The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1897-11-14
THE VOICE OF THE PULPIT
A PROTEST AGAINST WORRY AND A
PRESCRIPTION FOR IT'S CURE.
Sermon by the Rev. George L. Perrin,
ID. D., Pastor Everyday Church
UniversaIist), Boston, Mass.
Fear hath torment.-I .Jobn iv 49,

Fear hath torment-I John iv IS.
Be not anxious about the morrow; let
the morrow take thought for the things
OF itself.-Matthew vi, "a.
I. What is worry? Probably If we were
TO make careful analysis we should see
that the essence of it is fear, often intan-
gible, Elusive, half-unconscious; and yet at
bottom, worry is made up OF fear. How
ever unreasonable it may be and however
little cause there may be, people are ap-
prehensive of the future.
A farmer sees the apple blossoms, he ad-
mits that they give promise of splendid
yield, but adds: Like as not frost will
come and blight all the blossoms, and the
fruit viii be a failure" Now that 1 have
my hay down, of course, 1t will rain be-
fore get into the barn. Susie has the
measles, and, Of course, 1t will go through
the whole family" The children have come
in the thousandth time unhurt. but the
mother imagines them every time they are
out Of her sight as being suddenly brought
in, bleeding and mangled. Several million
people go and come by railway unframed.
but in our anticipation of evil we see rail-
way wrecks and subsequent fire, we see
hotels in flames and falling bridges. In
this category of evils anticipated will be
sickness, failure of crops, accident, failure
In business poverty and death.
But people are not content to worry about
the future, they also worry about the past,
and we have such EXPLANATIONS as these:
20 IL had only done so and so how diff
ferently things would have come out" IF
J. had only avoided this and that mistake"
With bitterest anguish of spirit we call up
the dead past, make it live over again in
our imagination like horrible nightmare
to paralyze our invention and affections.
With some form Of this dread disease
you are familiar yourself, for even if you
have not worried, you have felt the jar
and CRATE and saw-filing anguish of some
body's else worry. Now let us see.
IL What worry involves. A great many
people who would regard it as wrong to
get angry, anp who of course regard it as
a crime to steal and very reprehensible to
tell lies. would be much inclined to excuse
the man who Worries either with the re-
Election that he can't help it or that he
generally worries in a good cause and
therefore ought not TO be blamed; but if
we observe some Of the results of worry
some of it's dangers, do not believe we
will wish to excuse it at all.
L It involves the destruction of happi-
ness. This hardly needs argument. 1t will
be recognized as true by any one who has
had even a little experience in life. When
did worry ever make a happy man? When
did 1t ever fail to steal the joys of life? 1t
covers the face with wrinkles, contracts the
brow with frowns drives out the light of
the soul, and produces a reign of darkness.
If. therefore, there were no other rea-
son to uproot the habit of worry, this were
enough, that it steals the joy Of life 1t
makes the world unhappy. 1t would not be
so bad IL only the person who worries were
affected by it, but the worrying man makes
wife and children and employees, fellow
workers and laborers and friendS-all with
whom he comes in contact-unhappy also.
Although he dGes not mean to be, he is
really an enemy of his race, and daily dis
penser of the miseries of life.
2 1t involves the destruction Of work
ing power. 1t is sometimes supposed that
tina fretful, solicitous, worrying man is
often the most intense worker. He does,
perhaps, work intensely, but he does not
work sanely and with strength. 1t is the
fitfuI, nervous, unwholesome method of the
man who is unnerved. Let no one mistake.
A healthy interest in ones work is stimu-
lating, helpful, buoyant but when 1t be-
comes an exaggerated interest and reaches
the point of worry it is depressing, saps the
energies ard destroys the powers.
3. 1t also destroys the health. 1t has
come to be a matter of commonest observa-
ton and almost an axiom that 1t is not
work that kills, but worry. The average
man, no matter what his employment,
could stand all the work he has to perform
day in and day out, year in and year out.
If he could perform it calmly, without agi-
%oxx
have the mental poise and the spiritual as
surance to be able to do this. They use UP
their vital energy, not in the legitimate
work, but in the exaggerated fancy and
fears about it, and then by and by the ply
sician says: 20 you are overworked." His
diagnosis is wholly wrong. He is not
overworked-he is overworried. Let him
stop the worry and the work might go on
indefinitely. 1t is not the revolution that
destroys machinery but the friction.
But not only does worry affect the health
of the man himself, it affects health in
other people. When 1 am sick 1 want a
doctor who smiles, other things being equal.
A light in the heart is better than all medi-
cine, while q frOwn upon the face inspired
by a frown within the heart, is the germ of
disease in the mans own body, and nurses
1t also in other people.
4. Worry at last involves practical in
sanity. The man who worries never sees
things exactly as they are. To his vision
they are distorted, twisted, deformed. The
worrying employer is incapable of dealing
justify by his employees; the worrying house
wife is incapable of looking sanely upon
her household duties; the worrying school
teacher is incapable of dealing fairly by her
pupils. Worrying impairs the judgment and
destroys moral perspective.
III. Now, let us look for moment at
some of the causes of worry. We shall bet
ter understand how to cure the habit when
we understand what causes it; and
at the risk of making the thing at once a
cause and, an effect, want to say in the
first place that
L One fruitful cause of worry is I'll
health. I said above that worry causes III
health, and 1t does. There can be no doubt
that the mind acts upon the body and the