lose the labour of a lifetime. This makes sad havoc, however bravely we may seem to bear it; and year by year it makes inroads upon our powers of resistance, and undermines our health. You may have seen stout planks cut through, baring to the light colonies of little insects which have been steadily but surely eating away its strength; so it is with us. Many of us seem capable, except to the experienced eye of the physician, of bearing a great deal; but, at a certain period, when the anxiety is most intense, an unexpected loss comes, or a remittance we had fully relied upon to help us fails us, and we give way. How few suspect the large number who walk about seemingly in good health, but in this precarious condition, each bearing within a hidden something which, like the insect of the wood, is undermining their strength, and so, when any unexpected or heavy trouble comes, sink under it!

Success, in the majority of cases, is not worth the price paid for because men want too much of it. As a rule, the men who succeed love to give up their entire life to labour in mastering

thereof, and thereby lose all capabilities for recreation and contemplation, and all true when it comes at last, as the faculties of are apt to-nay, must-from want of use, e; and the successful man, with much to retire to; for literature, science, domestiropic interests-nature itself, with its exts perennial refreshment-have been lost ruggle, and these are treasures the key to and friends that, once slighted, cannot be whistled back au we sacrifice life to a living, and lay the foundation of a sad and dreary old age. The excuse is that this excess of toil is unavoidable-that you must keep the pace, or fall behind, and be trampled down by competitors who are more ambitious, or less inclined to measure and appraise the objects and the worth of life; and that, in a civilization like ours, moderation is forbidden to those who would succeed at all, or not actually fail. I fear it is so, and this is my reason for giving health the most prominent position in this work on Business, as, if we must work over-hard, we must work with greater caution and more thoughtful arrangements, so as not to have to work so long, and be prepared by economy to yield the place to younger and needier aspirants as soon as possible. Daily experience must convince every observant man that excess is enforced; moderation, which to the wiser Greeks seemed the essence of wisdom, is forbidden, for even to those endowed with the right natural capacity for their vocation, if ambitiously disposed and without capital or

friends, incessant application and severity of toil are so absolutely essential that such men, to win the prizes of life, need exceptional physique. Physical and cerebral toughness are the prime requisites.

This high pressure, this ceaseless wear and severity of toil, leaves the work of life, and assigns its prizes more and more to men of exceptional physique, the peculiarly healthy, the specially strong, the abnormally tough-those whose rare frames and constitutions. are fitted to endure the unnatural and injudicious strain under which the average man succumbs. In short, the race of life is so rapid, the struggle of life so stern, the work of life so hard, that exceptional organizations seem essential everywhere to great achievements, or anything beyond merely getting a living. The moderately endowed, the steady, fair, average men, the medium in all things, in wealth, in brains, in health and strength, are "nowhere" in the strife; the slow moving, the tardy developing, who fifty years ago might have attained a decent position and secured a decent competence, bid fair to be elbowed out of their careers; while the prospect before the dull and the dunces, who are seldom in the minority, is growing deplorable indeed.

The vitality of a nation rests with, and depends upon, the conduct of its individuals: the people now living are moulding the vitalities of those who have to follow them. If health be properly taken care of, death would not arrive until its appointed time, when it would cause no terror and inflict no pain. Proper rest, keeping from excitement and anxiety, thereby enabling you to bear annoyance with serenity, avoiding excess in eating or drinking, understanding your bodies, and treating them with the same attention as a good groom does a horse, will enable you to live longer than your fellows. According to the statistics of M. Legoyt, the vitality of the Jews exceeds that of the Teutonic and Celtic people amongst whom they live; the necessities of their persecuted career having made them more chaste, more attached to home, more tender to the feeble, more careful of to-morrow, and more careful of themselves than other people are. Poverty often tends to length of life, whereas luxury shortens life, unless accompanied by true ease of mind and body. Vitality has influences existing independently in ourselves, but manifested through our organic parts. There can be no doubt, by reason of ignorance and folly, we sacrifice two-thirds of the capital of vitality which is given us this is proved by those cases of human families, themselves by no means perfect, which by care have conserved and increased their vitality; whilst others, with splendid organisms, by trying to defy nature, and by a perversion of their free will, take from themselves, their children, and their children's children that capacity for vitality which naturally belonged to them.

FOOD.

Food

"Let the student honour his food, and eat it without contempt. eaten with constant respect gives muscular force and generative power; but, eaten irreverently, destroys both. Excessive eating is prejudicial to health and virtue."-Hindu.

"Nor is it left arbitrary, at the will and pleasure of every man, to do as he list; after the dictates of a depraved humour and extravagant phancy, to live at what rate he pleaseth: but every one is bound to observe the injunctions and laws of nature, upon the penalty of forfeiting their health, strength, and liberty, -the true and long enjoyment of themselves."-MAINWAYRINGE.

