eat from it, if necessary; the children must always be in their best
bibs and tuckers and appear as Little Lord Fauntleroys; and no one,
at any time, or any circumstance, must ever appear to be dirty,
except the scavenger who comes to remove the accumulated debris of the
kitchen, and the man who occasionally assists the gardener.

These people forget that all dirt and dust is not of greater value
than spotless cleanliness. Let us look calmly at the problem for a few
minutes. Here is a housewife who cannot afford help to keep her house
as spotless as her instincts and her training desire. It is simply
impossible for her, personally, to go over the house daily with rag,
duster and dustpan. If she attempts it, as she does sometimes--she
overworks, and a breakdown is the result. What, then, is the sensible,
the reasonable, the only thing she should do? Sit down and "worry"
over her "untidy house"; lament that "the stairs have not been swept
since day before yesterday; that the parlor was not dusted this
morning; the music-room looks simply awful," and cry that "if Mrs.
Brown were to come in and see my wretchedly untidy house, I'm sure I
should die of shame!" Would this help matters? Would one speck of dirt
be removed as the result of the worry, the wailing, and the tears? Not
a speck. Every particle would remain just as before.

Yet other things would not be as they were before. No woman could feel
as I have suggested this "worriting creature" felt, without gendering
irritation in husband, children and friends. Is any house that was
ever built worth the alienation of dear ones? What is the dust, dirt,
disorder, of a really untidy house--I am supposing an extraordinary
case--compared with the irritation caused by a worrying housewife?

Furthermore: such a woman is almost sure to break down her own health
and become an irritable neurasthenic or hypochondriac, and thus add to
the burdens of those she loves.

There are women who, instead of following this course, make themselves
wretched--and everyone else around them--by the worry of contrasting
their lot with that of some one more fortunately situated than they.
_She_ has a husband who earns more money than does hers; such an one
has a larger allowance and can afford more help--the worry, however,
is the same, little matter what form it takes, and worry is the
destructive thing.

What, then, shall a woman do, who has to face the fact that she cannot
gratify her desire to keep her house immaculate, either because she
has not the strength to do it, or the money to hire it done. The old
proverb will help her: "What can't be cured must be endured." There
is wonderful help in the calm, full, direct recognition of unpleasant
facts. Look them squarely in the face. Don't dodge them, don't deny
them. Know them, understand them, then defy them to destroy your
happiness. If you can't dust your house daily, dust it thrice a week,
or twice, or once, and determine that you will be happy in spite of
the dust. The real comfort of the house need not thereby be impaired,
as there is a vast difference between your scrupulous cleanliness and
careless untidiness. Things may be in order even though the floor has
a little extra dust on, or the furniture has not been dusted for four
days.

"But," you say, "I am far less disturbed by the over work than I am by
the discomfort that comes from the dust." Then all I can say is that
you are wrongly balanced, according to my notion of things. Your
health should be of far more value to you than your ideas of house
tidiness, but you have reversed the importance of the two. Teach
yourself the relative value of things. A hundred dollar bill is of
greater value than one for five dollars, and the life of your baby
more important than the value of the hundred dollar bill. Put first
things first, and secondly, and tertiary, and quarternary things
in their relative positions. Your health and self-poise should come
first, the comfort and happiness of husband and family next, the more
or less spotlessness and tidiness of the house afterwards. Then, if
you cannot have your house as tidy as you wish, resolutely resolve
that you will not be disturbed. You will control your own life and not
allow a dusty room--be it never so dusty--to destroy your comfort and
peace of mind, and that of your loved ones.

When a woman of this worrying type has children she soon learns that
she must choose between the health and happiness of her children
and the gratification of her own passionate desire for spotless
cleanliness. This gratification, if permanently indulged in, soon
becomes a disease, for surely only a diseased mind can value the
spotlessness of a house more than the health, comfort, and happiness
of children. Yet many women do--more's the pity. Such poor creatures
should learn that there is a dirtiness that is far worse than dirt in
a house--a dirtiness, a muddiness of mind, a cluttering of thought, a
making of the mind a harboring place for wrong thoughts. Not wrong in
the sense of immoral or wicked, as these words are generally used, but
wrong in this sense, viz., that reason shows the folly, the inutility,
the impracticability of attempting to bring up sane, healthy, happy,
normal children in a household controlled by the idea that spotless
cleanliness is the matter of prime importance to be observed. The
discomfort of children, husband, mother herself are nothing as
compared with keeping the house in perfect order. Any woman so
obsessed should be sent for a short time to an insane asylum, for she
certainly has so reversed the proper order of values as to be so far
insane. She has "cluttered up" her mind with a wrong idea, an idea
which dirties, muddies, soils her mind far worse than dust soils her
house.

