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 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF ILLINOIS 
 LIBRARY 
 
 From the collection of 
 Julius Doerner, Chicago 
 Purchased, 1918* 
 
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 h 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 CURE OF OLD AGE 
 
 BY 
 
 ELEANOR KIRK 
 
 AUTHOR OF 
 
 “ Influence of the Zodiac upon Human Life,” “ Libra,” 
 “ Perpetual Youth,” etc. 
 
 PUBLISHED BY 
 
 ELEANOR KIRK 
 
 696 Greene Avenue 
 Brooklyn, N. Y. 
 
Copyright, 1899 
 By ELEANOR KIRK 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 Chapter Page 
 
 I. — A Double Bondage, i 
 
 II. — The First Steps, io 
 
 III. — Ego, 23 
 
 IV. — I Can Because I Am, . . . .36 
 
 V. — Respect for the Old, . . . .51 
 
 VI. — Don’t Be Discouraged, . . . .61 
 
 VII. — Prevention, 70 
 
 VIII. — Processes, 82 
 
 IX. — In Material Things, . . . .95 
 
 X. — “Supplementary Proceedings,” . .111 
 
 XI. — The Ignorant Word 123 
 
 XII. — Duty, 137 
 
 XIII. — Food and Exercise, . . . .146 
 
 Get up or Get Out! 157 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2017 with funding from 
 
 University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign Alternates 
 
 https://archive.org/details/preventioncureofOOames 
 
THE PREVENTION AND CURE 
 OF OLD AGE. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 A DOUBLE BONDAGE. 
 
 There is nothing beautiful about old age, 
 because there is nothing beautiful about de- 
 cay. There isn’t a single person on this 
 planet who wants to be old, and there isn’t 
 a single young person alive who desires to be 
 the companion of old age. Affection, filial 
 duty, and gratitude may lead us to be very 
 tender to the tottering steps and weak wills of 
 the helpless ones under our care; but, how- 
 ever kind and fond we may be, there is 
 always a protest in our souls against such fail- 
 ure of the life forces. We weep when these 
 dear ones yield their last breath, but all the 
 same we experience a sense of relief. It is 
 
2 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 inevitable. They are in bondage, and we are 
 bound with them. Indeed, for all these ages 
 the human race has been doubly bound — 
 bound to be the daily witnesses of decay in 
 others, and by the expectation of decay for 
 themselves. 
 
 Old age has never had a single logical leg 
 to stand upon. Because it has been con- 
 sidered inevitable, it has been bolstered up by 
 sentiment and trimmed with flowers of rhet- 
 oric, much on the same principle that induces 
 us to cover the coffins of our friends with buds 
 and blossoms. Death is hideous, and so we 
 draw as comforting a curtain over the scene 
 as nature and art can devise. 
 
 Poets have sung of the “ sweet fading out of 
 the body,” “the gradual and beautiful release 
 of the spirit,” while striving with all the 
 power they possessed to delay the beautiful 
 release for themselves. As long as death had 
 to be, versification was as good a setting for it 
 as any other ; and like the boy who whistled 
 when he passed the graveyard, they have 
 rhymed decay and cannot stay, and fade and 
 shade, and die and sky, in the vain attempt to 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 3 
 
 keep tip their courage. If all the old-age and 
 death poems and death essays were taken out 
 of the language, the books remaining in our 
 libraries to be dusted would be perceptibly 
 diminished, to the great good of all con- 
 cerned, housekeepers included. 
 
 This treatment of negative and undesirable 
 conditions has been called “making the best 
 of things,” “making the best of a bad bar- 
 gain,” “submitting to the inevitable”; and 
 every fresh endeavor to become reconciled 
 to them has added to the burden of our 
 wretchedness. This belief in the necessity of 
 sickness, old age, poverty, and death rolled 
 up and rolled up until it became so large and 
 so unwieldy that in the effort to continue 
 turning over it has crumbled here and there, 
 leaving little heaps of dirt for spiritual geolo- 
 gists to speculate about. Their investigations 
 started a new school, and this school has di- 
 vided into scores of classes, every one of them 
 intent upon demolishing this colossal bundle 
 of error. It is still rolling by the force of its 
 own momentum, but the stones of truth which 
 are constantly being fired into it will ultimate- 
 
4 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 ly destroy it. Every day the blows are more 
 efficient because the aim is better, and because 
 a few thinkers are tireless in this work of 
 bombardment. 
 
 Among the rest of the things which we 
 have been told to do is the impossible one of 
 “growing old gracefully.” This phrase has 
 doubtless been incorporated into almost every 
 language under the sun ; here was more 
 whistling in passing the graveyard. It gave 
 the decaying man or woman a little diversion 
 in the matter of buying silver-headed canes, 
 and in selecting the shawl or the gown which 
 would best harmonize with the lustreless eyes 
 and faded cheeks. It said to them : “ Make 
 yourself as contented as you can in exter- 
 nals. True, you must grow old and older 
 until you sink into the grave. You have 
 plenty of company, so brace up and think as 
 little about the disgusting process as possible. 
 Show your superiority to the situation by 
 growing old gracefully.” 
 
 Now, who ever saw anybody grow old 
 gracefully? We have seen our friends submit 
 graciously and uncomplainingly — more’s the 
 
CURE OP OLD AGE. 
 
 5 
 
 pity — to what they believed they could not 
 help. They have called it God’s will, as they 
 have limped and tottered toward the grave; 
 but it hasn’t been a pretty sight, a comforting 
 sight, a graceful process. We turn our faces 
 away in sorrow. They don’t like it, and we 
 cannot bear to behold it in others or anticipate 
 it for ourselves. And this failing and fading 
 and suffering and dying is God’s will — the fiat 
 of a loving Father. What an awful accusa- 
 tion to bring against the All-Good, and how 
 strange that such a falsehood could have been 
 for ages perpetuated ! 
 
 A great many people argue that old age 
 must be a natural process, and point to ex- 
 ternal nature for their proof. The flowers, 
 they tell us, bud, blossom, and fall to pieces, 
 the trees put forth their leaves, and after a 
 brief space the wind sighs through bare 
 branches. The grass withers, and fruit hav- 
 ing come to maturity decays. 
 
 Well, what if they do? Man is a living 
 soul, made in the image and likeness of God, 
 and trees and grass and fruit and sunshine 
 and flowers are for his delectation. He is the 
 
6 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 absolute owner and master of these things. 
 He always has been “ monarch of all he sur- 
 veyed,” and all the time has walked the earth 
 like a beggar. He has chained the lightning 
 and made the earth produce a million things 
 that would once have been considered in the 
 light of miracles, and yet he is not conscious 
 of his power and supremacy. The unit of 
 nature was his to start with, but by the force 
 of his God-will and intelligence — both en- 
 tirely unrecognized — he has added so many 
 ciphers to it as literally to have created a 
 new heaven and a new earth. And still he is 
 ignorant and goes travelling toward the ceme- 
 tery, because the pace has been set for him 
 by a few prehistoric idiots. 
 
 The stories of decay and death are the first 
 things a child makes acquaintance with. 
 These dismal impressions are deepened and 
 strengthened as the years go by, and a note of 
 anguish runs through every moment of exist- 
 ence, no matter what the apparent or an- 
 ticipated happiness. It sings these minoi; 
 strains, “Old age is approaching,” and “Man 
 is of few days and full of trouble.” 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 7 
 
 Is it any wonder that every old negative 
 thing that we have no use or wish for seems 
 to be in universal operation? 
 
 Personally I find great comfort and inspi- 
 ration in certain parts of the Bible. But I 
 have never had any patience with those old 
 fogies who talked about all flesh being grass, 
 and the few days full of trouble. We cannot 
 deny the last statement, but who is respon- 
 sible for the brevity of the hours and the 
 misery that fills them? Why, man himself; 
 but these ancient scribes had no hint of this 
 truth. Once in a while it dawned upon David, 
 and then he would dance a gig and chant the 
 psalms of joy that have vibrated all along 
 the ages. At other times he would declare 
 that he was “a pelican of the wilderness,” and 
 “like an owl of the desert,” and all “because 
 of thy indignation and thy wrath, for thou 
 hast lifted me up and cast me down.” 
 
 Contrast this pessimistic doggerel with the 
 grandeur and glory of the ninety-first psalm : 
 “ He that dwelleth in the secret place of the 
 Most High shall abide under the shadow of 
 the Almighty.” 
 
8 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 But we must not blame our old friends tod 
 much. The pace had been set for them as for 
 Us, and they knew no better than to limp 
 along the same road that the generations be- 
 fore them had travelled. It was “ Thus saith 
 the Lord,” and this Lord was sitting upon a 
 throne somewhere in the sky, ready to be pro- 
 pitiated if the right sort of a petition was 
 prayed up to him. This was the prayer of 
 faith, and very few knew how to formulate it. 
 
 So in those days, as in these days, there 
 were a great many more failures than suc- 
 cesses. The prayer that did the work was the 
 one in which the will of God and the will of 
 the individual ego were one and the same. 
 The “ Father and I are one ” prayer always 
 brought results. It did then; it does now, 
 and always will. The sublimest experiences 
 in every age have been those where men have 
 realized their birthright of divinity. We find 
 records of these experiences scattered all 
 along the way from Genesis to Revelation, and 
 we find such examples in our daily intercourse 
 with our friends. These states, however, are 
 exceptional. We do not dwell in the secret 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 9 
 
 place of the Most High — the highest and 
 grandest thought of ourselves. We do not 
 “abide.” No more did the prophets and 
 apostles, and this is why they were supremely 
 happy at one time and ignorantly miserable 
 at another. They believed in the God in 
 themselves one day, and a God in the sky 
 another day, and were like houses divided 
 against themselves. They could not stand. 
 And so they sickened, grew old and foolish, 
 and died. 
 
 This is exactly what is the matter with us; 
 but there is a way out of all these negative 
 conditions, and the path shall be made plain. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE FIRST STEPS. 
 
 We find that the chief cause of old age is 
 ignorance of our divine inheritance. This 
 truth should be ever present in the minds of 
 our readers, because it is the basic truth of 
 life, and is the firm foundation of everything 
 that ‘will come afterward. 
 
 Now for the prevention of old age. 
 
 How is it to be accomplished? 
 
 By scientific and consequently common- 
 sense methods. 
 
 The people who by reason of the title are 
 attracted to this book will be those who have 
 commenced to be anxious about their personal 
 appearance, w r ho seem to be expressing the 
 premonitory symptoms of decay, and those 
 who are well started on their reluctant trip 
 down-hill. All ages will be represented in 
 this audience. 
 
PREVENTION AND CURE OF OLD AGE. II 
 
 “ Personal appearance? ” 
 
 How much is contained in these two words. 
 To me this phrase holds the most sacred of 
 all thoughts; and yet the average woman, 
 even in these days of awakening, is afraid and 
 ashamed to admit that it means anything to 
 her. She may have her little complexion 
 aids, which are perfectly legitimate whether 
 she realizes it or not ; but she will keep them 
 locked away from all observers, in the hope 
 that her use of them will never be detected. 
 
 Why does she do this? 
 
 Because of the protest of the spirit of God 
 within her, against the necessity of employing 
 other than natural means in the preservation 
 of her beauty. Deep down in her soul the 
 spirit is ever whispering and suggesting. 
 These suggestions she mistakes for vanity. 
 
 Why does she? 
 
 For no other reason than that the whole 
 human race has been educated in this belief 
 of vanity until it seems to have become incor- 
 porated into their very blood and bones. 
 
 St. Paul — bless his dear heart! he didn’t 
 know everything — is more responsible per- 
 
12 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 haps than any other person for imbuing the 
 feminine mind with this false and pernicious 
 idea. Paul never quite recovered from Saul. 
 That was the trouble with him. But did he not 
 do wonders in the short time between his con- 
 version and his death? And if he had known 
 that he had a right to life right here on this 
 planet, what might he not have accomplished 
 on the beautiful and aesthetic side of exist- 
 ence? Inmost things he “knew whereof he 
 spoke,” but in regard to women he was an 
 out-and-out ignoramus. 
 
 Ministers of all denominations have fol- 
 lowed St. Paul’s lead in their fulminations 
 against what they have been pleased to call 
 the vanity of woman. But she hasn’t “kept 
 silence in the churches,” and she hasn’t as a 
 rule “obeyed her husband,” and she has 
 curled her hair and rigged herself out in what 
 the apostle described as “gaudy apparel.” 
 Her justice and artistic sense have proved 
 quite superior to masculine prejudice and 
 narrow creeds, and we find that the very 
 hardest thing to kill in woman is her love of 
 beauty. 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 13 
 
 And why? 
 
 Because all beautiful things are of God. 
 
 A lady was admiring a lovely gown that 
 had just been sent home, and her mother, an 
 old-time Presbyterian, felt it necessary to rep- 
 rimand her for her vanity. 
 
 “It brings the tears to my eyes,” she said, 
 “ to see you so wedded to the things of this 
 world — you, an immortal soul, with all your 
 Christian responsibilities.” 
 
 “ It is just because I am an immortal soul 
 that I enjoy these things,” the daughter re- 
 plied. “Why, mother, there isn’t an article 
 in this gown that is not made of God’s sub- 
 stance, and it is made with such divine taste 
 that I shall feel more godly than usual when 
 I wear it.” 
 
 Of course this was the most awful blas- 
 phemy possible to conceive of, and was by no 
 means easily forgiven. But it was the truth, 
 and one we should never lose sight of. 
 
 The word God is often on the lips of the 
 people, but he is the most distant of all their 
 acquaintance. He rules in a heaven beyond 
 their ken, and the only means of approach to 
 
14 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 him is by the entreaty of the prayer of faith. 
 He is a monarch in a distant part of the uni- 
 verse called heaven, and his children are all 
 poverty-stricken nobodies. 
 
 The very opposite of this is true. There is 
 no place where God is not. He is our life, 
 our breath, our hearts, our brains. He is 
 every atom and every molecule of us, and 
 there is not a single article that we see, wear, 
 or handle that is not made of the substance of 
 God. And all this substance is ours to enjoy. 
 When we are ashamed of our love of the 
 beautiful, we are ashamed of God. 
 
