The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1891-05-15
The VALUE OE HEALTH.
Abstract of a Lecture by DIR. j. II. Kellogg,
OF the Battle Creek Sanitarium.

OF the Battle Creek Sanitarium.
Most people do not value health as
they should, and its low esteem is one
of the greatest obstacles which physi-
clans have to contend with. People
want to get rid of a troublesome head
ache or neuralgia. but for getting thor
oughly well, they seem to care nothing,
and often sell their lives very foolishly
and for small equivalents. Men are not
only careless of their own lives, but also
criminally careless of the lives of their
families and their neighbors. They dig
well and put cess-pool on one side
and vault on the other, and these
sources of filth filter into the drinking
water and innoculate one or more per-
sons With typhoid fever. The doctor is
sent for, but nothing is done toward
the prevention of further disease How
nlucl money do you suppose the United
EsiHl- Vas spent during the last year in
the prevention of that dread disease,
consumption, disease which may be
likened to a leprosy, beginning at the
top of the lungs and causing their de-
cay little by little. How much has been
done, too, for the prevention of typhoid
fever or other diseases of a class which
might be stamped out almost entirely?
The government has spent a larger
amount for the prevention of one dis
ease among lower animals, viz, hog
cholera, than for the prevention of all
the diseases to which human beings are
subject. A few years ago national
board of health was esta blished, but
they can do nothing because learned
senators have made no appropriation
for several years, not even for travel
ing expenses. This shows how very lit
tie human life is appreciated by the
government, and the same spirit exists
their own life and the lives of their
neighbors.
A person finds himself suffering from
a chronic malady, and yet he pays n
attention to it, unless he is seriously
incommoded, but if he had sick horse,
he would send for veterinary surgeon
to see what the matter was and why it
was becoming useless. He sees himself
growing thin and weak, and by and by
he is unfit for work and wakes up to
the fact that perhaps he has an incura-
BILE disease which might have been very
durable at the outset. Instead of want
ing the most health, we are satisfied
with just a little. We goad ourselves
about and do things because we must
do them and not because we have
pleasure in them, and with many peo-
pie, life is merely a tread-mill, because
they have no vivacity or energy to
bring to their task.
In business, people manage differ
emily. They are not satisfied with a
mere pittance with which they can g t
along. A man works hard for his first
thousand dollars, and when his accumu-
lations reach five thousand he uses it as
a further leverage to obtain more. In
fact, it would be almost impossible to
find man who is satisfied with his
accumulatiOns or his income. He is al
ways striving for more. Why should
we not regard our health in the same
light? Why should we not husband our
strength, and eat for strength, and do
everything that is necessary to main
tain perfectly healthy existence, not
only FOR our present comfort, but for
the sake of possible years to Gomez
Reported by Helen l.. Manning.