Reader, keep your mind free from such dirt--for dirt is but "matter in
the wrong place." Far better have dust, dirt, in your house, dirt on
your child's hands, face, and clothes, than on your own mind to give
you worry, discomfort and disease.




CHAPTER VI THE SELFISHNESS OF WORRY


If worry merely affected the one who worries it might be easier,
in many cases, to view worry with equanimity and calmness. But,
unfortunately, in the disagreeable features of life, far more than the
agreeable, the aphorism of the apostolic writer, "No man liveth unto
himself," seems to be more than ordinarily true. It is one proof of
the selfishness of the "worrier"--whether consciously or unconsciously
I do not say--that he never keeps his worry to himself. He must always
"out with it." The nervous mother worrying about her baby shows it
even to the unconscious child at her breast. When the child is older
she still shows it, until the little one knows as well as it knows
when the sun is shining that "mother is worrying again." The worrying
wife does not keep her worry to herself; she pours it out to, or upon,
her husband. The worrying husband is just the same. If it is the wife
that causes him to worry--or to think so--he pours out his worry
in turbulent words, thus adding fuel to a fire already too hot for
comfort.

It is one of the chief characteristics of worry that it is seldom
confined to the breast of its victim. It loses its power, too often,
when shut up. It must find expression in looks, in tone of voice, in
sulkiness, in dumps, in nagging or in a voicing of its woes.

It is in this voicing of itself that worry demonstrates its inherent
selfishness. If father, mother, wife, friends, neighbors, _anybody_
can give help, pleasure, joy, instruction, profit, their voices are
always heard with delight. If they have reasonable cautions to give
to those they love, who seem to them to be thoughtless, regardless of
danger which they see or fear, or even foolhardy, let them speak out
bravely, courageously, lovingly, and they will generally be listened
to. But to have them voice their fretful, painful, distressing worries
no one is benefitted, and both speaker and the one spoken to are
positively harmed. For an unnecessary fear voiced is strengthened; it
is made more real. If one did not feel it before, it is now planted in
his mind to his serious detriment, and once there, it begins to breed
as disease germs are said to breed, by millions, and one moment of
worry weds another moment, and the next moment a family of worries
is born that surround, hamper and bewilder. Is this kindly, is it
helpful, is it loving, is it unselfish?

The questions answer themselves. The planting of worry in the mind of
another is heartless, cruel, unkind and selfish.

Another question naturally arises: If this course of action is
selfish, and the worrier really desires to be unselfish, how can he
control his worry, at least so as not to communicate it to another?
The answer also is clear.

Let him put a guard upon his lips, a watch upon his actions. Let him
say to himself: Though I do not, for my own sake, care to control the
needless worries of my life, I must not, I dare not curse other lives
with them. Hence I must at least keep them to myself--I must not voice
them, I must not display them in face, eyes or tone.

Then there is the mother who worries over her child's clothing. She
is never ceasing in her cautions. It is "don't, don't, don't," from
morning to night, and whether this seems "nagging" to her or not,
there would be a unanimous vote on the subject were the child
consulted as to his feelings. Of course the boy, the girl, must be
taught to take care of his, her, clothes, but this is never done by
nagging. A far better plan would be to fit a punishment which really
belongs to the evil or careless habit of the child. For instance, if
a boy will persist in throwing his hat anywhere, instead of hanging
it up, let the parent give him _one_ caution, not in a threatening
or angry way, but in just as matter of fact a fashion as if she were
telling him of some news: "John, the next time you fail to hang your
hat in its proper place I shall lock it up for three days!"