 “Is there no vanity then in the world?” 
 some one will ask. 
 
 Much less than people have generally sup- 
 posed. "When a woman puts all her thoughts 
 upon the fit of a gown, the lustre of her 
 jewels, and the furnishing of her establish- 
 ment, she is not only vain but selfish. This 
 is very different from the appreciation of 
 beauty for beauty’s sake, or God’s sake. 
 
 So we start on our little tour together with 
 the understanding that man is the greatest 
 thing in the universe, made in the image and 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 15 
 
 likeness of God, with all of God’s privileges. 
 This being the case we have a right to beauty, 
 health, strength, power, riches, and eternal 
 life. All these possessions are actually ours, 
 and the only reason that we are not in full en- 
 joyment of them is because we have not taken 
 them. We have been too ignorant to claim 
 our birthright. 
 
 A woman is seldom activ ely aroused to a 
 sense of her danger until she commences to 
 part with her good looks. Then her misery is 
 acute. She has seen her relatives and friends 
 grow old, and because of precedent and edu- 
 cation she has been sure that some time this 
 horrible change must come to her; but not 
 yet. Oh ! not yet. She is too full of life. 
 She feels as young as she ever did — you will 
 hear this remark made at ninety, if intelli- 
 gence has been sufficiently in operation to 
 protect the intellect — and now what can she 
 do? What means can be employed to arrest 
 the appearance of this creeping decay? It 
 has got to be — that she knows — but how can 
 she cover up the trail of the serpent? The 
 rouge pot and the powder puff come in here 
 
l6 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 with the woman who has not been educated 
 against the use of such things, but there is 
 small comfort to be found in these superficial 
 dabs and dustings. She sees through them 
 and is quite sure that everybody else does. 
 But anything is better than this strange and 
 awful grandmotherly expression that con- 
 fronts her every time she looks in the mirror. 
 So she flies from one external medicament to 
 another, and hunts about for tonics and reme- 
 dies which will produce plumpness, or which 
 will reduce the flesh which is beginning to be 
 so troublesome to carry, and so ugly to behold. 
 
 This picture is not in the least exaggerated. 
 Very few women have reached the age of 
 thirty-five without passing through these cru- 
 cial experiences. 
 
 Some persons who have been brought up in 
 a cast-iron creed, and who consider it almost 
 if not quite the unpardonable sin to endeavor 
 by any means to enhance one’s beauty, often 
 smile sardonically and comment most unkindly 
 upon such covering-up efforts on the part of 
 their troubled sisters. But you may find these 
 critics very particular and uncompromising 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 17 
 
 about the shape of a hat, the fit of a glove, or 
 the trimming of a gown. What they call 
 “vanity” shows itself in a different form, but 
 it is not vanity any more than the endeavor to 
 plump one’s cheeks or improve one’s com- 
 plexion is vanity. It is the protest of the 
 God within themselves against ugliness and 
 decay. 
 
 It is absolutely necessary to understand that 
 the desire for the retention of good looks, for 
 the expression of beauty, is a thoroughly legiti- 
 mate one. It is God-like, God-born, and has 
 no other origin. 
 
 The partial realization of this is the first step 
 toward either the prevention or the cure of 
 old age. 
 
 I say “ partial ” because it is a very excep- 
 tional thing when this thought is grasped at its 
 first presentation. It has to be taken hold of 
 intellectually and so held in mind by day and 
 by night that after a while it becomes a part 
 of one. It becomes incorporated into the very 
 marrow of the bones. Intellectual knowledge 
 grows into intelligent assimilation, and the 
 day comes sooner or later when one to a 
 
1 8 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 saving extent comprehends his or her position 
 in the universe. 
 
 Do not misunderstand here. There are those 
 who attain to this realization in a flash, “ the 
 twinkling of an eye,” but it is not usual. It 
 may be that such instantaneous revelation may 
 come to you, to you, or to you. If so, half the 
 battle is won. The first step is the long step, 
 and if it can be taken with “ the seven-leagued 
 boots ” of a quick intelligence, so much the 
 better. 
 
 But do not be discouraged if this conscious- 
 ness of your right to be free and happy comes 
 slowly. It surely will come if you are atten- 
 tive and conscientious, and if you listen to the 
 inner voice which is the voice of God. 
 
 “We hear a great deal about the new 
 thought, and the necessity of thinking right 
 thoughts,” an earnest student writes, “and 
 if you will only tell me what to think and 
 how to think it, I shall be the most grateful 
 creature upon earth. There seems to be a 
 deep and oiled groove in me through which 
 ten thousand thoughts a minute slip along 
 — some good ones and some bad ones, but 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 19 
 
 they certainly appear to be beyond my con- 
 trol.” 
 
 This is the common experience, and the re- 
 sult is discouraging. It is a sort of mental 
 chaos, but it is impossible for more than one 
 thought to occupy the mind at the same mo- 
 ment, to say nothing of ten thousand. It is 
 either a kind thought or an unkind thought, 
 a pure or an impure thought, a valuable or a 
 no-account thought. 
 
 The error thought must be banished, and 
 the only way on earth to do this is to put a 
 good thought in its place. The student must 
 learn to do this immediately, and here is the 
 pivot upon which everything turns. 
 
 Every thought of sickness, sorrow, old age, 
 poverty, or death is an error thought. Every 
 envious, jealous, or suspicious thought is an 
 error thought, and to harbor them is to live 
 in a deadly and dying condition. These 
 are the things that produce the burdens and 
 penalties that weigh us down to the earth 
 
 with sorrow and suffering. We sow and 
 we reap. When we stop scattering error 
 seeds and substitute good seed we shall reap 
 
20 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 the joys of the kingdom of God, and not till 
 then. 
 
 Suppose one wakes in the morning with a 
 feeling of depression, or what are supposed to 
 be the premonitory symptoms of illness. The 
 first thought with those who have not studied 
 on these lines will be: “Oh, dear! I’m just 
 as blue as I can be,” or, “Another cold is 
 coming on, and I have only just got over the 
 last one.” 
 
 The wise and faithful student will, instead 
 of these negative statements, declare : 
 
 “ Nothing can induce me to listen to this 
 nonsense. I am in the best of spirits. I am 
 well and strong and happy. I am full of di- 
 vine vigor. I refuse utterly to hear or to be 
 dominated by a single negative suggestion. I 
 am the child of freedom, and the God in my- 
 self makes it possible for me to declare my 
 dominion over all things.” 
 
 It is utterly out of the question for one to 
 make these strong and true affirmations with- 
 out realizing the power of the spirit. This 
 power is absolute, and our trust in it will lead 
 us “ beside the still waters ” and keep us in a 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 21 
 
 state of harmony inconceivable to those who 
 live simply upon the surface of life. 
 
 “ Keep us?” 
 
 Yes, if we keep it. The spirit of truth 
 never pushes, never intrudes, but stands ready 
 to honor every demand made upon it. 
 
 We are finding out in these days that there 
 is something for us to do, and a very intelli- 
 gent minority of the human family has discov- 
 ered that this work must be done now. There 
 can be no more postponing, no more daw- 
 dling. Neither philosophy nor religion has 
 saved the world from suffering. Science 
 must. 
 
 The substitution of a pleasant for an un- 
 pleasant thought is scientific. To banish a 
 tear and put a smile in its place is scientific. 
 To think well of a person of whom one has 
 been thinking evil is scientific. To steadfast- 
 ly refuse to be associated with inharmony of 
 any description is scientific. 
 
 Why are these things scientific? 
 
 Because the person is working with the 
 creative principle which always builds up and 
 never tears down. One fit of temper, one 
 
22 PREVENTION AND CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 quarrel will destroy more tissue than can be 
 made up in a week. Material science, now the 
 beautiful helpmeet and corroborator of mental 
 science, has proven to the satisfaction of the 
 most critical intellects that anger and fear and 
 worry poison the blood, and each emotion 
 makes use of its own special means in pro- 
 moting decay. 
 
 So we find we cannot worry and keep young. 
 We cannot hate our neighbor without having 
 a picture of that hatred appear on our faces. 
 
 Think of that ! 
 
 Add to this the fact that when we keep on 
 hating we are lavishly sowing the seeds of 
 death. 
 
 This is true of all the other error emotions, 
 and is it any wonder that there are so many 
 cemeteries and so many old and dying people? 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 EGO. 
 
 “ He who fights and runs away. 
 
 Will live to fight another day.” 
 
 This is an old and a very homely couplet, 
 but it holds a great and pregnant truth. 
 Somewhere, some time, the fight has got to be 
 fought out, and it is my opinion, from an ex- 
 tended observation and considerable experi- 
 ence, that the longer it is delayed the harder 
 it is. 
 
 This chapter commences with the biggest 
 thing in the universe — the immortal, the om- 
 nipotent, omnipresent, omniscient ego — the I. 
 
 The / is the only power that ever delivered 
 us from bondage of any sort, and is the only 
 force that will ever keep us out of the clutches 
 of old age. The God in the sky hasn’t done it. 
 Our friends haven’t helped in any direction, 
 for they are all dying with us. Not even 
 
24 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 one little lift have we had from anybody in 
 this matter, — and as we think it over, who 
 has helped us out of the most of our scrapes? 
 Those who loved us have in many cases hon- 
 estly tried to bring us peace and happiness, but 
 as they were out at the elbows in such ways 
 themselves, their service has chiefly consisted 
 in proving that we were no worse off than 
 themselves. A kindred misery never helped 
 to alleviate a single sorrow. And we have all 
 been very close relatives in unhappiness. 
 
 Who has helped us? We recall many a cru- 
 cial experience from which we have emerged, 
 if not triumphantly, at least with some credit 
 to ourselves. It seems as if we must have 
 had outside aid. “The doctor did this,” 
 we tell ourselves, and “this friend loaned 
 a little money to tide over a rough spot. 
 We couldn’t have pulled through without 
 that money.” 
 
 Perhaps not, but what made it possible for 
 you to receive this loan or gift? 
 
 Did you ever think of that? 
 
 Perhaps the friend arrived at the opportune 
 moment and offered the financial help. Was 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 2 5 
 
 it so in your case ? If so, yours is an excep- 
 tional one. You know that such things seldom 
 occur, and when they do we are apt in our 
 ignorance to cry “ Miracle ! miracle ! ” But 
 this proves the almighty power of the I bet- 
 ter than any other example that could be 
 given. If this has happened to you it is proof 
 positive that for some reason you are ahead of 
 your kind. It shows that the power of attrac- 
 tion, the creative power, is far stronger with 
 you than with others. By means of this force 
 of which you were entirely unaware, you drew 
 this friend to your side to supply the demand 
 you had unconsciously sent out into the uni- 
 verse. He or she caught the vibration and 
 you were relieved from your necessity. But 
 you did it yourself. The I of you was the 
 agent, actor, and doer. In this calculation the 
 money was little more than a secondary con- 
 sideration, although it meant so much to you. 
 
 In most instances where assistance of any 
 kind is necessary, one is compelled to ask for it 
 by letter or by personal interview. Is this not 
 your work ? When you constructed the com- 
 munication which you hoped would postpone 
 
26 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 the foreclosure of that mortgage or would lift 
 it entirely, did you not use every argument 
 that your ingenuity could suggest to touch the 
 vibrating note in the one to whom you ap- 
 pealed? In other words, you put yourself in 
 it, the fervent, beautiful, glorious I. And you 
 were lifted out of this slough of despond by 
 the God within yourself. 
 
 Somebody will say right here : “ But what 
 of the answers to such distressing calls that 
 are not favorable ? I have written such letters 
 and they brought me nothing. I was either 
 ignored or insulted.” 
 
 Such failure may be due to poor judgment, 
 lack of tact, which shows the absence of the 
 attracting power more plainly perhaps than 
 anything else, or a lack of faith. Either one 
 of these will defeat the most praiseworthy ob- 
 ject in the world. Good judgment selects the 
 right man or right woman to whom to say the 
 right word. Tact says it, and faith gets it. 
 
 We have all of us heard more or less talk 
 ever since we can remember about magnetism. 
 We have noticed that some persons draw us 
 and some repel us. We like to be in this 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 27 
 
 man’s society, and we cannot bear to be in 
 the same room with that one. Good judg- 
 ment would assure us of the foolishness of ask- 
 ing a favor of a person who inspired such a 
 feeling. We are not magnetically related to 
 each other, and this is no discredit to either of 
 us. But it is a waste of time and energy to 
 endeavor to vibrate in their atmosphere. All 
 these things are quickly discerned by the wise 
 ones, but wisdom is rare, and so we go on 
 making mistakes. In other words, we strive 
 to take, and take amiss. This is all a part 
 of our education, if we will have it so. It is 
 called by some the school of discipline and 
 God’s way of dealing with his children. The 
 fact is, it is simply our ignorant way of doing 
 things. Of the true God we know nothing, 
 and so we bump our heads and stub our toes 
 against everything that seems to be in our 
 way, and when there is no obstacle or impedi- 
 ment in sight, we are sure to scare up some 
 hobgoblin that is worse than anything we have 
 had before. 
 
 That people do learn by these bumps and 
 tumbles is undoubtedly true — some people — 
 
28 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 the majority, perhaps. But there are many 
 others — we see them every day and sometimes 
 wonder what excuse there could have been 
 for their birth and continued existence — who 
 never appear to learn anything. They simply 
 encumber the earth and make trouble for 
 everybody who comes into their atmosphere. 
 
 What of these? 
 
 They are densely ignorant, spiritually blind, 
 deaf and dumb. Their brothers and sisters 
 who slip and slide and fall and pick themselves 
 up again have some knowledge of their divine 
 origin, though this knowledge may be an un- 
 conscious possession. They do not make in- 
 telligent use of it because they do not know 
 that it is theirs, but it often moves them to 
 good and even great issues. These are they 
 who learn on this plane by their mistakes. 
 
 We find that unconscious intelligence is 
 preferable to no intelligence. 
 
