much deducted from one's reputation and influence. Hence it appears that characters as well as bodies may be weak, mis-shapen, and deformed. Habit being periodical renders our conduct regular and consistent, so that if we omit the habit, the omission makes us feel uneasy. It is in this way both a reminder and a safeguard. The feeling of uneasiness acts as a monitor and a stimulus, and is another instance of the manifold and benevolent foresight with which human nature has been constructed. It must not be disguised that it is quite possible to run into an excess of discipline, and to make life precise, slavish, and monotonous. This was the mistake of the Emperor Julian. The minute instructions which regulated the service of his table and the distribution of his hours were adapted to a youth still under the discipline of his preceptors, rather than to the situation of a prince intrusted with the conduct of a great war.* The mistake lay in forgetting that habits suitable for early youth may not be suitable for mature age. Students leaving college and entering on the business of life should bear in mind the mistake of Julian. How few set to work deliberately to form character by selecting and forming habits! Men in this matter are not like themselves. When they build a house, they have plans and designs; but how do they prepare to rear up the edifice of character? Do they consider what style will be noblest and best for them? Do they sketch a * Gibbon, "History," c. xix. + "Idem manebat, idem non decebat."-Cic. design? Do they determine what parts shall be most prominent, and what shall be most subdued? Seldom do men take such pains to form their character. It is oftenest left like a cloud to be shaped by winds and other casual influences, whereas every man ought to take an active part in fashioning himself. This is the active education, the other is oftenest passive. How we prize character may be seen in the ordinary affairs of life. All know what a pleasure it is to have a conscientious, punctual, and obliging tradesman; and he in turn finds that, wherever there is a character for integrity, there will be an afflux of confidence. Looking at a higher class, are we not impressed by a look, fascinated by a smile, charmed by a pleasantry, interested by an opinion, and, in a word, magnetized by a character that is compounded of great, and good, and graceful habits? CHAPTER XV. HEALTH. HEALTH is that condition in which the body performs all its functions easily, and thereby imparts to the whole man a consciousness of strength and an enjoyment of life where the sensation is so keen that little pleasures are relished,* and the endurance is so strong that little pains are despised. Health intensifies the pleasure of food, and drink, and sleep; it makes sights and sounds more interesting and more enjoyable; it sweetens the temper, and it makes the mind more calm, judicious, and fertile. Then labour is welcomed as a delightsome exercise, and life is felt to be an inexpressible blessing. Such is health, and a mighty blessing it is; and to be retained or regained by a care of the body; and yet this body has been depreciated, disparaged, vilified, denounced, impeached, condemned, cursed, scourged, and mutilated by theologians † scholastic and mystical, *"(Voluptas summa) in te ipso est."-Hor. Sat., ii. 2, 19. Notwithstanding St. Paul's disapproval of the "neglecting of the body."-Col. ii. 23. who had wedded a religion divorced from science. Even such a large mind as Shakespeare's was not unaffected with this morbid feeling, and he makes some of his characters speak of the body as a vile prison,* and as a grave. Those who look back with an ignorant veneration upon mediæval religion, may be surprised to learn how superstition could torment and degrade the wondrous and glorious body which God has given us. Let us take the case of Archbishop Becket. When his corpse was stripped, the whole body down to the knees was found incased in hair-cloth; and the whole so fastened together as to admit of being readily taken off for his daily scourgings, of which yesterday's portion was still apparent in the stripes on his body. Such marvellous austerity was increased by the sight of the innumerable vermin with which the hair-cloth abounded-boiling over with them, as one account describes it, like water in a simmering caldron. † It is passing strange that it never occurred to those despisers that in damaging the instrument they were diminishing its usefulness. Strange that it never occurred to these calumniators that in maltreating the body they were dishonouring its Maker; but that was at a time when God allowed a whole world to relapse into igno * Plato also regarded it as alpyuós (Phædon, c. xxxiii.); and at c. x. he speaks of the eyes and ears, and, in a word, the whole body, as disturbing the soul, and not suffering it to acquire truth and wisdom, when it is in communion with it. + Dean Stanley's "Historical Memorials of Canterbury," p. 75. rance and superstition. How much in advance of these Christians was the heathen Galen, who is said to have been so struck with admiration and reverence at the anatomy of a human body, and the fitness and use of every bone, muscle, and vein, that he gave vent to his enthusiasm in a hymn of praise to the Creator. If we look on Cicero as a representative Roman, he speaks wisely, so far as he knows. In a single sentence * he says: "Health is preserved by a knowledge of one's own constitution; and by observing what things are wont to do us good or harm; and by moderation in all food and manner of living, for the sake of preserving the body; and by self-denial in pleasures; and last of all, by the skill of those to whose profession these things belong." His practice corresponded-he lived in a frugal manner. He rarely took his meal before sunset- -a rule which he thought suitable to the weakness of his stomach. He had stated hours for rubbing and walking. By this care he acquired sufficient health and strength for his great labours and fatigues.t Monastic notions seem to have influenced the compilers of the English Liturgy negatively; for there is no eulogium of the body, no prayer for its health, no thanksgiving for its functional regularity. The Jews escaped this pernicious influence, and hence their daily acknowledgment. "Blessed art thou, O Lord! our God, King of the Universe, who hath formed man in wisdom, and created in him pipes, tubes, veins, and arteries. It is manifestly known before the throne of thy glory, *Cic., De Off., ii. 24. Plut. in Cic. |