Then, if John fails, take the hat and lock it up, and _let it
stay locked-up_, though the heavens fall. The same with a child's
playthings, tennis racquets, base-balls, bats, etc. As a rule one
application of the rule cures. This is immeasurably more sensible than
nagging, for it produces the required result almost instantly, and
there is little irritation to either person concerned, while nagging
is never effective, and irritates both all the time.

Other parents worry considerably over their children getting in the
dirt.

In an article which recently appeared in _Good Housekeeping_ Dr. Woods
Hutchinson says some sensible things on "Children as Cabbages." He
starts out by saying: "It is well to remember that not all dirt is
dirty. While some kinds of dirt are exceedingly dangerous, others are
absolutely necessary to life."

If your children get into the dirty and dangerous dirt, spend your
energies in getting them into the other kind of dirt, rather than in
nagging. Fall into the habit of doing the wise, the rational, the
sane thing, because it produces results, rather than the foolish,
irrational, insane thing which never produces a result save anger,
irritation, and oftentimes, alienation.

In a little book written by J.J. Bell, entitled _Wee MacGregor_, there
is a worrying mother. Fortunately she is sweet-spirited with it all,
or it would have been unbearable.

She and her husband John, and the baby, wee Jeannie, with Macgregor
were going out to dinner at "Aunt Purdie's," who was "rale genteel an'
awfu' easy offendit." The anxious mother was counselling her young son
regarding his behavior at the table of that excellent lady:

'An' mind, Macgreegor, ye're no' to be askin' fur jeely till
ye've ett twa bits o' breed-an'-butter. It's no' mainners; an'
yer Aunt Purdie's rale partecclar. An' yer no' to dicht yer
mooth wi' yer cuff--mind that. Ye're to tak' yer hanky an'
let on ye're jist gi'ein' yer nib a bit wipe. An' ye're no' to
scale yer tea nor sup the sugar if ony's left in yer cup when
ye're dune drinkin'. An' if ye drap yer piece on the floor
ye're no' to gang efter it; ye're jist to let on ye've ett it.
An' ye're no'--

'Deed, Lizzie,' interposed her husband, 'ye're the yin to
think aboot things.'

'Weel, John, if I dinna tell Macgreegor hoo to behave hissel',
he'll affront me,' etc., etc., etc.

Who has not thus seen the anxious mother? And who ever saw her
worrying and anxiety do much if any good? Train your child by all
means in your own home, but let up when you are going out, for your
worry worries him, makes him self-conscious, brings about the very
disasters you wish to avoid, and at the same time destroys his,
your, and everyone's else, pleasure who observes, feels, or hears the
expressions of worry.




CHAPTER VII

CAUSES OF WORRY


Worry is as multiform and as diverse as are the people who worry.
Indeed worriers are the most ingenious persons in the world. When
every possible source of worry seems to be removed, they proceed
immediately to invent some new cause which an ordinary healthful mind
could never have conceived.

The causes of worry are innumerable. They represent the sum total
of the errors, faults, missteps, unholy aims, ambitions, foibles,
weaknesses and crimes of men. Every error, mistake, weakness, crime,
etc., is a source of worry--a cause of worry. Worry is connected only
with the weak, the human, the evil side of human nature. It has no
place whatever in association with goodness, purity, holiness, faith,
courage and trust in God. When good men and women worry, in so far as
they worry they are not good. Their worry is a sign of weakness, of
lack of trust in God, of unbelief, of unfaithfulness. The man who
knows God and his relationship to man; who knows his own spiritual
nature and his relationship to God _never worries_. There is no
possible place in such a man's life for worry.

Hence it will be seen that I believe worry to be evil, and nothing but
evil, and, therefore, without one reclaiming or redeeming feature, for
it can be productive of nothing but evil.

If you really desire to know the sources of your worry _study each
worry as it comes up_. Analyse it, dissect it, weigh it, examine it
from every standpoint, judge it by the one test that everything in
life must, and ought to submit to, viz.: its usefulness. What use
is it to you? How necessary to your existence? How helpful is it in
solving the problems that confront you; how far does it aid you in
their solution, wherein does it remove the obstacles before your
pathway. Find out how much it strengthens, invigorates, inspires you.
Ask yourself how much it encourages, enheartens, emboldens you. Put
down on paper every slightest item of good, or help, or inspiration
it is to you, and on the other hand, the harm, the discouragement, the
evil, the fears it brings to you, and then strike a balance.