 The man who fights and runs away, or sits 
 weakly down and deplores his hard luck, will 
 certainly live to fight another day, but his oc- 
 casional attempts at overcoming will surely 
 stand him in good stead. The other fellow 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 2 9 
 
 has got to learn also. Whatever the seeming, 
 man is potentially perfect, and potentiality 
 must become reality sooner or later. We 
 may delay this process indefinitely. There is 
 time enough even for the slowest intelligence. 
 
 This thought cannot fail to comfort those 
 whose lives have been greatly disquieted by 
 contact with these mistaken souls. God did 
 not create such sinners, so-called, for the es- 
 pecial development and spiritual salvation of 
 their relatives. This is a tremendous fallacy, 
 but one that has obtained through all the ages. 
 It is clear gain, however, if one realizes de- 
 velopment by such means. God is certainly in 
 it, but not at all in the way that has been so 
 ignorantly believed. The God in the person, 
 the supreme omnipotent /, has in such in- 
 stances risen to the occasion, and for the time 
 being at least dominated the adversary. 
 
 This is the God that does the work at all 
 times. 
 
 The demand now is for conscious growth, 
 real God growth, and this demand is a per- 
 fectly possible and legitimate one. It is mak- 
 ing itself powerfully felt all over the earth, 
 
3 ° 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 and the supply is meeting it just as supply 
 always does meet the intelligent determina- 
 tion to have. 
 
 The Ego? The I? 
 
 What must be done to bring the I into the 
 working consciousness of the individual ? 
 
 It has lain dormant, been ignored and mis- 
 understood long enough. Ignorance con- 
 cerning it has been the cause of all the sor- 
 row and suffering that have ever come to 
 man. 
 
 When we wish to become acquainted with a 
 language, an art, a science, what do we do? 
 We study it, we devote our time and atten- 
 tion to it. We concentrate upon it, and day 
 by day we become more and more familiar 
 with our subject, and after a while proficiency 
 crowns our efforts and we look upon our work 
 and say it is good. If it is good we know it is 
 good, although still loath to make such admis- 
 sion save to ourselves in the privacy of our 
 own apartments. We have called this natural 
 modesty and a proper delicacy, when it has 
 been no such thing. On the same principle 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 31 
 
 we have spoken slightingly of our poem, our 
 pie, our lecture, our gown, our housekeeping, 
 all the time knowing in our inmost hearts that 
 these things were hard to beat. 
 
 In this manner the / has been entirely 
 ignored, and the strangest part of it is that it 
 has usually been done in the name of God, 
 the mighty creative Ego. The race has been 
 taught that boasting and vanity were dis- 
 pleasing to God, and that a proper apprecia- 
 tion of one’s work was an offence to him. To 
 praise another’s efforts was, on the contrary, 
 pleasing to Deity. 
 
 This is the result of a false education and 
 an ignorant precedent, and now at the close of 
 this wonderful cycle some of us begin to real- 
 ize that a proper education must usurp the 
 fallacious one which has wrought so much 
 misery and strewn this lovely green earth 
 with so many wrecks. 
 
 One time at a woman’s club meeting a very 
 sweet little lady was unexpectedly called upon 
 to make a few remarks. It was plain to see 
 that this was a new and a very embarrassing 
 position; but she rose, and, after a moment’s 
 
32 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 pause, began in this way : “ Mrs. President and 
 Ladies: You have done a very foolish thing to 
 invite me to this platform to-day. I never 
 made a speech in my life, because I was per- 
 fectly aware that I did not know how to make 
 a speech ; but, ladies, I can make the best apple 
 pie that was ever put into human mouth, and 
 if you will do me the honor to come to my 
 home in New Jersey, I will prove my state- 
 ment beyond a doubt.” 
 
 This was the oration of the afternoon. And 
 why? Because of the affirmation of the I. 
 Here was a woman who knew of one thing 
 that she could do and do well, and was not 
 ashamed to say so. It was a new thing, and 
 all wholesome novelties are delightful. Then 
 this visitor possessed wisdom. She knew bet- 
 ter than to talk about the subjects which were 
 on the programme, because she had had no 
 training, though after this bright little speech 
 there wasn’t a member of the club who did not 
 believe that she could have spoken to the point 
 on any conceivable topic. When the glorious 
 Ego is strong enough to make itself felt by 
 others, even in so small a matter as making 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 33 
 
 a pie, its influence for general upliftment is 
 remarkable. 
 
 It is a fine accomplishment to know how to 
 make a good pie, a good loaf of bread, a good 
 soup, — in fact, a good anything to eat, drink, 
 or to wear, but the realization of ability in 
 these directions is really what makes the good 
 bread and the artistic gown. The / is master 
 of the situation. 
 
 Then the declaration of our little club visitor 
 was a happy change from the usual conven- 
 tional methods. The person who is brilliantly 
 unconventional is unique. 
 
 Now suppose this woman could have stepped 
 to a still higher height and in a few words had 
 said something that her audience could carry 
 home with them and remember, about the all- 
 mightiness of this God-principle incarnated in 
 every son and daughter of the Most High. 
 Suppose she had said : “I do not choose to 
 speak upon the educational topics that appear 
 on your programme, but I would like to give 
 you, if there was time, my idea of true funda- 
 mental education. Your speakers have ac- 
 quitted themselves with credit, but to my mind 
 
34 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 they have not once touched the heart of the 
 matter. They have ignored the real girl and 
 the real boy, the real man and the real wo- 
 man, and placed them in the light of puppets 
 to be pulled and acted upon by some outside 
 influence. This conception of education has 
 endured for ages, but all the same it is most 
 false and pernicious. Education is unfold- 
 ment, and that which is good for anything 
 comes from within instead of without. The 
 very first thing to teach a child is the lesson of 
 his own God-force, the power of his own Ego 
 to learn anything, do anything, overcome any- 
 thing that stands in the way of his advance- 
 ment. He needs to be taught that he has in 
 his own little self every quality and faculty 
 that God possesses, and that nothing is im- 
 possible to him.” 
 
 Such a talk, thanks be to the spirit of pro- 
 gress, the evolution of the Ego in many a 
 soul, would be received with gratitude and 
 fullest appreciation by many members of our 
 women’s clubs. But even those who appeared 
 shocked by these hard statements would be 
 benefited. The writer has observed such ef- 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 35 
 
 fects too often to be in the least doubt of their 
 value. 
 
 “ How do I know that the I you talk about 
 is good enough to be cultivated or relied 
 upon?” some timid, creed-bound friend will 
 inquire. 
 
 Because the 1 is the almighty part of you — 
 the God of you, and God is good. 
 
 “ But do not many persons mistake their 
 will for God’s will? ” another may ask. 
 
 No intelligently conscientious person can 
 ever so mistake. The only thing to know is 
 the righteousness of your cause. “ Find out 
 you’re right, then go ahead.” 
 
 Go ahead and stop for nothing. It is the 
 doubt, the fear that has kept this omnipotent 
 I from the true expression of itself. These 
 twin spectres can only be put out of our lives 
 by the realization of the rights and the power 
 of the /. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 I CAN BECAUSE I AM. 
 
 This is a favorite affirmation of mine and no 
 stronger one can be found. 
 
 What is an affirmation ? 
 
 If called to the witness-stand we can either 
 kiss the Bible and swear to tell the truth and 
 nothing but the truth, or we can hold up our 
 right hand and affirm. So when we make an 
 affirmation we declare what we believe to be 
 the truth. 
 
 We are all continually upon the witness- 
 stand. We are witnessing for ourselves and 
 consequently for God, though we are not 
 aware of it. We never can lie to ourselves, 
 however much we may lie to others, because 
 God is in us, and God cannot be deceived. 
 
 I can because I am. 
 
 I can what? 
 
 I can be master of myself and my sur- 
 
B82006© I B 
 
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 PART COM 
 
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 DATE OF BILL 
 
 IF RUSH INDICATE DATE WANTED 
 
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 AUTHOR 
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 DATE OF PUB. ~ J-Q-L 
 
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 SEPT5 1950, 
 
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PREVENTION AND CURE OF OLD AGE. 37 
 
 roundings. . I can be well, strong, happy, and 
 free. 
 
 “ But how can I be free when I have never 
 seen a well and happy day in my life? ” 
 
 By the steadfast endeavor to realize the I, 
 the real, the God of yourself. 
 
 Do you know what is meant by “ steadfast ” ? 
 
 It is to hold on steadily, and this the major- 
 ity of persons are too lazy or too faithless to 
 do. They may become enthused by something 
 they have read, or some treatment they have 
 had, sufficiently to start on the work of over- 
 coming negative conditions. But it is a more 
 difficult job than they anticipated, and so they 
 often grow discouraged. After a while they 
 relax their efforts and fall back into apparently 
 old conditions. 
 
 “ Why, I made my affirmation for a whole 
 week just as I was told, and my headaches 
 were not a bit better,” a very distressed and 
 weary-looking woman told a circle of friends. 
 “I’ve simply had to go back to bromides. 
 They do relieve temporarily, and I must have 
 a little rest. I know that bromides are de- 
 structive, but I had rather die than live in this 
 
38 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 way. I had tried everything else, you see, 
 before I went into science.” 
 
 “ Went into science? ” 
 
 It is impossible not to be amused with such 
 speeches, even though they do disclose such 
 depths of ignorance. 
 
 Affirmations are merely steps to the accom- 
 plishment of a purpose. They are what the 
 alphabet is to a language, the multiplication 
 table to mathematics. One may say five times 
 seven are thirty-five, and five times eight are 
 forty till his tongue is paralyzed, and if he 
 does not put these figures and all the figures 
 into practical demonstration he will never 
 know anything about the science of numbers. 
 So one may say, I am well, I am rich, I am 
 free, and if he does not know what these state- 
 ments mean, and how to use his common sense 
 and intellectual ability in putting the affirma- 
 tions into practice, he might as well be a parrot 
 for all the good the words will do him. And 
 here is where a great many serious mistakes 
 are made. This loose talk about “ science ” is 
 enough to disgust any man who has ever used 
 his brains to any purpose. The law is all 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 39 
 
 right, but we must co-operate with the law in 
 order to make it of any use. Here is the law 
 of the locomotive, for instance. This intricate 
 and powerful machine, invented and brought 
 to its present perfection by the spirit of God 
 made manifest in his highest creation — man 
 — draws a train of cars across the continent. 
 Here is a law in full and beautiful operation. 
 Suppose now you want to go to Denver. What 
 do you do? You make your preparations, 
 write to your friends to expect you at a cer- 
 tain time, pack your trunk, buy your ticket, 
 go to the depot, and get aboard the train. In 
 this way you have co-operated with the law of 
 the locomotive, which is simply universal force 
 brought into special use for the comfort, bene- 
 fit, and prosperity of the individual and the 
 nation. 
 
 Now, you desired with all your heart to 
 make this trip, or you thought it of sufficient 
 importance to warrant a good deal of work and 
 expense. The locomotive takes you to your 
 destination, and there you are, wearied or 
 rested, happy or unhappy, according as you 
 personally have co-operated with the God with- 
 
40 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 in yourself. If you have fussed and fumed, 
 and fanned and complained, if you have 
 usurped the engineer’s prerogative and tried 
 to make better time from one station to another 
 all the way from New York to Denver, you 
 were probably something of a wreck when you 
 got there ; but if you realized that the very 
 same force that ran that machine was run- 
 ning you and that you could depend upon 
 it, there isn’t the least doubt but what you 
 were a credit to yourself and a joy to your 
 friends when you swung into the great Den- 
 ver depot. 
 
 Suppose, instead of this intelligent working 
 with the law, you should make no prepara- 
 tions for the journey you desired to make, 
 and should sit still in your home and say: 
 “ I can go to Denver. I am on my way to 
 Denver. I shall arrive in Denver next Satur- 
 day morning. I am free to go where I please, 
 and I please to go to Denver. I am God’s 
 child, and because this is so I have a pass to 
 any point in the universe. I am on my way 
 to Denver. I am on my way to Denver” — 
 would you expect to get there? 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 41 
 
 I do not think you would, and yet this ex- 
 pectation wotild not be a bit more ridiculous 
 than the claims which are constantly made by 
 alleged scientists. These claims are all mis- 
 leading. You cannot sit in your rocking- 
 chair and get anywhere, though you piled up 
 affirmations and concentrated all }mur mental 
 energies upon the trip. You would hitch 
 along a little in the old way — this is the law 
 of rocking-chairs — and the result would be a 
 more defined rounding of the shoulders and 
 a shrivelling of brain-cells. 
 
 Try and remember that the only value of an 
 affirmation is to familiarize the mind with a new 
 truth. To the boy just taking up the study of 
 arithmetic the science of mathematics is a 
 sealed book. He is obliged to open this vol- 
 ume little by little. So he studies addition, 
 multiplication, and division, until he sees his 
 way into new combinations. After a while he 
 is not compelled to recall that nine times nine 
 are eighty-one. He knows it, and that part of 
 his mathematical education is finished. He 
 can run up a great column of figures in a jiffy, 
 and if he makes a mistake he knows that it is 
 
42 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 his own blunder, and that there is nothing 
 amiss with the law. 
 
 There is very little difference between the 
 student of mathematics and the student of 
 mind. The thought of being able to govern 
 ourselves instead of being governed by fate 
 or circumstance is a truth which has only re- 
 cently been recognized. Centuries of error 
 have made it a hard matter to comprehend. 
 Like the science of numbers it must be com- 
 menced at the very beginning and in the sim- 
 plest manner possible. 
 
 When we make the glorious statement — 
 “/ can because I am," it is imperative that we 
 do our level best to understand what these 
 words mean. Without this understanding the 
 phrase is of no earthly use. 
 