Ir is an anxious question with many, "What to eat, drink, and avoid." It is said that" at forty every man is either a physician or a fool," but, properly trained, every one at " fourteen" should know his constitutional peculiarities, and what food is adapted for or disagrees with him; every one should himself be the best judge of what seems adapted for his constitution, and best calculated to give him the power, mentally or physically, that he requires. If a certain diet or drink suits you, take it, let the physician or theorist say what he may. As the due nourishment of the body cannot be delayed without danger to health and life, the Creator, with that beneficence which distinguishes all His works, has been most lavish in the variety of eatables and drinkables, adapted for every constitution and stomach. And to compel attention when nourishment is necessary, we have the sensations of hunger and thirst, our appetites acting as watchful monitors to enforce attention to the wants of the system; and the feeling of hunger is one not easy to resist. Without this instinct "to eat," we should die. Other motives, as it is, prevent our taking food at proper intervals; but if wise, we should recognize the importance of nourishing our body by a supply of food in proportion to its wants. It is a great blessing not to know you have a stomach; this you will secure if you exercise selfdenial, and abstain from anything that disagrees with you, and take in moderation what gives you pleasure and supplies the nourishment necessary to repair the waste your daily duties make upon your system.

All organized bodies are nourished by the introduction into their internal structures of materials from without. Such materials are called aliments, or food, and are fitted to supply and maintain the

fluid and solid matter of the body. For this purpose, they must either be soluble naturally, or capable of being dissolved by the digestive principle of the stomach. However diversified the articles may be in external appearance or chemical composition, they are reduced by the action of the organs of digestion into a fluid (chyle) of homogeneous character, which is reconverted into solids and fluids of different natures by the influence of the powers of assimilation. In animals and vegetables we can observe the phenomena of decomposition and reproduction, and analyze distinctly the substances that administer to their growth and repair. Man derives his food from both the vegetable and animal kingdoms, but the animals which are consumed by man derive their nourishment from the vegetable kingdom; so that plants are the true source of all the food both of man and the lower animals. In reality, we are all vegetarians; but the Creator, in His wisdom, has created animals, who, no doubt, enjoy their existence, and are useful to man in preparing for him a part of his food, from which he derives nourishment quicker than if he had to live entirely upon vegetables. The mixed diet is better adapted, alike for his teeth, digestive organs, and stomach; and the wise man will nourish his body by partaking of the varied animal and vegetable substances the Creator has supplied for his enjoyment. Climate, custom, religion, give rise to an innumerable diversity of food and drink,-from the repast of the cannibal savage to that of the Parisian epicure; from the diet of the carnivorous native of the North to that of the Brahmin, whose appetite is satisfied with vegetables; from the oak-bark bread of the Norwegian peasant to the luxuriously served table of a Hungarian magnate at Vienna; from the bread and cheese and beer of our working class to the sumptuous extravagance of the dinner-table of our aristocracy. Some nations abhor what others relish, and great want often renders acceptable what, under other circumstances, would have excited the greatest disgust. The aliments, or articles of food, of different countries, vary with the climate, and exert a great influence on the different races. The food taken influences the health, and even the character, of man. He is fitted to derive nourishment both from animal and vegetable food, but can live exclusively on either. Natives of the North incline to animal, those of the South to vegetable food. Animal food most readily augments the solid parts of the blood, the fibrin, and therefore the strength of the muscular system; but, without exercise, it disposes the body to inflammatory, putrid, and scorbutic diseases, and the character to violence and coarseness. Vegetable food renders the blood lighter and more liquid, but forms weak fibres, and disposes the system to the diseases which spring from feebleness, and tends

to produce a weak, inoffensive, gentle character. All kinds of aliment must contain nutritious substance, which, being extracted by the act of digestion, enters the blood, and effects by assimilation the repairs of the body. Alimentary matter, therefore, must be similar to animal substance, or transmutable into such. In this respect alimentary substances differ from medicines, because the latter retain their peculiar qualities in spite of the organs of digestion, but act as foreign substances, serving to excite the activity of particular organs or systems of the body. All alimentary substances must, therefore, be composed, in a greater or less degree, of soluble parts, which easily lose their peculiar qualities in the process of digestion, and correspond to the elements of the body. These substances, in their simple state, are mucilage, gelatine, gluten, albumen, farina, fibrin, and saccharine matter. Of these, vegetables contain principally mucilage, saccharine matter, and farina, which latter substance, particularly in connection with the vegetable gluten, by which both become fit for fermentation, and thus for dissolution and digestion, is the basis of very nutritious food. The nutritious parts of fruits consist of their saccharine matter, and a little mucilage. In animal food gelatine is particularly abundant. The nutritiousness of the different species of food and drink depends, therefore, upon the proportions which they contain of these substances, and the mode in which they are converted, favouring or obstructing their dissolution. Organs of digestion, in a healthy state, dissolve alimentary substances more easily, and take up the nutritious portions more abundantly, than those of which the strength has been impaired, so that they cannot resist the tendency of each substance to its peculiar chemical decomposition. The wholesome or unwholesome character of any aliment depends, therefore, in a great measure, on the state of the digestive organs in any given case. The food is good or wholesome according as it is in harmony with the strength of the organ that has to digest it. For instance, food abounding in fat is said to be unwholesome, because fat resists the operation of the gastric juice; still, there are lots of people that can eat fat, enjoy it, and derive benefit from it. That food is the most wholesome which is suited to the digestive powers of the individual-food that is easily dissolved; but in order to render food perfect, the nutritious parts must be mixed up with a certain quantity of other substances affording no nourishment, but which fill up the stomach, because people are too apt to injure their health by taking too much nutritious food; and the nutritious parts of food which cannot be dissolved act precisely like food which is in itself indigestible. Stewed and boiled meats are much more difficult to digest than roast meat. A great deal