I can tell you beforehand that after ten years' study--if so long were
necessary--you will fail to find one good thing in favor of worry,
and that every item you will enumerate will be against it. Hence, why
worry? Quit it!

Worry, like all evils, feeds on itself, and grows greater by its own
exercise. Did it decline when exercised, diminish when allowed a free
course, one might let it alone, even encourage it, in order that it
might the sooner be dead. But, unfortunately, it works the other
way. The more one worries the more he continues to worry. The more
he yields to it the greater becomes its power. It is a species of
hypnotism: once allow it to control, each new exercise diminishes the
victim's power of resistance.

Never was monster more cruel, more relentless, more certain to hang on
to the bitter end than worry. He shows no mercy, has not the slightest
spark of relenting or yielding. And his power is all the greater
because it is so subtle. He wants you to be "careful"--taking good
care, however, not to let you know that he means to make you _full of
care_. He pleads "love" as the cause for his existence. He would have
you love your child, hence "worry" about him. He thus trades on your
affection to blind you to your child's best interests by "worrying"
about him. For when worry besets you, is harassing you on every hand,
how can you possibly devote your wisdom, your highest intelligence to
safeguarding the welfare of the one you love.

Never was a slave in the South, though in the hands of a Legree,
more to be pitied than the slave of worry. He dogs every footstep, is
vigilant every moment. He never sleeps, never tires, never relaxes,
never releases his hold so long as it is possible for him to retain
it. When you seek to awaken people to the terror, the danger, the
hourly harm their slavery to worry is bringing to them, they are so
completely in worry's power that they weakly respond: "But I can't
help it." And they verily believe they can't; that their bondage is
a natural thing; a state "ordained from the foundation of the world,"
altogether ignoring the frightful reflection such a belief is upon the
goodness of God and his fatherly care for his children. Natural! It is
the most unnatural thing in existence. Do the birds worry? The beasts
of the field? The clouds? The winds? The sun, moon, stars, and comets?
The trees? The flowers? The rain-drops? How Bryant rebukes the worrier
in his wonderful poem "_To a Water Fowl_," and Celia Thaxter in her
"_Sandpiper_." The former sings of the fowl winging its solitary way
where "rocking billows rise and sink on the chafed ocean-side," yet
though "lone wandering" it is not lost. And from its protection he
deduces the lesson:

He who, from zone to zone,
Guides through the boundless sky thy certain flight,
In the long way that I must tread alone
Will lead my steps aright.

And so Celia Thaxter sang of the sandpiper:

He has no thought of any wrong,
He scans me with a fearless eye.

And her faith expressed itself in a later verse:

I do not fear for thee, though wroth
The tempest rushes through the sky:
For are we not God's children both,
Thou, little sandpiper, and I?

There is no worry in Nature. It is man alone that worries. Nature goes
on her appointed way each day unperturbed, unvexed, care-free, doing
her allotted tasks and resting absolutely in the almighty sustaining
power behind her. Should man do any less? Should man--the reasoning
creature, with intelligence to see, weigh, judge, appreciate,--alone
be uncertain of the fatherly goodness of God; alone be unable to
discern the wisdom and love behind all things? Worry, therefore, is an
evidence that we do not trust the all-fatherliness of God.

It is also the direct product of vanity, pride and self-conceit. If
these three qualities of evil in the human heart could be removed a
vast aggregate amount of worry would die instantly. No one can study
his fellow creatures and not soon learn that an immense amount of
worry is caused by these three evils.

We are worried lest our claims to attention are not fully recognized,
less our worth be not observed, our proper station accorded to us. How
we press our paltry little claims upon others, how we glorify our own
insignificant deeds; how large loom up our small and puny acts. The
whole universe centers in us; our ego is a most important thing;
our work of the highest value and significance; our worth most
inestimable.