 I can be free and happy and strong because 
 I am. Am what? Am the expression, the 
 temple of the living God — the expression of 
 creative energy. This makes me the true “ I 
 am,” and all that I have to do is to recognize 
 this truth and express this energy. There 
 can be no realization of the “ I am ” until one 
 begins to create, just as grammar can be of 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 43 
 
 no use to a student until he begins to make 
 sentences and write letters and compositions. 
 Then he creates something, and so puts into 
 practice the rules which seemed so hard when 
 he was memorizing them. Let us take a case 
 in point. I, for instance, was at the head of 
 my class in grammar, though, with the excep- 
 tion of mathematics, I thought it the dryest 
 stuff that the mind of man had ever conceived 
 of. I was at the foot of the class in mathe- 
 matics, and as I look back I think I was some- 
 what proud of the position. I was ashamed of 
 myself about the grammar, however, for I re- 
 alized that I was a thorough fake. My teacher 
 was deceived in me because of a quick and re- 
 tentive memory. I could remember pages of 
 anything no matter how dry or abstruse. But 
 I did not know how intellectually to apply the 
 rules to composition, and yet, strange to say, 
 the preparation of an essay was a perfect joy 
 to me. I instinctively used these rules with- 
 out perceiving how I did it, and it was not until 
 in later years when I commenced to earn my 
 living by the pen that the meaning and appli- 
 cation of these rules dawned upon me. When 
 
44 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 this time came I was amazed, and I could not 
 help wondering if the failure to make these 
 connections in the past was the fault of my 
 teacher or my own. It seems to me that I 
 could have known as well then as afterward, 
 but perhaps not. 
 
 To take a large view of the subject, was it 
 important that I should know these rules when 
 I could talk to the point and write to the point 
 without them? It appears sometimes as if 
 this especial creative faculty was born whole, 
 so to speak, and needed no primary instruc- 
 tion. It came full-fledged, all ready to do its 
 work. 
 
 This is no uncommon experience, as most 
 of us know. There are born mathematicians, 
 mechanics, and musicians, who every day 
 demonstrate the completeness of the creative 
 principle. 
 
 We see, more infrequently, it is true, ex- 
 cellent mental scientists who never needed a 
 constructed affirmation in their progressive 
 work. They are themselves tne affirmations. 
 They intuitively know that the God-right to 
 govern is vested in themselves. They did 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 45 
 
 not have to be told. It was not necessary for 
 them to say, “I am free,” “I am well.” 
 These were self-evident propositions. 
 
 This is the way it will be in everything one 
 of these days. We shall not need the slow 
 processes of learning in any department of art, 
 literature, or science. We shall know because 
 we know that we have a right to know. Until 
 then we must learn the primary rules of any- 
 thing in which we wish to become proficient. 
 
 There is no way of getting a truth firmly 
 fixed in the mind outside of these psychic or 
 intuitive methods which we have been consid- 
 ering, except by beginning with the alphabet, 
 and according to our attention will be our 
 progress. 
 
 Every conscientious student of the science 
 of being has times of illumination which clear 
 away the fog and reveal the onward and up- 
 ward path. He is not obliged then to grope 
 his way by short and careful steps. He walks 
 bravely and triumphantly along, feeling confi- 
 dent that, whatever the obstacles, he can never 
 be left entirely in the dark. 
 
 The progress of the individual is determined 
 
46 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 by the amount of his creative force. The first 
 thing to know is that we possess this creative 
 energy, and the next thing is to bring it into 
 intelligent exercise. In order to grasp this 
 knowledge, affirmations of power are abso- 
 lutely necessary. An approximate realization 
 of such possession is usually a sufficient stimu- 
 lus to endeavor. It is impossible to be care- 
 less or lazy when the song of dominion is sing- 
 ing in one’s soul; when the divine in one’s 
 self is constantly declaring that health and 
 happiness and immortality in the flesh are 
 truths if one is only willing to work them out. 
 
 Not long ago a friend, whom I always 
 called “ the woman with a willing mind,” so 
 desirous was she of knowing and doing, started 
 in with all her might on this work of recon- 
 struction. Her life had been a hard and bitter 
 one, but there was not an atom of bitterness 
 in her nature that I could ever discern. And 
 I really tried to do so, although such effort was 
 quite opposed to the usual scientific method of 
 looking only for the good. In one of our con- 
 versations she said : 
 
 “ I have always felt that there was some- 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 4 7 
 
 thing wrong in myself, or all these horrible 
 things could not intrude upon my life. But 
 what? As far as the Ten Commandments 
 were concerned I was absolutely perfect. I 
 was kindly disposed to my fellow-creatures 
 and always ready to do a kindness. I never 
 quarrelled, and was very slow to anger.” 
 
 “ But these were all negative virtues,” I ven- 
 tured to remark. 
 
 “Yes, I have thought of that, but as long as 
 I was willing to do all I could for peace and 
 harmony what more was to be expected from 
 me? I could not make the persons in my 
 environment behave themselves. I tried that 
 for years, and it didn’t work. The more I 
 expostulated and reasoned and coaxed, the 
 more friction I found to contend with. Un- 
 der all these circumstances, why should I con- 
 stantly blame myself for what was continually 
 happening? ” 
 
 Then I told her that this accusation was the 
 God in herself protesting against the sacrifice 
 of her individuality; that this divine force, 
 this creative principle was ever on the watch 
 to assure her that self-preservation was really 
 
4 S 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 the first law of nature ; that we could do noth- 
 ing worth doing for others until we lifted our- 
 selves out of negative conditions. 
 
 “But,” said she, “you do not mean that we 
 must stop caring and doing for others? That 
 would be impossible.” 
 
 “ It is just as Jesus Christ said: 'I, if I be 
 lifted up, will draw all men unto me.’ As 
 long as we are down in the valley with our 
 brothers and sisters we are of no use to them. 
 The sentiment that passess current for helpful 
 love is maudlin stuff. Did it ever do you any 
 good to sit down and weep with a friend, or 
 have that friend weep with you? Did you 
 ever feel any better or stronger for listening 
 to a detailed account of an illness or a death 
 or a sorrow? Did you ever receive any last- 
 ing help from pouring your woes into another’s 
 ear? Do you think he or she was lifted and 
 inspired by your doleful story? No, you were 
 all in the ditch together. When we reach an 
 eminence where it is possible for us to hold 
 out our hands and say, “Come up higher, 
 brother. Jump up and try it again, sister,” 
 with smiles on our faces and happiness in our 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 49 
 
 hearts, because we know that by one proc- 
 ess or another every child of God must some- 
 how or somewhere save himself, then we can 
 do some good. When we are really ‘ lifted 
 up ’ we realize that all is well with everybody, 
 notwithstanding the seeming, and it is utterly 
 impossible for us any longer to worry about 
 them, or be hurt by them. They are po- 
 tential conquerors and have the same privi- 
 lege of Sonship and Daughtership that we 
 have. Then our letting go of them is the 
 very best thing that could happen. There is 
 nothing more aggravating to a person who 
 is working out his problem, whether in the 
 science of mathematics or the science of 
 Being, than to be continually nagged, ques- 
 tioned, and advised. His rights are being in- 
 truded upon, and he resents it, and that makes 
 inharmony rampant and is the cause of more 
 sickness and sorrow to the interferer than to 
 the one who is interfered with.” 
 
 “I begin to see it,” said the woman with 
 the willing mind. “ I have been sentimental 
 instead of wisely loving. I will strive for the 
 eminence you spoke of.” 
 
50 PREVENTION AND CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 And she did strive. For weeks there was 
 no report. I minded my own business — 
 though I confess it was hard — and asked no 
 questions. Finally, one morning we met at 
 a shopping counter. I knew that she had 
 climbed the heights as soon as I saw her face. 
 
 “Well?” said I. 
 
 “All is well,” she replied, “ and oh ! it came 
 so suddenly. There had been an unusual con- 
 flict in the family, and I started to make my 
 affirmations of peace. But to my wonder and 
 surprise I found I did not need them. Peace 
 was really mine right in the midst of this rag- 
 ing tempest. It had no more effect upon me 
 than distant thunder, and I have a perfect 
 realization that I never again can be affected 
 by such conditions.” 
 
 This was the result of willingness to learn, 
 and a steadfast holding to the lessons. Her 
 affirmations were at first merely intellectual 
 helps, the same as the multiplication table to 
 a child, but they opened the door for her into 
 countless realms of beauty and harmony, 
 
 “Go thou, and do likewise.” 
 
 “I can because I am.” 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 RESPECT FOR THE OLD. 
 
 “ W hy do people generally lose respect for 
 the old?” 
 
 For no other reason in the world than that 
 the old generally lose respect for themselves. 
 
 This answer will probably be strongly com- 
 bated by the asker of this question, who shows 
 by her communication a very strong belief in 
 the necessity of old age and other negative and 
 equally unpleasant conditions. But let us see 
 if the statement is not true. 
 
 The thought of the ages has so crystallized 
 into a belief in the inevitableness and help- 
 lessness of old age, that at a certain time in 
 life every human being considers it an imper- 
 ative duty to begin to travel down hill. They 
 say that the hand of the Lord is upon them, 
 but they reckon without their host, for the 
 Lord has nothing whatever to do with it. 
 The One whom we call Lord is the Lord of 
 
52 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 life and not of death, the Lord of strength and 
 not of weakness. The All-Good could never 
 have decreed anything so horrible as disease 
 and decay. Ten years ago even, such a sen- 
 tence as the above would have been challenged 
 and seriously criticised, but to-day, thank 
 God, orthodox ministers are preaching this 
 doctrine in their pulpits, and eminent but once 
 narrow philosophers are putting such thoughts 
 into books. 
 
 Growing old is a habit and a very bad 
 one. Growing old is a letting go, a relaxing 
 of energy. 
 
 “ I am so many years old. I do not see as 
 well as I once did. None of my faculties are 
 as acute as they once were. I am getting 
 feeble. I am growing old." 
 
 This is what we hear on all sides ; what we 
 always have heard, and what we shall continue 
 to hear until there is a more universal waking 
 up in this matter. A good many are waking 
 up, however, and these questioners and think- 
 ers will carry the glad tidings to others, who 
 in their turn will prove evangels. 
 
 As many of our readers are already impa- 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 53 
 
 tient to know what is meant by the statement 
 that the old are not respected because they do 
 not respect themselves, we will consider that 
 point now, and go on with the argument later. 
 
 The letters that come to this office from 
 those who call themselves old are all of one 
 character. They are full of complaints of 
 their children, relatives, and friends. They 
 are not treated well, not respected. Many of 
 them have broken up their homes and gone to 
 live with their children, in many cases having 
 invested the bulk of their money in the son’s 
 or the son-in-law’s business. If any of them 
 have ever realized on these sums, the good 
 news has not reached this department. 
 
 There are honest sons and honest sons-in- 
 law, but there seems no reason, now that 
 mother has got along in years, why she should 
 not put her money into the business and take 
 it out in board. 
 
 Then there are the mothers and fathers who 
 are taken in out of charity, and who feel them- 
 selves a burden every moment of their miser- 
 able lives. There are all sorts and conditions, 
 but every one of the number parted with his 
 
54 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 or her self-respect before entering upon this 
 bondage. 
 
 Here is a woman who gave up a fine home 
 and a small but adequate income for the privi- 
 lege (?) of living with her daughter. Now, 
 through some mismanagement and more sel- 
 fishness on the part of the daughter, mother 
 is obliged to ask for car-fare and money for 
 postage-stamps, and is considered very cruel 
 if she is not willing at all times, by night or 
 by day, to act as nurse for the grandchildren. 
 This woman has sacrificed every right. Do 
 you think she respects herself? Not much. 
 Had she kept her house and lived on her in- 
 come, she would have been independent and 
 consequently self-respecting. This she would 
 have done had she known herself for what she 
 was — a free-born citizen of God’s universe. 
 The head of a family should never carelessly 
 pass the reins of government to another. 
 There are children and children; some that 
 can be trusted and others that can not. The 
 son or daughter who has been selfish or sly in 
 their dealings before marriage will be tricky 
 and selfish afterward. Marriage, like death, 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 55 
 
 produces no great change. The average son 
 has no misgivings about leaving his mother 
 and starting out for himself in life. He mar- 
 ries and goes away. So does the daughter. 
 This is all as it should be. The birds forsake 
 the parent nest, but is it very poor policy for 
 the mother bird to fly with them, at least to 
 the extent of deserting her own home. Some- 
 times, of course, here seems no other way, but 
 such changes should be made with the greatest 
 caution. Right here is one of the places where 
 individualism is so necessary. The home 
 may seem a different spot after the children 
 have left it, but the home made by the father 
 and mother is not alone for the rearing and 
 the education of children. It is for themselves. 
 The greatest mistake that was ever made is in 
 thinking that there is nothing more to do, to 
 have, to enjoy after the children are “settled.” 
 
 “ If I can live to see my daughters happily 
 married and settled,” says the fond, foolish, 
 ignorant mother, “ I shall have nothing left to 
 wish for.” 
 
 There is nothing in the least right about 
 such an attitude or statement, from the first 
 
5 6 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 premise to the last. To commence with, the 
 marriage of the daughters should not be, as it 
 generally is, the first consideration. It should 
 be the proper training and education of the 
 girl, with a view to the evolution of individu- 
 ality, that she may be able to hold her own 
 anywhere, in marriage or out of it. The 
 mothers who think that life holds nothing 
 more for them after their children are disposed 
 of, are sure to become burdens upon somebody. 
 What little individuality they possessed has 
 vanished with the children, and there is noth- 
 ing left but a grumbling, tottering stepping 
 toward the grave. Such persons are not desir- 
 able anywhere. The sons may want to bor- 
 row their money, and the daughters will put 
 up with them if they are obliged to. Of 
 course they “won’t see mother without a 
 home,” but she is so hard to get along with, 
 with her pains and fears and stories of the 
 past. How can these mothers inspire respect 
 when they have not enough respect for them- 
 selvs to keep them cheerful, hopeful, active, 
 and perfectly independent? There can be no 
 happiness in life without independence, and 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 57 
 
 one’s own home is the best place to foster and 
 cultivate this most desirable quality. 
 
