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Show SOME ILLS OF LIFE OUR MODERN CIVILIZATION HAS ITS BAD FEATURES. 'Vet the Men and Woiucu of tho Present Pres-ent Day Are Physically Suporlor to Tlielr Ancestors Evils la the Itiice for Superfluous Wealth. Some features of civilized life are not wholesome. It does not insure a perfect digestion, which is tho basis of good health. It is not healthful to ' breathe sewer gas in houses the plumbing of which has been passed by an inspector who receives Christmas Christ-mas gifts from the plumber. There are many other conditions which are not favorable to the best physical health. However, in spite of other drawbacks and disadvantages, there is every warrant to affirm that never has the standard of health, strength and agility been as high as it is to-day. Though an indoor life is vicious in its influence, the men and women of today to-day and especially the women are capable of a greater physical endurance endur-ance than has ever been known before. be-fore. The first and best proof of this is that at the age when our grands sires and their dames took their places in the chimney corner as capable capa-ble only of vegetable existence, the men and women of to-day are at their best, and, as Dr. Stevenson complains, the grandmothers are demanding the right to run for public office, instead-of instead-of being content to knit stockings. A believer in the physical superiority of the savage brought out the great-grandson great-grandson of a famous Indian sprinter to pit him agamst the white runners of the colleges. Even after a systematic syste-matic training he was beaten by ama teurs. His celebrated ancestor had defeated every white runner here and in England, but his record has been surpassed long since. Life in the open air is necessary to the best heatth, but there is no reason why the modern conveniences should be abandoned. On every hand are proofs of the physical, superiority ol the men and women of to-day over th people of any other known period. The rules of wnolesome living are better understood and are more generally ob served. It needs only for men to refrain re-frain from business excesses, from dissipating dis-sipating their energies in the pursuit of wealth, in order that they may find life well worth living. The too frequent fre-quent suicide of successful business men may be traced to their long and absolute absorption in the work of money-getting and the discovery that it is profitless and unsatisfactory. The ' realization of the fact that, wealth alone does not bring happiness comes only after it is too late to effect a change. The delusion that there is no more satisfying purpose than the accumulation of money is the chief obstacle ob-stacle in the way of man's happiness. . |
