The Secret of Good Health
“I wish, above all things, that thou mayest be in health as thy soul prospereth.” — John hi. 2.
There is a very strong connection between the health of the body and the health of the soul. One side of the connection is universally recognised; we all feel that the body has an influence on the mind. But we are less prone to recognise the other side — that the mind has an influence on the health of the body. Yet it is this latter connection that St. John specially emphasizes. He would seem to suggest that the larger number of our physical troubles have their root in something mental, just as the larger number of our mental troubles have their root in something physical. I believe he is right in this. I think that the majority of outward ailments originate in the thoughts.
How did you catch cold yesterday? “By standing in a draught,” you say. But you stood in the same draught the day before and got no hurt. “Ah, but,” you say, “I was predisposed to cold yesterday; before coming out I got a letter which chilled me.” There it is! the draught came not from the street corner, but from the anxious moment. There are times when we can pass through the fiery furnace, unharmed — it is in moments of mental enthusiasm. Men tell us that the dread of the pestilence exposes us to its contagion. Why? Because fear is the mind’s paralysis. You would be equally liable to that pestilence if you were in dread of a different one. If there is a cloud over the mind, it can rest on one valley as easily as on another. The dread of life is as liable to the pestilence as the dread of death. If I would pass scathless by, I must pass by on the uplands. I must be free, not from any special fear, but from fear itself.
Lord, let me take Thy prescription for perpetual youth! I desire to have the eye undimmed and the natural strength unabated;
2 bo Leaves jor Quiet Hours.
place me on Mount Nebo, show me the Promised Land! Often have I thought of Thy words, “Hast thou /aiV/i to be healed? “Human physicians would have said, “The body first and the mind afterwards.” Not so Thou. To Thee the root of the body’s cure is the spirit’s wing. Thou takest the invalid to the Mount before Thou healest him. Take me to the Mount, O Lord! I have long outward marches to make; how shall I prepare for them? Shall I practise the movement of the feet? Shall I inure myself to fatigue by long stretches of walking? Nay, that is not Thy method for me. Not by my walking, but by my flying, wilt Thou prepare me — not by the body’s labour, but by the spirit’s song. Thou art calling my soul to the hills, my heart to the home of the morning.. If my heart is on the hill, my feet will not slide in the valley; if my soul is in the song, my body will not bend to the dust. Give me the lark before the labour, the mount before the mire, the joy before the jostling, the wing before the winter, the clarion before the cloud! The secret of my health will be the prospering of my soul.