mself and others. But work, like everything else, should be limited.
Many cannot do this, and overtax both their physical and intellectual
energies. The employment of labour should be regulated by the
capabilities of the working-classes, not by the economy or profits to be
obtained by extra labour; and legislation, if paternal, as it should be,
ought to protect the toiler in all instances--not in the few in which
it attempts to ameliorate his condition. So with every pursuit or
avocation, the leisure essential to health and happiness is too often
sacrificed to cupidity, and when this is the case there can be no
longevity.

Exercise is beneficial to man; but it should not be taken in excess, or
in too trying a form. It is very questionable if what are called
"Athletic Sports" are not too often as hurtful as they are beneficial.
It is quite certain that they cannot be indulged in with impunity after
a certain time of life.

Sustenance is essential alike to life and longevity, but it is trite to
say it must be in moderation, and as far as possible select. So in the
case of temperance, moderation is beneficial, excess hurtful. Total
abstainers defeat the very object they propose to advocate when they
propose to do away with all because excess is hurtful. Extremes are
always baneful, and the monks of old were wise in their generation when
they denounced gluttony and intemperance as cardinal vices. The physical
powers are as a rule subject to the will, which is the exponent of our
passions and propensities and of our moral and intellectual impulses.
Were it not so we could not curb our actions, restrain our appetites, or
keep within that moderation which is essential to health, happiness and
longevity.

Our passions and propensities are imparted to us for a wise purpose, and
are therefore beneficial in their use. It is only in their neglect,
misuse or abuse that they become hurtful. A French author has
pertinently put it thus: "The passions act as winds to propel our
vessel, our reason is the pilot that steers her; without the winds she
would not move, without the pilot she would be lost."

Even our affections, so pure and beautiful in themselves, may, by abuse,
be made sources of mischief, evil and disease. The abuses are too well
known to require repetition here. The powers of energy and resistance,
beneficial in themselves, in their abuse bring about the spirit of
contradiction, violence and combat.

It seems passing