1t is the perpetual miracle which all
common things are-the more common,
the more miraculous. An aristocratic
product of life. it is life itself, for when
it is exhausted the organization ceases
to be. We are then not to be surprised
that it yields slowly to attacks upon it.
succumbing only to long siege, for it
Is the very force of all forces. Neither
ought we to be surprised that to recover
from real attack of what is called
nervous prostration" there should be
demanded by cheated nature time
which always seems to the sufferer I'M
reasonably long if indeed it be not in
terminable. But he has not kept his
books balanced with the minute care
which nature always employs in the
management of her accounts. He has
hoped, if he has thought about it at all,
that she was as least as careless or as
weakly indulgent as he, and that
some few things might be overlooked
Or haply forgotten. But natures ways
Of doing business are not his ways, as
no
are not the curving and yielding lines
Of benevolence and charity, but the
rigid and straight ones of truth and
Justice, and it is better that the punish
ment for the repeatedly broken law
should be sometimes terribly swift and
hopelessly fatal in a particular instance
than for one lot or or one title to pass
from the law. With those who have
offended against it in the constant mad
chase after pleasure, or in the equally
mad struggle to win and hold a coveted
place in what is called society, have
nothing to do. They must be left to
settle their accounts as best they can.
But to most earnest people life is hard
and fast, and growing continually hard
err and faster, and to many it is becom-
ing more and more burning question
how they shall meet, like men and wo-
men. the demands of each day without
falling under the condemnation of that
law. 1t would be comparatively easy
for the society followers, if they had
any desire to do SO, to settle their
problem by following Carlyle's plan, and
reducing their denominators. He makes
it very clear to those who have passed
beyond the stage of childhood, that our
wishes and desires stand to our abilities,
either pecuniary or mental, in the same
relation as the denominator of a frac-
ton to its numerator, and that the val
lie of the fraction of each ore of us ex-
presses in terms easily written down
the total amount of our solid happiness
or contentment. In this view it follows
that there are always two possible ways
of increasing the amount of the latter
namely, to increase our numerator by
increasing our possessions. or to dimin-
ish our denomination by decreasing the
total amount of our desires. To many
of us there is no liberty of choice left
open. Forced by the demand of the
working world to which we belong. we
have already reduced our denomination
to surprisingly low figure. We find
positive pleasure, as we walk in the
city. in seeing shops loaded with innu-
merable things that we do not want,
and would not have even if we could.
Even in the matter of books the number
which we care to own grows smaller
Gay by day instead of larger. We
have learned the great lesson
that it is easier to climb at
once to the high hills and drink
from the springs which run there, than
to accept the diluted stuff which is de-
livered to us in conduitS often not of
the cleanest. With regard to society,
too, the number of houses into which
we do not desire to enter is infinitely
larger than that of those to which we
aspire. And it conferS almost feeling
of royalty to see so many people around
us who do not hesitate at any sacrifice
or any effort to obtain an Introduction
into certain circles of society to which
no entrcatics of our best-meaning
friends would be able to drag us for a
single evening. We have had so much
to do all our lives that we have learned
the value of time, and we are blessedly
thankful for it, for nobody who has not
lived a life of constant labor can pos
sibly know the exquisite delight of
whole half-hour in which one has at
last the right to do what she pleases.
The fifty years of Europe hold more
conscious throbbing life than cycle of
Cathap, and even if we had the liberty
of choosing, we would take the fifty
years. Anna c. Bracket, in Harpers
Magazine.
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