Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1892-02-25

~ oo"l idNotdole comparison With
most OF them. for delicaey of workman
ship and purity of design. S. S.
YEARS Do nor MAKE oLD AGE
Where There is YIgor of Mind and Rodx
There is Youth.
Sir James Crichton Browne has enum-
Grated instances of long-lived persons
possessing all their faculties unimpaired
and opennd up a subject full of interest,
and which even the large space occupied
by his address die not allow him fully
to develop. 1t seems a physiological law
that the functions of the body must
be kept in exercise In order to maintain
their efficiency, and it is as true of the
body as of the mill or any other machine
that it will rust out from disuse sooner
than wear cut by employment
The fact is constantly observed in per-
sons engaged in commercial pursuits
who retire at the age OF sixty, and then
fall into rapid decay, while professional
men remaining at work preserve their
vigor, often for another 20 years. It is
a sad thing to see the nerve centers de.
cay, with a corresponding weakness of
body ana mind, but it is still sadder to
witness, with wrinkdng Of the skin,
corresponding shriEkage of the brain,
allowing vanity and some of the weakly
pas sions which had been KEEP in sup
preston to come again to the fore.
How different is the spectacle when
the organ is kept In its integrity by
constant use, and the mental faculties
preserved in all their pristine force. We
have only TO look around and to see our
poets, bishops, judges, ministers of state,
~,
mental vig0r while working at their re-
spective vocations.
Very remarkable. too. is it that, as Sir
James Crichton- Browne observed, the
freedom of language will remain as good
as ever; an illustration Of this was OBJ
served but lately in discussion on the
London university questions, when two
OF the most logical and weIl-expressed
speeches were made by octogenarians.
We can at the presant time point to
statesmen and lawyers of great age still
before the public; as not long ago we
could see Lord Pallnerston, Lord
Broug ham, Lord Lyndhurst, and others.
In former times we may remember New
ton living to be IS, while Sophocles is
said to have lived to be 80 and Plato not
much short of this. 1t is clear that hard
work does not kill. The toll, however,
must be genial and diversified. The man
of business often has no occupation be-
sides his bread-winning, whereas a medi-
cal man has variety Of subjects to inter
est him.
A speaker at The recent international
congress showed by experiments upon
school children when three or four sums
in arithmetic were given in succession
that each sum showed an inferiority to
the previous one, both In correctness and
as regards the time in which it was COM
pie ed The one faculty employed was
gradually exhausted, fresh piece of
evidence showing the necessity for diver
sity of work.
In the treatment OF persons with mental
trouble or worry, the very worst method
is to rely too much on what is called rest,
meaning thereby leaving the patient with
out other employ ment th@n to brood over
his sorrows. True rest to the mind is only
to be obtained by the occupation Of other
faculties reused into action by new sur
roundings.
There is no reason why old age should
not be as happy and as enjoyable as any
other period of life, If old persons be
asked as to their consciousness Of age they
will all with one consent declare that
there exists nothing of the kind.
An old person has knowledge Of his
age the same way as his friends he sees
it 10y looking in the mirror; by remem-
brance Of past events, Or the loss of con-
temporaries, but he is not constantly
carrying about with him the conviction
or feeling that he is old; be is thus still
able to occupy himself in the business and
pleasures Of life.
Button spoke of his green old age as
one of the happiest PERIODS of his life, al
though the kind Of pleasures then exper
fenced are, of course, different from those
OF youth; and even when decay comes,
and man is becoming free from the re-
membrance of all earthly things, then, as
Sir James Paget says land no mental
activity by continued work., it may be
so ordered on pHrpose that the spirit may
be inyigOrated and undisturbed inthe con-
temptation of the Frightening future.
Another writer, speaking of old age in
reference to the disease of an eminent
barrister, also maintained that the high
est faculties are kept keen by constant ex-
ercise, and the brain vigorous by constant
action and reward.
The understanding has often been in
the highest perfection in quite advanced
old age, and that mas been the best pc
riod Of human life. 1t is the time when
the rage and storm of passage have died
away, when the jeaousies and cares of a
career have ceased and been forgotten,
when memory fingers upon all that is
bright and charming in the past, and
when hope scatters her most glowing tints
over the fast AZ preaching future, or, in
the words of Sir J. Crichton Browne
himself.
eve are able to see in old age glimpses
of the truth that its chief glory consists
not In the remembrance of feats Of prowess,
nor in The egotistic exercise Of power, but
IN the conquest of peevish weakness, in
the brightness of hope, and IN the discrim-
nation Of happiness around
Depend upon it the best antiseptic
against senie decay is an active interest
in human affairs, and those keep young
longest who love most.
In the same key did Oliver Wendell
Holmes, the laureate of old age, sing
when some ladies' lately presented him
with loving cnp in his Sofa year:
Better love perfume in the empty bowl
Than wine nepenthe for the aching SOUL
Sweeter than song That poet sung,
1t makes the old heart yOungl
-Bukish Medical Journa l.