 The satisfaction of having wisely directed 
 one’s children should add many years to one’s 
 life instead of taking from them. There is 
 very little time during the period of child-bear- 
 ing and child-rearing for the broad study and 
 enjoyment to which every daughter of God is 
 entitled. After the toil and heat of the day 
 come the natural rest and refreshment. This 
 is the opportunity for the attainment of a 
 higher culture which some day some men and 
 women will know how to enjoy. There is no 
 time for comfort and peace and joy when peo- 
 ple are spending all their energies in getting 
 ready to die. Is it not possible to make the 
 writers of these old-age and death letters to 
 this office understand that they not only do 
 all their own dying, but their own decree- 
 ing as well ? There is no far-away God sitting 
 on a throne in a far-away heaven, who decrees 
 that you shall fail in health, fail in pocket, 
 grow old, and in other ways make fools of 
 yourselves. It is all according to your own 
 desire, intelligence, and determination. If, 
 
58 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 with the love of God in your heart, you plant 
 yourselves firmly on your two feet, resolved 
 to stand, there is nothing in the universe that 
 can overthrow you, because there is nothing in 
 the universe superior to man. He is the big- 
 gest thing in it, and when he says a thing and 
 means it, it is bound to go. Man — this word 
 is of course used generically and means woman 
 as well as man — is made in the image and like- 
 ness of God, and is the only medium through 
 which God can express himself. Whether this 
 medium is strong or weak, well or ill, happy 
 or unhappy, rests in the individual. It is a 
 question of his intelligence and fidelity. The 
 better and stronger the medium of expression, 
 the stronger and better the message. 
 
 Some of you will ask : “ But what are these 
 
 feeble old people to do in order to bring about 
 a better state of things? They are old, they 
 are sick, they are dependent, they are very 
 unhappy, and their children do not respect 
 them. Granted that they brought these con- 
 ditions upon themselves, what can they do 
 now ? " 
 
 All of them could do something if they 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 59 
 
 would. Some of them will when the truth is 
 clearly presented to them. This habit of 
 growing old and dying is a very hard one to 
 overcome. It is in the very blood and bones. 
 
 Steps can be retraced, dropped stitches 
 taken up, but it is not easy work. Old houses 
 can be renovated and put in beautiful order if 
 will and intelligence stand at the helm. But 
 it must be an up-and-a-doing sort of business, 
 and each one must be a faithful warder at his 
 or her own gate. Thoughts of feebleness, 
 illness, old age, and death must be met and 
 vanquished at once, and in their stead must be 
 placed high and brave thoughts of dominion 
 over all things. 
 
 One friend who has been carefully practis- 
 ing on these lines writes that she hasn’t cele- 
 brated a birthday for three years, and is deter- 
 mined not to count the time off as was once 
 her foolish habit. 
 
 “ My children and grandchildren do not 
 know what to make of me,” she adds. “I 
 have no occasion now to ask aid in buttoning 
 my boots or tying my veil. I go out and re- 
 turn when I please, and I trouble no one to 
 
60 PREVENTION AND CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 come after me; indeed, I will not permit it 
 under any circumstances. This used to be a 
 standing cause of complaint : ‘Oh, dear! I’ve 
 got to go after grandmother. ’ I could talk to 
 you a week and then not tell you all the good 
 things that I have substituted for bad and weak 
 ones. I am rarely ever ill now, and five years 
 ago illness was my normal condition. Let me 
 tell you that mother is treated with some re- 
 spect now.” 
 
 Certainly, and because she respects herself. 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 / 
 
 don’t be discouraged. 
 
 In following the path laid out in previous 
 chapters there may come moments when it 
 will seem far easier to lie down by the wayside 
 and die than to keep up the march. This is 
 the case with the majority of persons who 
 have spent their lives in thinking wrong 
 thoughts and doing foolish deeds. Error- 
 thinking has become habitual, and the work 
 of casting out error and substituting truth will 
 sometimes be wearisome. But there is one 
 supreme satisfaction in this quest, tired and 
 disheartened though we may occasionally be — 
 we can never turn back. We may go slowly, 
 and we may sit down and wait a while, but 
 it is an utter impossibilty to retrace our steps. 
 We may look back, and perchance cry out for 
 the things we have left, foolish and unsatis- 
 factory though they were — such is the force of 
 habit — but up to date I have not found a sin- 
 
62 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 gle person who ever returned to the old start- 
 ing-point. 
 
 And isn’t this glorious testimony! One 
 may falter for a moment and think he is about 
 to faint or fall, but a little converse with the 
 God in himself braces him up again, and off 
 he starts more determined than ever. He may 
 feel and declare that he seems to be making 
 very little headway compared to what he ex- 
 pected when he took the road, but there is 
 never any real desire for the old methods. 
 
 The tremendous statement has been made 
 that no one likes to have the care of the old. 
 This will be contradicted by a few sentimental- 
 ists, who will declare that they were never so 
 happy in their lives as when they were antici- 
 pating the wants of mother or grandmother, 
 or tagging along after dear old grandpa for 
 fear that he would stumble and fall. 
 
 I do not believe that these are true state- 
 ments, though I do not think that these per- 
 sons mean to lie. They have schooled them- 
 selves to this work because some one must do 
 it, but that they like the job is not conceivable. 
 How can one fail constantly to compare mother 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 63 
 
 as she once was with mother as she is now? 
 And how is it possible not to cry out in bitter- 
 ness of spirit against such waste and disinte- 
 gration ? 
 
 A young man said to me with a vehemence 
 which I never saw equalled : 
 
 “ I would give every dollar I own in the 
 world if I could stop my mother in this down- 
 hill process which she seems to have adopted 
 lately. She is the light of my eyes and the 
 joy of my heart, and to see her ageing and 
 failing day after day drives me nearly dis- 
 tracted.” 
 
 “What does she say about it? ” I asked. 
 
 “ Oh, she smiles serenely, and declares that 
 I am both illogical and irreverent. God has 
 created us all to grow old and die, and her 
 time has come for the decrepitude of age. I 
 told her this morning that I thought it would 
 be a good plan to die and be done with it.” 
 
 “ Then you would not like to walk along 
 with her through these processes of decay ? ” 
 
 “ No, and I don’t believe it would be possi- 
 ble for me to do so. I would a thousand times 
 rather she would breathe her last breath this 
 
64 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 minute than to see this awful work go on. 
 Just think of it — once so dainty and bright, 
 and now picking out sombre colors and wear- 
 ing what she calls ‘ old ladies’ bonnets.’ ” 
 
 “ You don’t agree with your mother in re- 
 gard to the cause of old age and death? In 
 other words, you do not consider them God- 
 sent? ” 
 
 “ God forbid ! ” was the godly response. “ I 
 believe that the devil of ignorance is the only 
 one to blame in this matter.” 
 
 These were advanced thoughts indeed for a 
 young man scarcely twenty-four years old, but 
 he spoke the honest truth out of a full, tender, 
 and loving heart. He was not fettered by 
 creed or habit. He did not care what any one 
 might think or say, and that is the place we 
 must all reach before we can be really free. 
 
 “ Is it possible that I have got to stand by 
 and see my mother go trotting down-hill in 
 this fashion?” my companion asked at part- 
 ing. 
 
 “And, oh! those confounded old ladies’ 
 bonnets! ” he added. “ It sometimes seems to 
 me that if I could get her to take some interest 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 65 
 
 in her personal appearance, in the style and 
 quality of her garments, half the battle would 
 be won. But, no! Any old thing is good 
 enough for an old woman, and I have at last 
 reached the place where I hate to take her out, 
 because I am ashamed of her. If she goes on 
 at this rate in five years’ time she will look 
 more like an Egyptian mummy than anything 
 else.” 
 
 My advice to this loyal and sensible son was 
 to talk these things right out, whatever the 
 apparent consequences. He was right and his 
 mother was wrong. Patience and determina- 
 tion might succeed in forcing a seed into her 
 benighted mind which would take root and 
 grow and blossom into a saving grace. 
 
 This young man had good and sufficient 
 reasons for the faith that was in him, so this 
 advice was safe. It might be safe in any in- 
 stance, though it does seem as if the average 
 spoken protest against old age served only to 
 stir up discord. 
 
 “I come not to bring peace, but a sword,” 
 said Jesus Christ. And sometimes the sword 
 of the spirit is more necessary than anything 
 
66 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 else. We should certainly be very positive in 
 our treatment of these negative conditions. 
 
 Does any one really think that there would 
 be such a demand for old men’s and old ladies’ 
 homes if the children of these decrepit and dy- 
 ing ones really liked to take care of them? 
 That there are inmates of these institutions 
 whose children would gladly care for them if 
 they were able to do so, goes without saying, 
 but that this work would be done more from a 
 sense of duty than real desire, goes also with- 
 out saying. The secrets are all disclosed when 
 one is so unfortunate as to be obliged to listen 
 to the stories of those who are supported by 
 public charity. 
 
 “ I was very disagreeable to my son-in-law,” 
 a sweet-faced, bright-eyed woman told me. 
 “You see I had a long spell of rheumatism, 
 and he thought it was more than my daughter 
 was able to bear, and the first thing I knew I 
 was obliged to come here. Of course I came 
 with my own consent, but I could not stay and 
 be a burden, you know.” 
 
 And this foolish woman had heavily mort- 
 gaged a house and a store to pull her son-in- 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 67 
 
 law out of a financial hole. He couldn’t pay 
 the interest on the property, and the mort- 
 gages were foreclosed. 
 
 With this woman, as with thousands of oth- 
 ers, there had been no intelligent preparation 
 against old age — or, speaking after the man- 
 ner of the world -— for old age. Even without 
 the spiritual quickening which discloses the 
 truth that such decay is not necessary, it does 
 seem as if we might have had a little better 
 showing in these respects. 
 
 Now, I would not be in the least discouraged 
 about our friends in the old ladies’ and the old 
 men’s homes if it were not for the fact that 
 these institutions are exclusively governed by 
 the churches and considered as simple halting- 
 places for the dying. Sometimes death seems 
 long in coming to all concerned. The rooms 
 and the beds are wanted for other occupants, 
 those who are not so helpless, and in such an 
 atmosphere how is it possible to speak the 
 word that will be likely to start a healthy train 
 of thought ? Outside the cemetery there is 
 nothing nearer death than these congregations 
 of men and women “waiting for the call.” It 
 
68 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 is the saddest sight on earth, because it more 
 vividly shows the effect of ignorance than 
 anything else can do, not excepting prisons. 
 
 There is life and health and strength in 
 prisons. The inmates have materialized error 
 thoughts, that is all, and there is a fine chance 
 for a man as long as he expects to be free 
 some day. 
 
 I never saw a horse “ turned out to die ” 
 without a keen sense of sorrow, but how much 
 harder to bear is the sight of these multitudes 
 of our dear brothers and sisters waiting for 
 death to relieve them and all who have the 
 care of them ! 
 
 It is a hideous picture, and the less we con- 
 template it the better for our peace of mind 
 and consequent usefulness. But these object- 
 lessons are occasionally necessary. They 
 teach us the importance of a steadfast protest 
 against this crystallized thought of old age. 
 They brace us up to speak the word continu- 
 ally. 
 
 We know now that no one wants to grow 
 old, feeble, and helpless, that no one enjoys 
 observing this process in others, and that the 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 69 
 
 care of the old is not a congenial occupation. 
 The whole universe cries out against decay, 
 and yet every human creature on top of the 
 earth believed until very recently that God or 
 nature had decreed old age and death. The 
 large majority of the world’s inhabitants are 
 of this opinion now, but there are enough 
 who are not to leaven the whole lump. 
 
 So let us not be discouraged, but let us work 
 with all our might for the establishment of 
 the truth, which is that we have as much right 
 to life as the God who made us, and that the 
 issues of life and death are within ourselves. 
 
CHAPTER VII. 
 
 PREVENTION. 
 
 This work should be commenced in child- 
 hood, as soon as a boy or a girl is born into 
 the world. Yea, verily, and before, months 
 and years before there is any thought of giv- 
 ing birth to children. Many persons are now 
 waking up to this necessity, and are doing 
 their best to educate the young in the science 
 of being. 
 
 I charge all those who read this volume to 
 strive in every imaginable way for the estab- 
 lishment of schools which shall teach this 
 science of mind along with the intellectual 
 branches which must form the groundwork of 
 a child’s education. It is a shame to be any 
 longer remiss in this matter. Why should 
 we who are so keenly aware of our own mis- 
 education stand passively by and permit our 
 little ones to box the compass of errors which 
 have made life a perpetual Tophet, and which 
 
Prevention and cure of old age. 71 
 
 we are striving so hard to eliminate from our 
 consciousness ? 
 
 When we commence this work we find that 
 there is something to do all along the line. We 
 must meet and speak the word to every kind of 
 negative thought. We have the so-called very 
 old and those “past middle life,” who are fret- 
 ting their hearts out because of the loss of 
 beauty and the expected approach of infirmi- 
 ties. We have the young man and the maiden, 
 and last, but not least, the dear little children. 
 There is a great work to be done for each and 
 all of these. The work with the child is by far 
 the easiest. Children are passive, receptive, 
 natural, teachable. They have nothing to 
 unlearn, and are utterly without prejudice. 
 
 We have found that nothing is impossible 
 when the Ego has learned to recognize its own 
 divinity. We have learned that this is the 
 bed-rock upon which every material, moral, 
 and spiritual structure must be reared. “ Oth- 
 er foundation there is none.” For thousands 
 of years men have built upon the shifting 
 sands. Most of them were half dead to start 
 with — the majority unwished for and unwel- 
 
7 2 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 come, ushered into families that had no use 
 for them — by the lustful use of the great crea- 
 tive principle. Of course they were half dead 
 when they were born. As if that were not 
 enough, precedent decreed that the live half 
 should immediately commence to die. 
 
 “ If you do this you will be sick. If you 
 eat that you will die. If you are not a good 
 child you cannot go to heaven. Mamma will 
 punish you and God will punish you.” 
 
 This is the kind of teaching that the young 
 and plastic mind has had from time imme- 
 morial. Are we not strong enough even now 
 to at least hamper and harass this death-deal- 
 ing, old-age-breeding curriculum? I am sure 
 that we are, if we all attend to our business by 
 speaking the right word and administering 
 the strong blow against the walls of creed and 
 tradition whenever we have opportunity to do 
 so ; and surely there can be no lack of that. 
 
