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Show RE. 00 AUK." For The Dispatch :1 Both by sacred promis nnd profane precept long life bus bet-n regarded as a blfssing, while to live forever has bee d the lrem of every suortal from , Abraham to Ponce de Leon, and from the tiaie of l)r. Dee's researches to those of . Dr. riiRsinbotham's experiment. experi-ment. , Sorne eiekly rhymst-er has faintly lisped something about "1 would not live always," but it is the, !Uin4', strongly marked wish of most t peoplf to . live lon. The eminent legislator who drv up the Ten Cora-mauiinents. Cora-mauiinents. for tlie guidance of the children of Israel knew very well what he was aoout when bar held out the ; proiiiise of long life to the tiiially obedient. ..'It wus tlie solitary promise of the JJecaloiine, and was inserted because be-cause it was recognized as the great Jink that .would keep the children in theaith of their fathers. All that a man hatli will he gre in exchange for his life," and well he miglvt, -when it is the only tangible rock to which lie can cling in the illimitable, ocexu of speculation. It may indeed be set Unvu as an axiom that the desira to live and to live long is natural and sane, and that the de-' sire to cut life short is insane and un-natural. un-natural. Longevity has been sought fur-with a persistence only equalled by that displayed ou the prt of those curious gentlemeu who have been uuxioiis to deal is the transmutation of metals, but Hit elixir of life has eluded the students as thoroughly as the philosopher's stons has slipped from the hands of the alchemists. .This is not to be wondered at. because be-cause the elixir maniacs have wisned tp retmpply that which is lost, to make the old .new but it is rather surprising surpris-ing that vfcith all our intimate acquaintance ac-quaintance with our physiological selves we have discovered no formula thatwill unfailingly arrest decay an1 so Lengthen rot the'spaa of our lives An exiein' of ink shed has been : -'voted to thtV 'proper presentation of the art tr "prolonging life, wonderful liscoveries have been reported, juar-reJotiE juar-reJotiE nostrums hare been discorered, extraordinary regimens have been tabulated, but all without avail we cannot depend upon fixed wiles to produce pro-duce longetive any more than we can account for the vagaries of feminine taste. We know that there are certain things which exert a powerful influence pon our lives and the length of their courss. Of such as these are temperance, temper-ance, pure air, regular tixerce aod uji easy mind, self-denial and vtue proper attention in fact to whatever lias to do with the inner chemistries of nature and the laws of organized bodies. "But these things are no infallible. in-fallible. Tbomis Parr lived to 152, was anything but a temperate mai during his life, and died from the effects of. a drinking-bout, so the avoidance of liquor is not always the cause of longetive. That old Venetian Louis Corn aro, who lived to he 100i was habitually guilty of irregular ex-ctMsett; ex-ctMsett; Henry Jeukyns of Yorkshire, lived to be 169, yet depended on charity char-ity for a living, which he solicited in ill sorts of weather. Albuma Marc reached" loO in the sultry interior of Ethiopia; and Christian Drakenberg reached to within four venrs of that tfme on the steril mountain! of Norway. Nor-way. It is said that Hippocrates lived to be 104 in the delicious Isle of Cos, but it is also on record that Jane Heese lived to be 103 among the marshes of Essex. , . It would seem fron this that longevity long-evity is not a question-of cliuiaU au? more than it is of sobriety. I( is true that &ome climates are distinguished for an insalubrity that shortens unman life while other climates hare a tendency ten-dency to lengthen it It is quite possible, pos-sible, for instance,, that there are no centenarians to speak of on the coast of Sierra Leone, and it is said on the otljtr hand that in the interior of Norway, Nor-way, the liris so pure that the inhabitants in-habitants live until they are actually tired of living. The cosst of Devonshire, Devon-shire, the sweet vales of Utah, and the whole of California are certainly far more congenial to the human frame than the swamps of Missolonghi, or the poison-swept deserts of Syria; but, as we have sees, extraordinary cases of longevity have occurred in the most inauspicious places, climatically speaking. speak-ing. Any table of cuiiogities In vital statistics will nhow this. Abraham Paiba lived until he was H2 in South Carolina. Junes Sand was a native of the pott try districts of Staffordshire and liyed to be 140, his wife dying onlv twenty years his junior. Francis lions and Alexis Goldschmidt were both Frenchmen. .and.died aged respectively 121 and 142 yars. ilargaret Potter was a Scotch woman and lived to be 132; ltichurd Dyod was a Welshman, and only quitted his native bills for kingdom come when he was 133 years of age. James Hayley was brought up in the fresh wolds of Cheshire and died at the rips age of 112. while Agues Milbure attained the maturity of 116 amidthesmeke and fogs of London. It certainly does not look as if climate was the essential. Mny of these people, most ef them indeed, wer i" Pwor circumstances, oneor two of them being paupers. Yet itearjno he neediness that is the retjuisits, for the Countess Desmond attajned the age of 10. arid the last Marquis of Winchester was lOfl whs 11 I the made way for the next of km. It might be supjused that the long livers thfimsslves were able to impart the secret uf their enduring strength, yet such is not the case. ad for tvery icoraof old mn who opinion were sked there would lft s!ei'if recipes. re-cipes. Out would attribute it to being be-ing much bj tj open sir; another t aa extreme c$ulsKity in diet; another to moderate but-regular prentices of wine or Hhr stlfuulabtV. another to j his drinking nothing but water, and so j o. tlirou-jh the wboU? gairai f theory. I Thiv ;ae some, people vho believe jii following certain PJC'pts, .such m thov? that inculcate the kepiugof the sad cool and the fi warm, working touch and eating little sod a acore of - v others with which, the reader must surely be familiar, The fact of the matter is, longevity is largely constitutional, and the lymphatic lym-phatic constitution is that which ia the most favorable to living long. He whom nothing worries, for whom the affairs of tomorrow are 110 consequence, conse-quence, whose wants are solely those of the body, whose passions are subjective sub-jective and whose sympathies are dormant dor-mant such a inn as this will see many years m the land the Lord has given him. Unless there is something radically wrong with his functions. "Every man,' says an old writer 'is born with a eeruliu stock of vitality, vital-ity, which cannot be increased, but which mav be husbanded. With this stock he inay live fast or slow, extensively exten-sively or intensively may draw bis little amount over a large space or narrow it into a ontr acted one; but when this stock is exhausted Iwe has no more. He who lives extensively, diinks pure water, avoids InllammatiT ttis-eses, ttis-eses, exercises sufficiently but not too laboriously, indulges 00 exhausting passions, feeds on no exciting material', -pursues no debilitatietr pleasures, avoid nil laborious or protracted studies, stud-ies, preserves an easy mind, and thus husbands his. quantum of -vitality, will live considerably longer than he ao lives in the opposite way." This it all true enough, but who is there that follows such strictly drawn rules of guidance; and does not the question of temperament and constitution consti-tution cover all this? The easy-going machine cares nothing for your "exhausting "ex-hausting passions," debilitating pleasures" and ''protracted studies. We Americans live fast because it is our nature to live fast, and this great, bustling, money-getting, ipitentive, dominating race, could no more live slow, live by rule and measure, than it could adopt a principle without applying apply-ing it to practical purpose. Tha American Ameri-can people will never be a long-lived people, because it is aot in their teto perameat to take things easy and pt9 existences that are bounded by aolfisb ease. But while they do live they make themselves felt, and it is a moot question ques-tion alter all whether longevity is ao unmixed blessing. "The days, of or years are three-score years and ten ana if by reason of our strength ther re four score years, yet is their length but labor and serrow." Fklix AjiTONtUs. Puovo, Utah, Feb. 2, IStfl. |