The fact of the matter is most men and women are inestimable, their
deeds of value, their lives of importance. Our particular circle needs
us, as we need those who compose it, we are all important, but few,
indeed, are there, whose power, influence and importance reach far.
Most of the men and women of the world are ordinary. A man may be
a king in Wall street, and yet influence but few outside of his own
immediate sphere. Most probably he is unknown to the great mass of
mankind. Adventitious circumstances bring some men and women more
prominently before the world than others, but even such fame as this
is transient, evanescent, and of little importance. The devoted love
of our own small circle; the reliable friendship of the few; the
blind adoration of the pet dog are worth more than all the "fame," the
"eclat," the "renown" of the multitude. And where we have such love,
friendship, and blind adoration, let us rest content therein, and
smile at the floods of temporary and evanescent emotion which sweep
over the mob, but do not have us for their object. I have just read
a letter which perfectly illustrates how our vanity, our pride, and
personal importance bring much worry to us. The writer--practically
a stranger coming from a far-away state--evidently expected to be
received with a cordial welcome and open arms, by one who scarcely
knew him, given an important place in a lengthy program where men
of national reputation were to speak, and generally be treated with
deference and respect. Unfortunately his name was not placed _in
full_ on the program,--curtly initialed he called it--and owing to
its length "the chairman caused me to spoil my remarks by asking me to
shorten them," and a hotel clerk "outrageously insulted" him when he
asked for information. Then, to make ill matters worse--piling Ossa.
upon Pelion--he was asked to speak at a certain club, with others.
One of the newspapers, in reporting the event, commented upon what the
others said and did but ignore him. This he thought might have been
merely an oversight, but when, the next day, he saw another report
wherein he was not mentioned he was certain "it was a deliberate
intention to ignore" him. He then asks that the person to whom he
writes "try to find out who is responsible for this affront," and tell
him--in order that he may worry some more, I suppose, over trying to
"get back at him."

Poor, poor fellow, how he is to be pitied for being so "sensitive," so
sure that people regard him enough to want to affront him.

Here is a perfect illustration of the worries caused by vanity;
five complaints in one letter, of indignities, or affronts, that an
ordinary, robust red-blooded man would have passed by without notice.
If I were to worry over the times I have been ignored and neglected
I should worry every day. I am fairly well known to many hundreds of
thousands of people who read my books, my magazine articles, and hear
my lectures, yet I often go to cities and there are no brass bands,
no committee, flowers, or banquet to welcome me. No! indeed, the
indignity is thrust upon me of having to walk to the hotel, carry
my own grip, and register, the same as any other ordinary, common,
everyday man! Why should not my blood boil when I think of it? Then,
too, when I recall how often my addresses are ignored in the local
press, ought not I to be aroused to fierce ire? When a hotel clerk
fails to recognize my national importance and gives me a flippant
answer when I ask for information should I not deem it time that the
Secretary of State interfere and write a State paper upon the matter?

Oh vanity, conceit, pride, how many sleepless hours of worry and fret
you bring to your victims, and the pitiable, the lamentable thing
about it all is that they congratulate themselves upon being filled
with "laudable pride," "recognizing their own importance," and
knowing that "honorable ambition" is beneficial. Nothing that causes
unnecessary heart-aches and worry is worth while, and of all the
prolific causes of these woes commend me to the vanity, the conceit,
the pride of small minds and petty natures.

False pride leads its victim to want to make a false impression. He
puts on a false appearance. He wishes to appear wiser, better, in
easier circumstances, richer than he is. He wears a false front. He is
unnatural. He dare not--having decided to make the appearance, and win
the impression of falseness--be natural. Hence he is self-conscious
all the time lest he make a slip, contradict himself, lose the result
he is seeking to attain. He is to be compared to an actor whose part
requires him to wear a wig, a false moustache, a false chin. In the
hurry of preparation these shams are not adjusted properly and the
actor rushes on the stage fearful every moment lest his wig is
awry, his moustache fall off, or the chin slip aside and make him
ridiculous. He dare not stop to make sure, to "fix" them if they are
wrong, as that would reveal their falsity immediately. He can only
play on, sweating blood the while.

In the case of the actor one can laugh at the temporary fear and
worry, but what a truly pitiable object is the man, the woman, whose
whole life is one dread worry lest his, her, false appearance be
discovered. And while pride and vanity are not the only sources of
these attempts to make false impressions upon others they are a most
prolific source. In another chapter I have treated more fully of this
phase of the subject.