 The prevention of old age, so far as treat- 
 ment in this small volume is concerned, must 
 principally concern those persons who have 
 reached a point where they begin to observe 
 and acutely dread their own decadence. How 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 73 
 
 shall they prevent the further processes of 
 decay ? 
 
 First, as I have tried to make plain in pre- 
 vious chapters, by the recognition of the “ I 
 am ” in themselves. As long as they depend 
 upon an unapproachable God in the far-off 
 realm of nowhere, they will sicken, grow old, 
 and die. This lesson has been taught by cen- 
 turies of suffering and heartbreak. We need 
 not emphasize it except in the attempt to in- 
 duce our readers to discard from their minds 
 the cut-and-dried conclusion that because a 
 certain order of things has always obtained it 
 always must. We once studied our lessons by 
 the light of a tallow candle. If the arc light 
 had been predicted at that time it would have 
 been considered blasphemous. “ If God had 
 intended a better light than the candle he 
 would have given it to us,” the wise in their 
 own conceit would have argued. But we have 
 the arc light now, and a thousand other al- 
 most inconceivable things, which I trust the 
 dear ones of the tallow-dip era observe and 
 enjoy with us. I am sure that they do, 
 though this conviction, founded upon knowl- 
 
^4 THE prevention and 
 
 edge, will doubtless seem as heretical and 
 absurd to some of our readers as other state- 
 ments in the science of being. 
 
 But how beautiful it is! When one abso- 
 lutely knows a thing one is never disturbed 
 by what other people think. Having done all, 
 we stand and wait for further light, which is 
 never denied the honest seeker. 
 
 To prevent old age we must realize our 
 right to life, health, and good looks, and exer- 
 cise that right continually. 
 
 There are grades of realization. No one 
 has yet come to a perfect recognition of his 
 own God-power. When that time does come 
 — and it is coming — this world will be the 
 theatre of events that have never been ap- 
 proached in the history of the world. Those 
 who have ears to hear let them listen. 
 
 In this matter a few persons stand conspicu- 
 ously in the foreground. They “have not yet 
 attained,” but they are fast attaining. But 
 many are pressing on with more or less diffi- 
 culty. They have turned away from every 
 other method of finding happiness, and success 
 is assured. 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 75 
 
 The following is a copy of a letter from an 
 enthusiastic worker, which seems to me 
 as fitting an introduction to many other 
 points which I wish to cover as any I could 
 select ; 
 
 “Dear Friend: 
 
 “Won’t you please write something for the 
 folks who daily observe the approach of ' the 
 sere and yellow, ’ and who feel that such de- 
 cay is very mean and unnecessary? Your 
 ‘ Perpetual Youth has done me no end of 
 good. Without that I should have grown 
 too discouraged to care whether I lived or 
 died. 
 
 “ Now I want to know something about pro- 
 cesses — ways and means — I am a Sagittarius 
 woman, and practical in the extreme. I know 
 to my perfect satisfaction that the starting- 
 point is realization, and I am getting there as 
 fast as I can. I lived to be forty years old 
 without a glimmer of an idea that I had any- 
 thing to do with my own soul except that I 
 must not lie, steal, murder, commit adultery, 
 or bear false witness against my neighbor. I 
 never had the slightest desire to do either. 
 My body was to be kept clean and wholesome 
 and clothed according to my means. When I 
 
76 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 was poor I wore prints, and when I was rich 
 purple and fine linen. In short, I conformed 
 to every condition with a grace and humility 
 which I supposed was very pleasing to God. 
 In this cheerful salaaming to what I consid- 
 ered God’s law, I grew round-shouldered both 
 in mind and body. One day I awoke to the 
 fact that I had greatly changed. Why that 
 particular day I cannot tell you. Perhaps I 
 had been too busy, too absorbed in the ever- 
 lasting round of social functions to notice this 
 transformation, but the revelation almost 
 paralyzed me. When I spoke to my husband 
 about it he said calmly, 4 Why, yes, Anna. 
 You have been falling off for some time.’ 
 Then I began to cry, and reproached him for 
 not having told me. 
 
 “ ‘ But what good would it have done?’ he 
 asked. 
 
 “ ‘ Why, I would have painted and powdered 
 and put on some extra frills, taken more pains 
 with my toilet ■’ 
 
 “ ‘None of those things will ever cover up — 
 that,’ he interrupted, “and paint and powder 
 will only make you a laughing-stock.’ 
 
 “ This was unutterably awful. This change 
 in me could only be described by ‘that.’ Had 
 I been a leper I could not have felt more hu- 
 miliated, more of an outcast; and yet that 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 77 
 
 blessed man had no intention of conveying 
 such an idea. 
 
 “ Most people will say that I was led en- 
 tirely by my vanity into what is called * The 
 New Thought.’ Possibly this verdict is cor- 
 rect. It is true that I had not felt well or 
 strong for some time, and off and on had been 
 under the care of a physician, but these things 
 had not roused me to seek a better way. The 
 reflection in the mirror did. I am thus ex- 
 plicit because I wish you to make no mistake 
 in my motive, and I will also say that by un- 
 derstanding this case you will get at the true 
 inwardness of many other cases. Since my 
 curious awakening I have talked with several 
 women who were brought to their senses by 
 the loss of their beauty and by no other cause. 
 If this is vanity, thank the Lord for vanity. 
 
 “ Now in regard to processes. The knowl- 
 edge that there is no one in the universe to 
 dispute my right to health, beauty, and hap- 
 piness lifted me at once to a place of safety — 
 a place of intelligence to grow from. But I 
 grow slowly. True, I have no doctor and take 
 no medicine in these bright days. I am 
 stronger and have improved in looks. Still, 
 certain things that I eat disagree with me, or 
 I think they do. Some of the things that I 
 used to like are simply disgusting to me now 
 
78 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 — meat, for one thing — and yet I fear that I 
 cannot be properly nourished without meat. 
 A good scientist, I am told, should be able to 
 eat, digest, and assimilate anything or any 
 combination of things, however rich. I could 
 do this far more successfully before I ever 
 heard of the new thought than now. Accord- 
 ing to Christian Science as it has been ex- 
 plained to me, this is all wrong, but I cannot 
 make it seem wrong. 
 
 “ Query : Is it not as scientific for one to use 
 his mind in the choice of things and methods 
 that are agreeable and appear sensible and 
 helpful, as it is to spend all one’s time in treat- 
 ing one’s stomach to take care of stuff that the 
 stomach doesn’t want and refuses point-blank 
 to have anything to do with ? 
 
 “ It appears to me that every day more and 
 more godly helps are disclosed to me. Should 
 I use them, or should I not? ” 
 
 The matter of personal vanity has been 
 treated in another chapter. The desire to be 
 beautiful is the God in us crying out for ex- 
 pression. This being the case it is not at all 
 strange, in the least wrong, or anything to 
 be ashamed of, that Truth is sought through 
 the gates of Beauty. It is a perfectly legiti- 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 79 
 
 mate passageway, and blessed indeed are all 
 who cross that threshold. They may not for 
 some time recover their long - shadowed 
 charms, but they will constantly feel the throb 
 of a new life, and will know that the work of 
 rehabilitation is going on. This is a great 
 comfort to be sure, but it is a very difficult 
 matter for those expectant and impatient ones 
 to keep from watching for results. They 
 seem to think that they can build up in a few 
 weeks that which they have been all their 
 lives tearing down. 
 
 There is nothing in the least miraculous 
 or supernatural about this work. The right 
 thought steadfastly held will materialize the 
 right conditions, or truth is not truth. It 
 may be sooner or later, according to the 
 desire, faith, and will of the individual, but 
 there is no lack of time, and so there is no 
 hurry. We have “all the time there is,” — a 
 beautiful thought when one is able to com- 
 prehend it. The main thing is to emerge 
 from the darkness. This is usually accom- 
 plished by degrees, but, “thanks be to God 
 who giveth us the victory,” even a glimpse 
 
8o 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 of the true light is sufficient to start one on 
 his forward way. More and more illumina- 
 tion follows as he makes himself receptive 
 to it. It is only necessary for us conscien- 
 tiously to use the light of each day to realize 
 a stronger one on each morrow. 
 
 Impatience here, as everywhere else, is a 
 great deterrent force, and should be swept out 
 with the rest of the error thoughts that have 
 kept the world in bondage. Our pain may 
 not all go to-day, our purse may not yet be 
 quite full enough for our needs, and the 
 wrinkles may not seem any less deep, but as 
 long as we know that we have turned our 
 faces to the light we have everything to gain 
 and nothing to lose. Above all things, let us 
 cultivate the 
 
 Sense of Security. 
 
 We are secure. There is no one to molest 
 or make us afraid. We are more or less con- 
 scious that we live, move, and have our being 
 in God. We are in him and he in us, and 
 there never was and never can be any sepa- 
 rateness. 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 8 1 
 
 With this thought always uppermost in our 
 minds, what is there to be disturbed about? 
 This sense of security accomplishes wonderful 
 growing. The hurry of impatience, on the 
 contrary, has the effect of a heavy weight 
 upon our spiritual feet, retarding our prog- 
 ress and balking our desires. 
 
 This is one of the most pregnant truths in 
 the prevention of old age, or in the prevention 
 of any other disagreeable and negative condi- 
 tion. 
 
 We have been restless and dissatisfied long 
 enough. Let us now come into the kingdom 
 of peace. This kingdom is accessible to all 
 who seek it. 
 
 Our correspondent’s communication will be 
 considered more in detail in the next chapter. 
 
CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 PROCESSES. 
 
 The present state of our unfoldment is one 
 of experiment. Two-thirds of the students 
 along mental science lines are in the same 
 condition as the writer of this letter. They 
 are more or less troubled about many things. 
 They are earnest and determined, but this 
 teacher says so and so, and that healer de- 
 clares something entirely opposite. Then 
 there are the friends and companions who 
 have not yet commenced to stir from their 
 sleep, and who talk and act as persons always 
 do when they are ignorant of what they are 
 talking about. 
 
 Now, whether in the prevention or the cure 
 of old age, these things must be determinedly 
 put out of mind. It is no sort of consequence 
 what anybody thinks or says. The rules and 
 regulations which seem so important to others 
 are not for you unless you choose to make 
 
PREVENTION AND CURE OF OLD AGE. 83 
 
 them so. Some of our friends came into the 
 New Thought through a very narrow door. 
 It was a tight squeeze, but it hasn’t harmed 
 a son or daughter among them. „ They are 
 bound to grow into the liberty of the gospel 
 of Christ; and no jurisdiction however emi- 
 nent, no man-made law however stringent, 
 can hinder this process. Their feet are 
 turned Zionward, and they are making good 
 progress. As expressions of a loving and 
 omnipotent God, divine from the first brain 
 cell to the last atom, we cannot be critical 
 concerning the methods of others. We can 
 bid them God-speed, go our own way, rejoic- 
 ing in our freedom to do precisely as we 
 please. 
 
 Personally I did not come into this domain 
 of thought by means of any school or sect, 
 nor did I have any sectarian limits to grow 
 out of. The impossibility of overcoming ill- 
 ness and trouble in any other way drove me 
 into a heaven right here and now ; and here I 
 am proud and happy to stay. This condition 
 is somewhat exceptional, but do not imagine 
 that there was not and is not plenty of over- 
 
8 4 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 coming to do. The heaven consisted at first 
 of the knowledge that not only was this the 
 domain of truth, but that there was no other. 
 This was heaven enough for a little while. 
 The assurance that one positively knows 
 something worth knowing, after years spent 
 in a fruitless quest after health and peace of 
 mind, is bliss unutterable, and there was one 
 woman who placed upon it the highest possi- 
 ble valuation. 
 
 There is nothing monotonous about the 
 Creative Principle. Some persons seem born 
 to lead, and others to follow. Then there are 
 those who are laws unto themselves. They 
 find out they are right, and then, as Davy 
 Crockett recommends, “go ahead.” They 
 have neither time nor inclination to confer 
 with their fellows on matters of doctrine. 
 
 “Get out of my way,” they say. “I have 
 put off the old man and am putting on the new 
 as fast and as thoroughly as T can. In the 
 mean time if you don’t like the garments I am 
 adopting, look the other way. My robe is 
 gray to-day; it may be green to-morrow. I 
 am experimenting, and in the mean time am 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 85 
 
 open to your charges of inconsistency ; but I 
 ask no odds of any of you. Some time per- 
 haps I shall choose purple or the pure white 
 of the spirit. In the mean time clear the 
 track, for nothing can stay my course.” 
 
 This is the spirit to cultivate. These ten- 
 dencies which we call natural, and which lead 
 us to bow and beg, ask advice and follow the 
 bell-sheep, are the garments of the old man. 
 It is easy sometimes to put off a coat or a col- 
 lar and necktie, metaphorically speaking, but 
 the other vestments stick like burrs when we 
 try to lay them aside. But here is the place 
 for patience. Stop worrying about them, and 
 the first thing we know they drop off appar- 
 ently of their own accord. 
 
 This is an unceasing wonder to me. Fear 
 of trouble, accidents, sickness and death — not 
 for myself, but for those I loved — made my 
 life an indescribable purgatory. For myself 
 I never had the slightest apprehension. 
 When I stopped to reason about this singular 
 condition, I would tell myself that some time 
 I should die because everybody else did ; but 
 I am quite sure now that I never quite be- 
 
86 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 lieved the story. It seemed to me that I had 
 some sort of a clutch upon the life principle 
 that others did not have. In those days I 
 gave utterance to some statements that horri- 
 fied the clergy and mortified my family ; but 
 these words were powerless because I could 
 give no reason for them. The thought of 
 what seemed to me should be was quickly 
 made null and void by the fact of what was 
 and what always had been. My clear glimpse 
 of God’s truth was quickly swept aside by 
 creed and precedent. I know all about it 
 now, and can Smile at some of the impotent 
 tussles I indulged in, and which must have 
 won for me the reputation of a high grade of 
 idiocy. 
 
