o the
young, since they, alas, are the only ones to be benefited by such
advice.

_As you value your happiness materially, and as you desire a healthy old
age and a long life, inform yourselves as to the few simple laws that
govern human existence, and attempt so far as lies in your power to
follow them. If you do not do this, disaster will follow as surely as the
night follows the day._

_Apathy of the Public as to Hygiene._--As a partial consequence,
probably, of all the reasons mentioned, along with others, there exists
in the popular mind a curious apathy concerning hygienic matters--an
apathy so great that it is scarcely possible to get the average man to
discuss, much less to put in practice the all-important laws that govern
health. As a result of the work of the various State boards of health and
of the Public Health and Marine Hospital Service, this condition of
affairs happily shows some signs of abatement, and we certainly have
reasons to believe that the future promises great things along these
lines. No sign of this change is more significant than the awakening of
the press of the country to the vast importance of instructing the public
in health matters, and their changed attitude toward the charlatans and
quacks who live by promising the impossible. Largely subsidized by the
infamous vendors of patent medicine, our newspapers and magazines still
lend their columns to these human vampires who prey pre-eminently on the
ignorance and credulity of the hopelessly-diseased poor; but within
recent years some of our foremost journals show signs of an awakening of
conscience, and a very few have even gone so far as to exclude
advertisements of this character altogether.

It has been said, certainly with more or less truth, that we are
creatures of our surroundings, but whether we accept this in its broadest
sense or not, there can be no question that our well being is most
intimately connected with those things with which we come into every day
contact. _Nothing is more important for us to recognize than that our
diseases are contracted from neighboring subjects just in proportion as
we are closely associated with them._ From our fellowmen we contract, as
everyone knows, a large number of diseases, either by direct contact or
by means of the air that surrounds us. From the earth we get hook-worms
and other animal parasites, either by coming directly in contact with it
or through eating uncooked fruits and veget