The Athena press. [volume] (Athena, Umatilla County, Or.) 18??-1942, 1907-12-27
DYSPEPSIA AND DESTINY.


Men Who Neglected Their Bodies
Failed When Success Was Nigh.
Man has machine, an apparatus of
delicate adjustment, but of great pow
er-his body-hut too often he neglects
to use it, says the Boston Globe. He
lets it rest In ease or slumber in sloth.
He coddles it. lie arrays it in fine lin
EN- and purple, bedlzens it with jewels
and pampers 1t with indigestble foods,
often sparing 1t the arduous labor of
mastication. He permits 1t to sit awk-
wardly with crossed legs or stopped
shoulders, as If the trunk was too
fragile to hold up its limbs, or the
weight of the atmosphere was an Atlas
load for It's back.
And what reward hath the mind for
this indulgence granted the sybarite
flesh? Ingratitude aud complaining ac-
companled by accusations The poor,
dehilitated muscles and nerves justly
charge that the overseer mind has been
neglectful of its duties and, despising
so weak and ignorant foreman, desert
or rebel, and leave their should-be boss
impotent to carry out the true work of
a man.
The marvellous mind of Alexander.
which ruled a world, had no discipline
for its body after it became acquainted
with oriental pomp and seriousness,
and disregarded the stalwart virility
with which in other days II tanned
Bucephalus.
Napoleon. busy with rearranging the
map of Europe did not properly mas
ticate his chicken a In Marengo and
allowed it to pass in the rough into the
spoiled child of a stomach, trusting to
the liver-a weak one inherited from
his father--to complete the lack Of
mastication.
Probably the great disaster of Lelp-
zig was due to his careless eating.
Voltalre has said the fate of ma
tion often depended on the good or bad
digestion Of prime minister and Mot
ley declares that the gout Of Charles
V. changes the destinies of the world.
Balzac. incompatible novelist, died
at so when he had planned for life
| of rural rest, died because he allowed
the craving stomach to have coffee at
all hours and in great quantities and
while his mind sauntered In Rll the
highways, lanes and alleys of human
society, his body, cabined in monks
robe, took no exercise, but stuck to n
| garret, except when a sheriff's APP
| proach made flight thing desired by
| the agile mind
In that delightful essay, Saints and
Their Bodies" Colonel Higginson says;
"Three of the four Greek fathers ruin
ed their health early and were nvalids
for the rest of their days. Three only
of the whole eight were able-bodied
men-Ambrose, Augustine and Athan-
aslus-and the permanent influence OF
these three has been far greater than
that of all the others put together"
''He is born for a minister" New
England parents once said Of the puny
twigs of the family tree, while they
deputed the lusty limbs to bear the
buffets of secular storms.
Luther scoffed at Juvenal's axiom Of
"a healthy mind in healthy body
an axiom commended to the degenerate
Romans-but other religious leaders
have welcomed and needed the warn
ing contained In the saying of the great
satirist. If Calvin was an invalid all
the days of his life, George, Michael
and Martin were robust. If some noted
prelates have not treated their bodies
as they ought, we have seen even
delicate Leo Kill Illustrate to the let.
ter, "mens sana in corpore sano"