 But this fear for others! What an inde- 
 scribable torture it was ! It seemed a real en- 
 tity sometimes, for it stalked about with me 
 wherever I went. As may be imagined, this 
 was one of the first things to which I turned 
 my attention after I had found this platform 
 of truth to stand upon. Some other condi- 
 tions were at once improved, but there wasn’t 
 a statement I could make, or a thought that I 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 87 
 
 could think, which had the least effect upon 
 these apprehensions of evil. Indeed, for 
 some time there was a decided aggravation of 
 the state. This was most discouraging. One 
 night after a very disagreeable skirmish with 
 these strong-as-death negations, I opened the 
 Bible and read, “ Cast thy burden upon the 
 Lord.” I had come to the place where I al- 
 most believed that the Lord God Almighty — 
 not all the Lord God Almighty there is — re- 
 sided within myself, and that this Lord was 
 able to do what seemed to me very difficult 
 things if I would only trust him. “Cast thy 
 burden upon the Lord.” Cast it. That 
 meant that the most intelligent part of myself, 
 which went by the name of “I,” should take 
 this cowardly fear and cast it on to the still 
 higher self, the God-self, with which part I 
 had not been very intimate. So to the very 
 best of my ability I obeyed the command, de- 
 claring that whether it stayed “ cast ” or re- 
 turned to me in its full pristine vigor, I 
 would make no more fuss about it. So com- 
 pletely did I fulfil these conditions, that for 
 several days I lost all consciousness of fear as 
 
88 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 well as of all thought of what I had done to 
 overcome this habit which for so many years 
 had kept me in such abject bondage. You 
 see this was real giving up, a genuine casting 
 of the burden upon the Lord. There was no 
 string attached to the renunciation. One 
 day, in the simplest manner possible, it 
 dawned upon me that I was no longer afraid, 
 and that many things had recently occurred 
 which once would have tried me almost be- 
 yond my ability to bear. I must have been 
 working up to this vantage-ground for some 
 time. Then came the desire for the spoken 
 word, which was supplied by this passage of 
 Scripture. It was just the right moment in 
 my unfoldment for this oft-quoted line to do 
 its work. 
 
 Some one will ask, “ But who sent you to the 
 Bible? How did it happen? Why couldn’t 
 you have received this help long before? ” 
 
 These were all natural interior processes, 
 and can no more be explained than the flower 
 can be explained from the seed. We plant the 
 seed, and if we unearth it a few weeks later, 
 we see that something has taken place. There 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 89 
 
 is a growth, but this change is quite inexplic- 
 able. If we allow the seed to remain undis- 
 turbed in the bosom of its mother, the first 
 thing we know a little green speck appears 
 upon the surface, and we say, “ Behold, the 
 seed has sprouted.” If we could only consign 
 all of our spiritual seed to the darkness and 
 silence as we trust the seed which never fails 
 to brighten and to nourish the material world, 
 we should be wise indeed. With a few per- 
 sons this time has already come. They sow 
 the seed and let it alone. They speak the 
 word and it stands fast. 
 
 All earnest workers will have tales like 
 these to tell. This obstacle, which seemed 
 insuperable, was rolled away. They did not 
 even know when it went. They admit that 
 perhaps for a long time they had affirmed 
 their superiority to such bondage, but in the 
 hour that they knew not of, the Son of Man 
 came forth and set the captive free. These 
 conclusions always came “in the hour that 
 ye know not of,” and these spiritual climaxes 
 are as absolutely unfailing as those we call 
 material ones. 
 
9 ° 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 You have recognized for a longer or a 
 shorter period that you were growing old, or 
 that you are old. Your eyes are growing 
 dim, or are dim. Your hair is turning gray, 
 or is gray or white. To look at yourself in 
 the mirror is a more trying ordeal than a sur- 
 gical operation. You have been ill and des- 
 pondent and afflicted for years; at least, this 
 is what you tell yourself. And now you are 
 reaping the consequences of your worry, anx- 
 iety, and sorrow. You have lost your money, 
 buried your friends, swallowed drugs, so- 
 journed in hospitals or health retreats, crossed 
 and recrossed the ocean in search of health 
 and happiness, and here you are, old, ill-look- 
 ing, and very, very disheartened. Maybe 
 you have had your faces enamelled or skinned 
 and your hair dyed. But there is no way of 
 deceiving the elect; and the elect is the un- 
 recognized God within yourself. At last hav- 
 ing boxed the compass of materia medica and 
 the art of the masseur and facial decorator, 
 you arrived at the place where you recognized 
 that there was no enduring help in any of these 
 things. All the time the Lord God Almighty 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 9 * 
 
 is waiting within you to show forth his mar- 
 vellous power, but you have been as dead to it 
 as the black earth is dead in consciousness to 
 the seed that is dropped into it. In fact, the 
 Lord God Almighty has been at work every 
 moment of the time, and has softly breathed 
 into you the breath of life as you went on in 
 your experimental work. These experiences 
 were all good, because, as you have proved, 
 nothing else would ever bring you to a knowl- 
 edge of their futility as happiness producers. 
 
 The majority of the people who have be- 
 come interested in Mental or Christian science 
 have commenced their investigations from the 
 standpoint of utter dissatisfaction and disgust 
 with everything else. It is all Greek to them, 
 but they have listened to the wonderful sto- 
 ries of dominion over sickness and poverty, 
 and they have turned to these methods as 
 drowning men clutch at straws. A little ex- 
 perimenting proves that there is a saving 
 power in mind, and they open themselves to 
 the light as the flowers to the morning sun. 
 Success begets enthusiasm, and for a time 
 everything seems changed for the better. 
 
92 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 After a while they note that this pain, which 
 has been such a hindrance to them, has not 
 entirely gone, and there is not the slightest 
 betterment in appearance. They have a little 
 more money than formerly, or their newly ac- 
 quired wisdom causes it to go further than it 
 ever did before. 
 
 This is the place for patience, and a casting 
 of the burden upon the Lord. It is a wise 
 thing to keep this advice in mind and to make 
 frequent trials of its potency if the first efforts 
 do not succeed. But this must not be done in 
 any spirit of haste or anxiety. Be assured 
 that all is going well with you, whether you 
 are constantly aware of this fact or not. Bear 
 in mind the truth that you must be a law unto 
 yourselves. No battle can be won without in- 
 dividuality. If some one tells you that you 
 cannot be a good scientist unless you eat 
 everything that he or she eats, make no re- 
 sponse, but partake of what you find most 
 agreeable and that which appears best suited 
 to your condition. If you are told, as I have 
 been, that physical exercise is entirely unne- 
 cessary to those who are “in the thought,” 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 93 
 
 hold your peace, but don’t believe a word of 
 it. It is not so; neither is it true that to 
 prove one’s scientific understanding it is im- 
 portant to eat baked beans, mince pie, and 
 Rochefort cheese at one sitting. If you think 
 coffee makes you nervous and keeps you from 
 proper rest at night, let coffee alone, though 
 all the world drinks coffee and does not wake 
 from ten o’clock till six. Spend your forces 
 for something better and higher and nobler 
 than in the endeavor to make your stomach 
 harmonize with your palate. If you prefer 
 whole uncooked wheat, apples, and raw pota- 
 toes to roast beef and pastry, take your com- 
 fort with your own peculiar diet, but don’t in- 
 sist upon your neighbor’s adopting it. Some 
 of the healthiest, happiest, and most useful 
 persons that I know eat neither flesh, fish, 
 nor fowl, and prefer raw food to cooked. 
 Who am I that I should criticise their meth- 
 ods, or talk them into doing as I do? 
 
 The same rules apply both to the Preven- 
 tion and the Cure of Old Age. First we must 
 find the God in ourselves. This furnishes a 
 sure foundation to stand upon, as we make 
 
94 PREVENTION AND CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 use of all the helps that Omniscience has pro- 
 vided for our use. There is literally no end 
 to these aids. They are to be found in the 
 scientific exercises that well-trained brains 
 have given to the world ; in the selection of 
 foods and the adaptation to our needs and 
 desires of the very best things we can find 
 in the material, psychic, and spiritual atmos- 
 phere. 
 
 First, the God in ourselves. 
 
 Second, faith and patience in working out 
 our problems, whether in the recovery from 
 old age or in checking the advance of the 
 enemy so much dreaded by all. 
 
 Third, in supplementing these processes 
 of rehabilitation in every sensible, so-called 
 material manner. 
 
 Some of these helps will be stated in 
 another chapter. 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 IN MATERIAL THINGS. 
 
 There is no reason to doubt the authentic- 
 ity of the Scriptures in regard to the advanced 
 ages of many of the men and women of the 
 Old Testament time. Indeed, our most scien- 
 tific scholars declare that these stories are 
 facts, and that the years at that period in 
 the world’s history correspond exactly to the 
 length of our years. This latter statement 
 is clearly proven by astronomical and astro- 
 logical data. So when we read that Methu- 
 saleh lived to be nine hundred and sixty-nine 
 years old, there is no reason to doubt the 
 story. This has seemed such an astonishing 
 tale to the majority of thinkers that a great 
 effort has been made to prove that this fine 
 old fellow in reality had no more claim to 
 longevity than the centenarians of our day, 
 because of a different way of computing time. 
 But this reasoning has been shown to be falla- 
 
9 6 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 cious, and now there is no reason to offer for 
 this extraordinary length of days, except that 
 this ancient worthy and others who improved 
 upon the threescore and ten limit did so be- 
 cause of the perfect simplicity of their lives. 
 We are told that they ate herbs and lived out 
 of doors. 
 
 That Methusaleh and his brethren kept 
 very close to the heart of nature is an indis- 
 putable fact, but whether they lived entirely 
 on herbs or not we have no means of know- 
 ing. If herbs constituted the main part of 
 Methusaleh’s nutriment, I should like to go 
 and gather some of the same kind. If he ate 
 them from the stalks, that is what I would do. 
 If he stewed them I would follow his lead. 
 Any man who could live in the flesh on this 
 planet for almost a thousand years is a good 
 enough example for me. In the matter of 
 herbs my education is exceedingly limited, 
 but I would be willing to chew catnip indef- 
 initely, if that was what Methusaleh found 
 good for him. 
 
 This will doubtless sound very unscientific 
 to some of our readers. “ As if it made any 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 97 
 
 difference what one ate,” they will say. 
 “ And the idea of going back to the dark ages 
 for examples.” 
 
 To the best of my knowledge and belief it 
 does make a difference what one eats, and the 
 age that can produce a Methusaleh is the age 
 that suits me. I suppose he ate when he was 
 hungry, drank when he was thirsty, and slept 
 when he was sleepy. He was not kept out 
 nights by his club, or perplexed by his inabil- 
 ity to met his club dues. He did not keep his 
 stomach constantly stuffed and fermented by 
 roasts and fries, stewed calves’ brains, pig's 
 kidneys, rich pastry, wine and beer. Perhaps 
 if these things had been in evidence at that 
 time, Methusaleh would have upset his stom- 
 ach and shortened his days the same as his 
 feebler brethren are now doing. That is why 
 I say that the simplicity of the Methusaleh 
 age is very attractive to me. As the wise 
 man declared, “ Man has sought out many in- 
 ventions,” and it does seem as if the influence 
 of these products of man’s brain had been to 
 keep the whole world wallowing in sin and 
 misery. 
 
9 8 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 “ Pessimistic? ” 
 
 That depends upon the point of view. If 
 the desire for well-established health, per- 
 petual youth, and all the life we want right 
 here on this faithful little planet is pessi- 
 mistic, I plead guilty to the charge ; but who 
 with a single well-developed brain cell could 
 fail to turn a longing glance to the time when 
 men and women were well and strong, when 
 food was not adulterated and folks knew what 
 they were eating, even if it was herbs with 
 perhaps a sprinkling of wild honey. 
 
 That these stalwart long-livers of the olden 
 time were to a degree conscious of their right 
 to life, liberty, and happiness, I do not doubt. 
 How much they recognized their divinity, 
 their oneness with the Infinite, it is difficult to 
 tell, but there must have been something that 
 kept them going besides herbs and fresh air. 
 Consciously or unconsciously they realized 
 their power to make conditions for them- 
 selves, and they made them. A man who 
 could live nine hundred and sixty-nine years 
 could live forever if he so elected. Probably 
 by the time Methusaleh got to be seven or 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 99 
 
 eight hundred years old — just a boy — some- 
 body started in with a “ new invention ” which 
 caused him to begin to think that he was not 
 on the right track. There might have been 
 “I Want to be an Angel,” or a “Sweet By 
 and By ” flavor to the new thought or thing. 
 Then he began to shift his will and desire 
 from the present to the future — that future in 
 the skies which has done more than anything 
 else to sap the vitality of the whole race. 
 
 Now I have never interviewed Methusaleh ; 
 but did I think he would heed my call, I 
 would shout to him a trumpet peal, if for no 
 other reason than to find out what he really 
 did eat and drink. It might not be easy to 
 stop there, for I should also want to know 
 how far the true God-thought held possession 
 of him. 
 
 I may get Methusaleh on my spiritual tele- 
 phone yet. This instrument is really getting 
 into fine operation. When he answers I will 
 tell you everything he says. 
 
 I once had a spell of thinking that I would 
 rather have written “ The Sweet By and 
 By ” than any classic I had ever read. But I 
 
IOO 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 have changed my mind. I wouldn’t now 
 have the responsibility of those verses on my 
 shoulders for all the gold in the Klondike. 
 Had I been the author I should have taken it 
 all back before this, and so have made peace 
 with my conscience. Think of intelligent 
 beings who hate to grow old, and who are 
 striving to hold on to their good looks and 
 to prolong life, making a practice of singing 
 “The Sweet By and By.”. 
 
 “ Why do you keep on singing that song? ” 
 I asked of a friend, who, wearied and dis- 
 gusted with every other attempt to find health 
 and happiness, had finally turned to the New 
 Thought. 
 
