River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1902-07-31
FEAR THE FEAR OF DEATH.
An Interesting Showing of the
Chances of Life from the InVes-
tiEatiOns of Scientists.

We should be afraid of the fear of
death-not of death itself. If we fol-
low this rule there is no reason why
we should not all become centenarians
SO we are told in the Revue d'Econo-
mic Politique by M. Jean Finot, says
the Literary Digest. The author
begins an article on the limita
tions of life by mentioning some
traditional long lives. Among these
cases are those of a resident Of
Goa, who is said to have reached his
4OOth year in the enjoyment of all his
intellectual faculties; a Scotchman
who lives to be over 200 years old, and
various monks of Mont Athos who
have reached $50 years. He asserts
that Servian statistics for 1897 show
persons between 1875 and 140 years old,
10 from 1875 to 1875, 1923 from Us to 125,
and 200 from 105 to lis. In 1890 there
were, he says, in the United States,
1881 persons over 100 years old, and p
in London. M. Finot cites mathe-
NAUTICAL formula, which he credits to
Dr. Richardson, by which any one may
get an idea of his probable length of
life. 1t is only necessary to add the
ages of ones father and mother to
those of ones two grandfathers and
two grandma Others, and the total di-
vided by six indicates the exact number
of years one should live. NJ Finot does
not believe that the average length of
human life has been reduced. On the
contrary, he believes that it is con-
TO- hoTN
ress of hygiene. Why do we grow old
at all? The writer answers:
''For three reasons: (D Want of
physical exercise in the open air; (2)
poisoning by microbes, which the
phagocytes have not succeeded in de-
stroying; (3) fear of death. 1t is hard
to imagine the Importance of this last
element. If man fears death, it will
carry him away. And yet it is quite
compared to it."
To prove this assertion M. Finot
quotes Helm who related the sensa-
tions he experienced while falling with
his companions from the summit of
one of the Alps to death which he
miraculously escaped:
Sat first a sense of beattitude, then
complete insensibility to touch and
pain; finally an extreme rapidity of
thought and of ina gination, which in
a few seconds enabled him to recollect
the events of his whole life. Therefore,
it is not death we should fear, but the
fear it inspires in us. We are wrong,
saws Socrates, to fear death, as it is
our great possession on earth, and
Seneca adds that it is the best of the in
ventions of life, while Montesquieu
concludes that we should shed tears
for men when they are born and not
when they die"
NJ Henry de Varigny examines the
question of longevity in ILLUSTRATION
from another point of view. He asks:
''Has the man of to-day a chance to
live longer than the man of 1000 years
ago? He bases his conclusions upon
charts and statistics published by Prof.
Karl Pearson in Biometrika and upon
the researches made by W. Spiegel-
berg, of Strassburg, on the age of
Egyptian mummies. These conclu-
sions are that an Egyptian who 1000
years ago lived to be 6S years old was
likely to live longer than modern
Englishman of the same age. M. de
Varigny gives the following explana-
ton:
Evidently there was among the
Egyptians natural selection, result
ing from environment, that does not
take place to-day at least to the same
degree among civilized people. The
Egyptians who reached the age of 6S