hall we eat? What shall we drink? and Wherewithal
shall we be clothed?"--not so much because the Scriptures have charged
us not to be over "anxious" on the subject, as because those who pay the
least attention to what they eat and drink, are supposed to be, after
all, the most healthy.

It is not difficult to ascertain how this opinion originated. There are
a few individuals who are perpetually thinking and talking on this
subject, and who would fain comply with appropriate rules, if they knew
what they were, and if a certain definite course, pursued a few days
only, would change their whole condition, and completely restore a
shattered or ruined constitution. But their ignorance of the laws which
govern the human frame, both in sickness and in health, and their
indisposition to pursue any proposed plan for their improvement long
enough to receive much permanent benefit from it, keep them,
notwithstanding all they say or do, always deteriorating.

Then, on the other hand, there are a few who, in consequence of
possessing by nature very strong constitutions, and laboring at some
active and peculiarly healthy employment, are able for a few, and
perhaps even for many years, to set all the rules of health at defiance.

Now, strange as it may seem, these cases, though they are only
exceptions (and those more apparent than real) to the general rule, are
always dwelt upon, by those who are determined to live as they please,
and to put no restraint either upon themselves or their appetites. For
nothing can be plainer--so it seems to me--than that, taking mankind by
families, or what is still better, by larger portions, they are most
free from pain and disease, as well as most healthy and happy, who pay
the most attention to the laws of human health, that is, those laws or
rules by whose observance alone, that health can be certainly and
permanently secured.

But these families and communities are most healthy and happy, not
because they live in a proper manner, by fits and starts, but because
they have, from some cause or other, adopted and persevered in HABITS
which, compared with the habits of other families, or other communities,
are preferable; that is, more in obedience to the laws which govern the
human constitution. Not that even _they_ are "without sin" or error on
this subject--gross error too--but because their errors are fewer or
less destructive than those of their neighbors.

Now is it possible that any intell