The Democratic advocate., 1902-03-15
Diseases That DO You Good.

Diseases That Do You Good.
Have you had smallpox IF you have.
and you have recovered from the terrible
disease without your eyesight or hearing
being seriously affected, as is very often the
case, you may congratulate yourself that
smallpox attacked you, for you will proba-
bly,, barring accidents, live considerably
longer and enjoy better general health than
if you had never had the disease.
1t is a remarkable fact-one of Nature $
peculiar compensations that people who
have suffered from smallpox generally live
longer than people who have not, says
Pearson's Weekly. Why this should be
the case there is only an improved theory
to explain, and the theory is that the MI
crobes which go to make smallpox, being
very powerful and pugnacious, swallow up
the microbes of many other diseases which
they find in the systems of persons they
attack Hence, by contracting smallpox
severely, you stand good chance OF elm
mating from your system other diseases
which would seize upon you at some time
or other, and, likely enough, prove fatal.
At the same time it must be admitted
that smallpox is not scheduled as preven-
tive medicine, and the number of persons
it either kills, mains or inficts with mental
incapacities is probably greater than the
number of persons whose lives it prolongs.
At the same time it is fact that the
disease, though one Of the most terrible
known to medical science, does you great
deal of good if you are capable of throwing
it off without suffering after-effects Of a
more serious character than being pitted
with Che queer little marks it almost invarl-
ably leaves behind to distinguish its past
time victims.
Numbers of elderly persons, in more or
less feeble health, are kept alive by coughs,
such, for instance, as bronchitis. Chronic
coughs are peculiarly common to old peo-
pie, and hundreds who complain of the
distress caused by such affections are really
indebted to their coughs for their length of
life. The reason of this is that most eld
erly persons suffer with weak hearts and
feeble circulations of blood, and weak hearts
become weaker and weaker merely as
result of their weakness A constant cough
corrects this, keeps the heart beating more
strongly than it otherwise would, and the
strong heartbeat keeps the blood circulat-
ing more quickly, and the vital organs are
thus kept in state of activity which could
only be maintained by artificial means, and
for limited time, but for the troublesome
cough.
Moreover, the constant reminders given
by the cough deter the sufferers from run
ming risks of catching colds. In other
words, they have to study their health or
suffer more acutely from their coughs, and,
choosing the former, they benefit accord
ingly.
Gout and rheumatism are exceedingly
painful diseases, and, of course, In some
cases prove fatal, but they confer many
blessing upon mankind, and rheumatism
particularly is well known to doctors as
preventive of many other diseases, 1t is
notorious fact that equity subjects generally
live to ripe age, and albeit they suffer
very severely at times, they generally enjoy
excellent general health, the very causes of
the gout keeping their blood in good con-
dition and making it uncomfortable to many
kinds of microbes.
Gases have occurred of whole households,
except one member, being stricken down
with infectious diseases, and the lucky ex-
ception has been a sufferer from rheuma-
tism or gout, which alone has prevented
him from contracting the diseases which
have run through the house. Such suffer
ers do not run half the risk of catching the
common illnesses that nonsufferers run, and
a large proportion of the people who reach
ages over fourscore years are people who
for years have suffered from gout or rheu
matism, to which fact they undoubtedly
owe many of the years they have lived over
the allotted span.
Take half-a- dozen persons over the age
of 20 who suffer from rheumatism or gout,
and half a dozen others who suffer from
neither, and you will find that, except for
their rheumatism or gout, they enjoy very
much better health than the nonsufferers,
and stand a splendid chance of OUTLYING the
latter. Moreover, gout and rheumatism
greatly enhance sufferers chances of re-
tanning his mental faculties until the end;
large percentage of centenarians who die
with all their wits about them, and with
excellent memories of the days of their
youth, have suffered for many years from
rheumatism, and been particularly free from
other diseases.
The loss of leg or an arm is also said
to do you good in the long run. Perhaps
that is an awkward phrase to apply to the
loss of leg, but let it stand. 1t certainly
seems that when man is deprived of a
leg or an arm, the vitality and vigor of the
lost member remain with him to increase
the vitality of the remainder.
It has been declared by 40 eminent au-
thority that when man has a leg cut off,
he being in sufficiently good health not to
collapse from the operation, adds two or
three, sometimes more, years on to his lat
ter days.