o speak,
daft on the subject of health. She attended to all points of health
with such minute detail that she seemed to have lost all idea of why we
should be healthy. One of her ways of over-emphasizing the road to
health was a very careful mastication of her food. She chewed and
chewed and chewed and chewed, and the result was that she so strained
her stomach with her chewing that she brought on severe indigestion,
simply as a result of an overactive effort toward digestion. This was
certainly a case of "vaulting ambition, which o'erleaps itself, and
falls on the other." And it was not unique.

The over-emphasis of "What shall I eat? How much shall I eat? How often
shall I eat? When shall I eat? How shall I eat?"--all extreme attention
to these questions is just as liable to bring chronic indigestion as a
reckless neglect of them altogether is liable to upset a good, strong
stomach and keep it upset. The woman who chewed herself into
indigestion fussed herself into it, too, by constantly talking about
what was not healthful to eat. Her breakfast, which she took alone, was
for a time the dryest-looking meal I ever saw. It was enough to take
away any one's healthy relish just to look at it, if he was not
forewarned.

Now our relish is one of our most blessed gifts. When we relish our
food our stomachs can digest it wholesomely. When we do not our
stomachs will not produce the secretions necessary to the most
wholesome digestion. Constant fussing about our food takes away our
relish. A gluttonous dwelling upon our food takes away our relish.
Relish is a delicate gift, and as we respect it truly, as we do not
degrade it to selfish ends nor kill it with selfish fastidiousness, it
grows upon us and is in its place like any other fine perception, and
is as greatly useful to the health of our bodies as our keener and
deeper perceptions are useful to the health of our minds.

Then there is the question of being sure that our stomachs are well
rested before we give them any work to do, and being sure that we are
quiet enough after eating to give our stomachs the best opportunity to
begin their work. Here again one extreme is just as harmful as the
other. I knew a woman who had what might be called the fixed idea of
health, who always used to sit bolt upright in a high-backed chair for
half an hour after dinner, and refuse to speak or to be spoken to in
order that "digestion might start in properly." If I had been her
stomac