Wastefulness, extravagance, is a prolific source of worry. Spend
to-day, starve to-morrow. Throw your money to the birds to-day;
to-morrow the crow, jay, and vulture will laugh and mock at you. Feast
to-day; next week you may starve. Riches take to themselves wings
and fly away. No one is absolutely safe, and while many thousands
go through life indifferent about their expenditures, wasteful and
extravagant and do not seem to be brought to time therefor, it must
not be forgotten that tens of thousands start out to do the same thing
and fail. What is the result? Worry over the folly of the attempt;
worry as to where the necessary things for the future are coming from!

While I would not have the well-to-do feel that they must be niggardly
I would earnestly warn them against extravagance, against the
acquiring of expensive habits of wastefulness that later on may be
chains of a cruel bondage. Why forge fetters upon oneself? Far better
be free now and thus cultivate freedom for whatever future may come.
For as sure as sure can be wilful waste and reckless extravagance now
will sometime or other produce worry.

One great, deep, awful source of worry is _our failure to accept the
inevitable_. Something happens,--we wilfully shut our eyes to the fact
that this something has changed _forever_ the current of our lives,
and if the new current _seems_ evil, if it brings discomfort,
separation, change of circumstance, etc., we worry, and worry, and
continue to worry. This is lamentably foolish, utterly absurd and
altogether reprehensible. Let us resolutely face the facts, accept
them, and then reshape our lives, bravely and valiantly, to suit the
new conditions.

For instance a friend of mine spent twenty years in the employ of a
great corporation. As a reward of faithful service he was finally put
in a responsible position as the head of a department. A few months
ago he was sent East on a special mission connected with his work.
Just before his return the corporation elected a new president,
who "shook up" the whole concern, changed around several officials,
dismissed others, and in the case of my friend, supplanted him by a
new man imported from the East, offering him a subordinate position,
but, at the same salary he had before been receiving.

How should this man have treated this settled fixed fact in his
life? He had two great broad pathways open to him. In one he would
deliberately recognize and accept the changed condition, acquiese in
it and live accordingly. It is not pleasant to be supplanted, but if
another man is appointed to do the work you have been doing, and your
superiors think he can do it better than you have been doing it, then
manfully face the facts and accord him the most sincere and hearty
support. It may be hard, but our training and discipline,--which means
our improvement and advancement--come, not from doing the easy and
pleasant things, but from striving, cheerfully and pleasantly to do
the arduous and disagreeable ones. The other way open for my friend
was to resent the change, accept it with anger, let his vanity be
wounded, and begin to worry over it. What would have been the probable
result? The moment he began to worry his efficiency would have
decreased, and he would thus have prepared himself for another "blow"
from his employers, another change less to his advantage, and with a
possible reduction in salary. His employers, too, would have pointed
to his decreased efficiency--the only thing they consider--as
justification for their act.

I would not say that if a man, in such a case as I have described,
deems that he has been treated unjustly, should not protest, but, when
he has protested, and a decision has been rendered against him let him
accept the judgment with serenity, refuse to worry over it, and go to
work with loyalty and faithfulness, or else seek new employment.

Even, on the other hand, were he to have been discharged, there could
have come no good from yielding to worry. _Accept the inevitable_, do
not argue or fret about it, put worry aside, go to work to find a new
position, and make what seemed to be an evil the stepping-stone to
something better.

