personal temptation in the way of pain,--from
the dentist's chair to the most severe suffering, or the most painful
operation,--and each can apply for himself the better way of bearing
it. And it is not perhaps out of place here to speak of the taking of
ether or any anaesthetic before an operation. The power of relaxing to
the process easily and quietly brings a quicker and pleasanter effect
with less disagreeable results. One must take ether easily in mind and
body. It a man forces himself to be quiet externally, and is frightened
and excited mentally, as soon as he has become unconscious enough to
lose control of his voluntary muscles, the impression of fright made
upon the brain asserts itself, and he struggles and resists in
proportion.

These same principles of repose should be applied in illness when it
comes in other forms than that of pain. We can easily increase whatever
illness may attack us by the nervous strain which comes from fright,
anxiety, or annoyance. I have seen a woman retain a severe cold for
days more than was necessary, simply because of the chronic state of
strain she kept herself in by fretting about it; and in another
unpleasantly amusing case the sufferer's constantly expressed annoyance
took the form of working almost without intermission to find remedies
for herself. Without using patience enough to wait for the result of
one remedy, she would rush to another until she became--so to
speak--twisted and snarled in the meshes of a cold which it took weeks
thoroughly to cure. This is not uncommon, and not confined merely to a
cold in the head.

We can increase the suffering of friends through "sympathy" given in
the same mistaken way by which we increase our own pain, or keep
ourselves longer than necessary in an uncomfortable illness.

IX.

NERVOUS STRAIN IN THE EMOTIONS

THE most intense suffering which follows a misuse of the nervous power
comes from exaggerated, unnecessary, or sham emotions. We each have our
own emotional microscope, and the strength of its lens increases in
proportion to the supersensitiveness of our nervous system. If we are a
little tired, an emotion which in itself might hardly be noticed, so
slight is the cause and so small the result, will be magnified many
times. If we are very tired, the magnifying process goes on until often
we have made ourselves ill through various sufferings, all of our own
manufacture.

This increase of emotion has not always