nd
the exceeding richness of the simple vegetables and fruits of which I
partake. But, within a few years past, I seem to have gotten the
victory, in a good measure, even in this respect. By eating only a few
simple dishes at a time, and by measuring or weighing them with the
eye--for I weigh them in no other way--I am usually able to confine
myself to nearly the proper limits.

This caution, and these efforts at self-government, are not needed
because their neglect involves any immediate suffering; for, as I have
already stated, there was never a period in my life before, when I was
so completely independent--apparently so, I mean--of external
circumstances. I can eat what I please, and as much or as little as I
please. I can observe set hours, or be very irregular. I can use a
pretty extensive variety at the same meal, and a still greater variety
at different meals, or I can live perpetually on a single article--nay,
on almost any thing which could be named in the animal or vegetable
kingdom--and be perfectly contented and happy in the use of it. I could
in short, eat, work, think, sleep, converse, or play almost all the
while; or I could abstain from any or all of these, almost all the
while. Let me be understood, however. I do not mean to say that either
of these courses would be best for me, in the end; but only that I have
so far attained to independence of external circumstances that, for a
time, I believe I should be able to do or bear all I have mentioned.

One thing more, in this connection, and I shall have finished my
remarks. I sleep too little; but it is because I allow my mind to run
over the world so much, and lay so many schemes for human improvement or
for human happiness; and because I allow my sympathies to become so
deeply enlisted in human suffering and human woe. I should be most
healthy, in the end, by spending six hours or more in sleep; whereas I
do not probably exceed four or five. I have indeed obtained a respite
from the grave of twenty-three years, through a partial repentance and
amendment of life, and the mercy of God; but did I obey all his laws as
well as I do a part of them, I know of no reason why my life might not
be lengthened, not merely fifteen years, as was Hezekiah's, or
twenty-three merely, but forty or fifty.

FOOTNOTES:

[5] Dr. Knox has since removed to St. Louis, Missouri.

[6] The reader will find another remarkable cure of epilepsy in a
subsequent chapter of this vo