Mrs. Jessie Benton Fremont, the wife of the gallant pathfinder,
General Fremont, was afflicted with deafness in the later years of her
life. She,--the petted and flattered, the caressed and spoiled child
of fortune, the honored and respected woman of power and superior
ability--deaf, and unable to participate in the conversation going
on around her. Many a woman under these conditions, would have become
irritable, irascible, and a reviler of Fate. To any woman it would
have been a great deprivation, but to one mentally endowed as Mrs.
Fremont, it was especially severe. Yet did she "worry" about it? No!
bravely, cheerfully, boldly, she _accepted the inevitable_, and
in effect defied the deafness that had come to her to destroy her
happiness, embitter her life, take away the serenity of her mind and
the equipoise of her soul. If there had to be a battle to gain this
high plane of acceptance, she fought it out in secret, for her friends
and the world never heard a word of a murmur from her. I had the joy
of a talk with her about it, for it was a joy to have her make light
of her affliction, in the great number of good things wherein God
had blessed her. Laughingly she said: "Even in deafness I find many
compensations. One is never bored by conversation that is neither
intelligent, instructive or interesting. I can go to sleep under the
most persistent flood of boredom, and like the proverbial water on a
duck's back it never bothers me. Again, I never hear the unpleasant
things said about either my friends or my enemies, and what a blessing
that is. I am also spared hearing about many of the evils, the
disagreeable, the unpleasant and horrible things of life that I cannot
change, help, or alleviate, and I am thankful for my ignorance.
Then, again, when people say things that I can and do hear--in my
trumpet--that I don't think anyone should ever say, I can rebuke them
by making them think that I heard them say the very opposite of what
they did say, and I smile upon them 'and am a villain still.'"

Charles F. Lummis, the well-known litterateur and organizer of the
South-West Museum, of Los Angeles, after using his eyes and brain more
liberally than most men do in a lifetime thrice, or four times as long
as his, was unfortunately struck blind. Did he "worry" over it, and
fret himself into a worse condition? No! not for a moment. Cheerfully
he accepted the inevitable, got someone to read and write for him, to
guide him through the streets, and went ahead with his work just as
if nothing had happened, looking forward to the time when his eyesight
would be restored to him and hopefully and intelligently worked to
that end. In a year or so he and his friends were made happy by that
coming to pass, but even had it not been so, I am assured Dr. Lummis
would have faced the inevitable without a whimper, a cry, or a word of
worry or complaint.

Those who yield to worry over small physical ills should read his
inspiring _My Friend Will_,[A] a personal record of his sucessful
struggle against two severe and prostrating attacks of paralysis. One
perusal will show them the folly and futility of worry; a second will
shame them because they have so little self-control as to spend their
time, strength, and energy in worry; and a third perusal will lead
them to drive every fragment of worry out of the hidden recesses
of their minds and set them upon a better way--a way of serenity,
equipoise, and healthful, strenuous, yet joyous and radiant living.

[Footnote A:_My Friend Will_, by C.F. Lummis, A.C. McClurg Co.,
Chicago.]

Recently I had a conversation with the former superintendent of a poor
farm, which bears upon this subject in a practical way. In relating
some of his experiences he told of a "rough-neck"--a term implying
an ignorant man of rude, turbulent, quarrelsome disposition--who
had threatened to kill the foreman of the farm. Owing to their
irreconcilable differences the rough inmate decided to leave and so
informed the superintendent, thus practically dismissing himself from
the institution. A year later he returned and asked to be re-admitted.
After a survey of the whole situation the superintendent decided that
it was not wise to re-admit him, and that he would better secure
a situation for him outside. He offered to do so and the man left
apparently satisfied. Three days later he reappeared, entered the
office with a loaded and cocked revolver held behind his back, and
abruptly announced: "I've come to blow out your brains." Before he
could shoot the superintendent was upon him and a fierce struggle
ensued for the possession of the weapon. The superintendent at last
took it away, secured help and handcuffed the would-be murderer.
Realizing that his act was the result of at least partial insanity,
the was-to-be victim did not press the charge of murderous assault but
allowed--indeed urged that he be sent to the insane asylum where he
now is.

Now this is the point I wish to make. It is perfectly within the
bounds of possibility that this man will some day be regarded as
safely sane. Yet it is well known by the awful experiences of many
such cases that it is both possible and probable that during the
months or years of his incarceration he will continue to harbor, even
to feed and foster the bitter feeling, the hatred, perhaps, that
led him to attempt the murder of the superintendent, and that on his
release he will again attempt to carry out his nefarious and awful
design.

What, then, should be the mental attitude of the superintendent and
his family? Ought they not to be worried? I got the answer for my
readers from this man, and it is so perfectly in accord with my own
principles that I find great pleasure in recording it. Said he:

Don't think for one moment that I minimize the possible
danger. The asylum physician who was familiar with the whole
circumstances warned me not to rest in fancied security. I
have notified the proper officials that the man who attempted
to murder me is not to be released either as cured or on
parole without giving me sufficient notice. I do not wish that
he should be kept in the asylum a single day longer than is
fully necessary, but before I allow him to be released I must
be thoroughly satisfied that he has no murderous designs on
me, and that he is truly and satisfactorily repentant for
the attack he made when, ostensibly, he was mentally
irresponsible. I shall require that he be put on record
as fully understanding and appreciating his own personal
responsibility for my safety--so that should he still hold any
wrongful designs, and afterwards succeed in carrying them
out, he or his attorneys will be debarred from again pleading
insanity or mental incompetency.

Hence while I fully realize the possibility of danger I do not
have a moment's worry about it. I have done and shall do all I
can, satisfactorily, to protect myself, without any feeling of
harshness or desire to injure the poor fellow, and there I let
the matter rest to take care of itself.

This is practical wisdom. This is sane philosophy. Not ignoring the
danger, pooh-pooing it, scoffing at it and refusing to recognize
it, but calmly, sanely, with a kindly heart looking at possible
contingencies, preparing for them, and then serenely trusting to the
spiritual forces of life to control events to a wise and satisfactory
issue.

Can you suggest anything better? Is not such a course immeasurably
better than to allow himself to worry, and fret and fear all the time?
Practical precaution, _taken without enmity_--note these italicized
words--trustful serenity, faithful performance of present duty
unhampered by fears and worries--this is the rational, normal,
philosophic, sane course to follow.

Another great source of worry is _our failure to distinguish
essentials from non-essentials_. What are the essentials for life? For
a man, honesty, truth, earnestness, strength, health, ability to work,
and work to do. He may or may not be handsome; he may or may not have
wealth, position, fame, education; but to be a man among men, these
other things he must have. For a woman,--health, love, work, and such
virtues as both men and women need. She might enjoy friends, but they
are not essential as health or work; she would be a strange woman
if she did not prize beauty, but devoted love is worth far more than
beauty or all the conquests it brings. What is the essential for
a chair?--its capacity to be used to sit upon with comfort. A
house?--that it is adapted to the making of a home. You don't buy a
printing-press to curl your hair with but to print, and in accordance
with its printing power is it judged. A boat's usefulness is
determined by its worthiness in the water, to carry safely, rapidly,
largely as is demanded of it.

This is the judgement sanity demands of everything. What is
essential--What not? Is it essential to be a society leader, to
belong to every club, to hold office, to give as many dinners as one's
neighbors, to have a bigger house, furniture with brighter polish,
bigger carvings and more ugly designs than anyone else in town,
to have our names in the papers oftener than others, to have more
servants, a newer style automobile, put on more show, pomp, ceremony
and circumstance than our friends?

By no means! Oh for men and women who have the discerning power--the
sight for the essential things, the determination to have them and
let non-essentials go. They are the wise ones, the happy ones, the
free-from-worry ones.

Later I shall refer extensively to Mrs. Canfield's book _The Squirrel
Cage_. She has many wise utterances on this phase of the worry
question. For instance, in referring to the mad race for wealth and
position that keeps a man away from home so many hours of the day
that his wife and child scarce know him she introduces the following
dialogue:

One of them whose house isn't far from mine, told me that he
hadn't seen his children, except asleep, for three weeks.

'But something ought to be done about it!' The girl's
deep-lying instinct for instant reparation rose up hotly.

'Are they so much worse off than most American business men?'
queried Rankin. 'Do any of them feel they can take the time
to see much more than the outside of their children; and isn't
seeing them asleep about as--'

Lydia cut him short quickly. 'You're always blaming them for
that,' she cried. 'You ought to pity them. They can't help it.
It's better for the children to have bread and butter, isn't
it--'

Rankin shook his head. 'I can't be fooled with that sort of
talk--I've lived with too many kinds of people. At least half
the time it is not a question of bread and butter. It's a
question of giving the children bread and butter and sugar
rather than bread and butter and father. Of course, I'm a
fanatic on the subject. I'd rather leave off even the butter
than the father--let alone the sugar.'