 “ Why, I sing it because it is beautiful,” she 
 answered as the tears of weakness and habit 
 rolled down her cheeks. “Why shouldn’t I 
 sing it? ” 
 
 “You should if you desire to,” I told her, 
 “but you will never make any headway in 
 overcoming while you do so. You cannot oc- 
 cupy two places at the same time. You 
 cannot live in the sweet by and by and at- 
 tend to the things which demand your atten- 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 lot 
 
 tion right here and now. Every thought 
 you put into the future robs the present. 
 Every tear that you shed starts into action 
 the machinery which ploughs furrows in the 
 face and presses the life force from the 
 body. I sang that song myself until I looked 
 like a spook, and all my friends considered 
 me ‘ as good as gone.’ I thought it put me 
 into communication with those I loved. Per- 
 haps it did; but if so, it was anything but 
 a healthy relation. As an inclined plane 
 toward dissolution I consider those verses the 
 easiest and the best oiled of any that I have 
 ever known. You can slide down to music 
 sure enough.” 
 
 If these arguments are as conclusive with 
 my readers as they were with my audience 
 of one, the result will be most satisfactory. 
 She saw the point, and decided to concen- 
 trate her energies on life more abundantly 
 right here and now. The consequence was 
 a renewed vitality, a sensible, healthful look 
 in her face instead of the weak, far-away and 
 vacant expression which had so long held 
 sway. 
 
102 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 To those who have felt that this much-sung 
 song is a sweet connecting link between the 
 seen and the unseen, the foregoing strictures 
 will doubtless seem very heartless as well as 
 severe. But they cannot fail to take a differ- 
 ent view of the matter when I assure them 
 that I fully believe in the continued existence 
 of the individual, and in his ability under cer- 
 tain conditions to make himself known. We 
 are taking wonderful strides in this matter of 
 spirit intercourse, and my own experiments 
 in mental telegraphy have proved to my 
 perfect satisfaction and delight the things that 
 I have always sensed with my psychic nature. 
 I have demonstrated that the “ Sweet By and 
 By ” is the same kind of a myth as a heaven 
 in the clouds and a God in the sky. It is all 
 arrant nonsense, and we must not allow our- 
 selves to be sung into the decrepitude of age 
 and the sleep of death. This is something 
 that we must not do if we would grow in 
 grace, health, and beauty here. The affirma- 
 tions have been plainly stated. When per- 
 fectly understood and practised there is no 
 need of denials, but until that joyful time we 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 103 
 
 are compelled to use the “ Thou shalt not ” 
 dictum very often. 
 
 If the persons who call themselves old and 
 growing old will for the sake of the lesson 
 stop a moment to reflect upon the tears they 
 have wasted, the groans they have uttered 
 which only made them more miserable and 
 everybody in their atmosphere wretched; if 
 they will recall the hard and bitter thoughts 
 they have cherished toward those perhaps 
 whom they most loved, they will be able to 
 form some conception of the reason of their 
 failing powers and their altered appearance. 
 In order to call a halt on approaching age, all 
 of these things must be put out of mind. 
 Don’t make a mistake here. The habits of 
 years cannot be broken in a week, but remem- 
 ber this — it will give you beautiful faith and 
 strength all along the line — if you commence 
 this work in earnest you will be constantly 
 helped and cheered. This assistance will 
 be so marked that it will sometimes seem 
 almost supernatural. But there is nothing 
 supernatural. There can be nothing above 
 Tie natural. You have simply stepped into 
 
104 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 harmony with the law, and that step has 
 brought you into relations with everything 
 strong and harmonious in the universe. You 
 are in the ranks of God’s soldiers, and 
 strength will be given you to march right 
 along. The old headache or the old heart- 
 ache may occasionally clutch you, and the old 
 life with its emotions and its sentimental and 
 sensational charms may sometimes beckon 
 you, but they are all powerless to detain you, 
 and every hour lessens their hold, or rather 
 your hold upon them. It is we who do the 
 enticing and the clutching. We invite all our 
 foes and entertain them afterward, and then 
 we talk glibly about this or that trouble and 
 misfortune sending us to our graves. Such is 
 the stuff that the so-called tragedies of life are 
 made of. 
 
 In the treatment of old age there is a great 
 deal to do, and a great deal that we must not 
 only not do, but we must cease to think about. 
 We must cease to depend upon other persons 
 for help and uplift. We must learn to evolve 
 all these things from ourselves — not an easy 
 task for those who have been “ waited upon 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 10$ 
 
 hand and foot,” as a woman who had com- 
 menced to rebel against her years and infirmi- 
 ties once expressed it. 
 
 “Why, I haven’t buttoned my boots in five 
 years,” she said, “nor have I been in the 
 street alone for that length of time. Why, 
 my daughter wouldn’t permit it.” 
 
 “What has your daughter to do with it?” 
 I asked. 
 
 “ She thinks it would be unsafe, and she is 
 always expecting that I am going to fall or 
 tumble downstairs.” 
 
 “ Did you ever fall downstairs ? ” 
 
 “No, I have never had a serious accident in 
 my life, but you see my child loves me 
 so, and if anything were to happen to me 
 she would be inconsolable. I am all she has 
 got." 
 
 How many of the world’s inhabitants are 
 just in this position ! They are all somebody 
 has got, and somebody is all they have got. 
 The fear of death, as St. Paul says, keeps 
 them all their lives subject to bondage. For 
 this reason the daughter dogs her mother’s 
 every step, making her a chronic invalid, and 
 
106 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 literally pushing her into old age and the 
 grave. 
 
 If the daughters do not desire to grow old 
 — and they do not — they must call a halt upon 
 such practices, and the mothers must com- 
 mence to wait upon themselves. 
 
 “ Why do you not button your own boots? ” 
 I asked the dearly loved and much watched 
 woman. “You certainly have the use of your 
 hands.” 
 
 “Oh, yes; but leaning over might bring on 
 vertigo. You see I am very fleshy, and my 
 stomach is so in the way.” 
 
 She meant her abdomen, and she told the 
 truth. It was large and very much in the 
 way, but not more so than those of scores of 
 women whom we daily meet on the street. 
 And what had caused this deformed condition, 
 for it was nothing else? 
 
 Intemperance in eating and lack of exer- 
 cise, and the settling down to the belief that 
 whatever little jurisdiction she once had over 
 her own life was now at an end. In other 
 words, she “lived, moved, and had her being” 
 in her daughter, and the daughter in her. 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 10 ? 
 
 For ages such willing service and loving 
 dependence has been considered most beauti- 
 ful; but let us analyze it for a moment. Fear 
 and selfishness were the prime factors in this 
 case as in almost every other, and the des- 
 truction of individuality followed as a matter 
 of course. There wasn’t a sound spiritual 
 fibre in either mother or child. They were 
 pulp. 
 
 “But what can I do?” the mother asked 
 tearfully. “ I knew that I have no business to 
 depend so much, and I knew that my daugh- 
 ter has other uses for her strength and time. 
 But I suppose she feels that she can only have 
 me a short time at the longest, and she wants 
 to hold me in the body just as long as she can.” 
 
 “Why don’t you hold yourself in the 
 body?” I inquired. 
 
 “ I— hold— myself?” 
 
 This seemed a new idea, although I had 
 previously spent some time explaining the 
 same matter. 
 
 “ Why should your child have more power 
 in this direction than you have? It is your 
 body, is it not? ” 
 
to8 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 “I used to think it was God’s body,” she 
 replied. 
 
 “Well, it isn’t now. It’s nobody’s body. 
 You have shut your God up in a closet, 
 and you and your daughter are trying to 
 run the business between you, but you can’t 
 do it.” 
 
 “ But what shall I do? ” 
 
 “ Put your daughter out of the partnership 
 and take God in.” 
 
 “ But you don’t know my child. She would 
 be broken-hearted.” 
 
 “I’ll risk the breakage. In a little while 
 she will be very much relieved. It wouldn’t 
 be in nature for her not to be. What do you 
 think her sensations will be when she sees 
 you a live, wide-awake, busy woman, able to 
 help yourself, and by the force of your exam- 
 ple to help others to freedom ? ” 
 
 “ But what shall I do first? ” 
 
 “ Well, I would button my boots if I burst 
 something.” 
 
 “ But suppose Alice refuses to let me? ” 
 
 “ Throw a boot at her and knock her down. 
 Take a slipper to her; do anything. Prove to 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 IO9 
 
 her that you have opened the door of the 
 closet and let your God out.” 
 
 There was a hearty laugh at this advice, 
 and I felt sure that the battle would soon 
 begin. 
 
 “ But after all is said and done, it is a very 
 small thing to button one’s shoes.” 
 
 Here was an immediate and eager reaching 
 out for a larger opportunity, as there always 
 is when the truth has worked its way into the 
 inmost parts. 
 
 “ That will be a beautiful beginning ; and it 
 will not be long before you will find yourself 
 taking some vigorous daily exercise without a 
 guardian or chaperone.” 
 
 “ But do you quite realize that I am what 
 the world calls an old woman — past seventy, 
 you know, when the years are counted.” 
 
 “ A hundred years is as one day with God, 
 and time is not to be divided into periods of 
 growth and decadence. Now the question is, 
 Do you really want to stop your dying, or 
 would you prefer to go on with it? You can 
 do either. Trust in your daughter is simply 
 launching you into feebleness, senility, and 
 
IIO PREVENTION AND CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 death. If you like that kind of travel, the 
 road is open to you.” 
 
 “Great heavens, I don’t like it! I never 
 liked it, but I thought it had to be. I’ll turn 
 about and take the other way, and do the very 
 best I can.” 
 
 This was dose enough for one day. The 
 matter of fastening her own shoes was a very 
 simple one considered by itself, but I knew 
 that, having performed this operation, she 
 would immediately cast about for something 
 else to do in the same line of personal help- 
 fulness. And I was not disappointed — no, 
 not even in the shrinkage of the abdomen. 
 An intelligent thought of her own God-given 
 right to symmetry, ease, and beauty, com- 
 bined with common sense, which is God also-, 
 in reference to proper food and exercise, 
 wrought a marvellous change which no one 
 could understand save those who were in the 
 secret. 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 “supplementary proceedings.” 
 
 Solomon with all his pretensions to knowl- 
 edge never said a wiser thing than did a 
 friend who, after listening to a very marvel- 
 lous account of certain electrical apparatuses, 
 remarked as follows: 
 
 “ There never was a story told yet too big 
 for me to believe.” 
 
 According to the opinion of her companions 
 on this occasion she was, if not a fool, at least 
 a most gullible creature. But the machine 
 got to working, and the doubting Thomases 
 marched along in a row to see it. 
 
 We are living in a wonderful age. Things 
 are coming into climaxes mighty fast. Here 
 and there, all over the world, men and women 
 are speaking the word of health, opulence, 
 and continued life on this planet. This word 
 is the vital leaven which is leavening the 
 whole lump. The raising of humanity may 
 
I 12 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 seem very slow and sporadic to the impatient 
 ones, and those without faith, but they are 
 quite mistaken. The God within and the God 
 without are felt and understood as never was 
 God felt and understood before. Even the 
 most apathetic and pessimistic persons occa- 
 sionally rouse up long enough to wonder what 
 it is that makes these days so different from all 
 the other days they have known. It is like a 
 rush of mighty waters, and more people than 
 we imagine hear the sound thereof. 
 
 Viewed from some aspects the whole world 
 seems very weak and wicked. We have our 
 multi-millionaires and our gigantic trusts 
 and corporations that appear to be sweeping 
 everything but themselves and their especial 
 interests from the face of the earth. But God 
 reigns, and they cannot do it. 
 
 In contradistinction to this appearance we 
 have the poverty-stricken, the lame, the halt, 
 the blind, the beggar in his rags. These peo- 
 ple are as numerous as ever, but we discern 
 that something has happened even to them. 
 The leaven is surely working. Some whisper 
 has vibrated way down the line that poverty 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 
 is not a God-sent condition, and that there are 
 better ways of materializing wealth than by 
 the crowding out and trampling down of 
 others. Somebody has said something about 
 “ the substance of God ” and the table that is 
 spread with this substance — a table from 
 which no one is excluded. 
 
 “What are you doing now for a living?” a 
 man was asked who had been compelled to 
 give up his small store on account of a new 
 neighbor who sold everything, and much 
 cheaper than he could afford to do. 
 
 “ I have gone into partnership with Al- 
 mighty God,” was the answer, “and it pays.” 
 
 The questioner did not in the least under- 
 stand what this meant, but he had reason to 
 believe afterward that some unusual force 
 had been at work in this man’s behalf. 
 
 In the recovery from old age it is necessary 
 that we constantly recognize this partnership, 
 or more, strictly speaking, this oneness with 
 the All-Good. Then, and only then, are we 
 individuals. It is impossible to feel too inde- 
 pendent or self-sufficient. 
 
 “ Through the God-power vested in me I 
 
1 14 THE prevention and 
 
 am equal to anything that I choose to do,” is 
 a statement which we cannot make too often 
 in our attempts to overcome. 
 
 These affirmations will tend to keep us up 
 to the mark of the high calling, but they must 
 be supplemented by earnest and untiring ef- 
 fort. 
 
 “ What kind of effort? ” 
 
 Physical effort. 
 
 You may say all these beautiful things, but 
 if you don’t do something you will die. 
 
 “Faith without works is dead,” our eldqr 
 brother told his followers, and this is as true 
 to-day as when these words were uttered cen- 
 turies ago. 
 
 Suppose, for instance, that under the do- 
 minion of the race thought of age, and your 
 consequent inability to do anything for your- 
 self, you have become bent in figure and stiff 
 in your joints. You rise with difficulty and 
 walk with pain. Now, do not believe that 
 you can dispel these evidences of old age by 
 any process of affirmation or denial. No, 
 indeed. You have got to get up and keep 
 getting up until you have taught these joints 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 1 15 
 
 and limbs their proper lesson. To be de- 
 livered from the stoop which you yourself 
 have fastened upon yourself, you must not 
 only direct your mental forces that way, but 
 you must take the physical exercises that will 
 tend to change that condition. You could 
 sit in your chair and declare your dominion 
 over these states with all the power and 
 eloquence of which you were capable, and 
 the stoop and the weakness would still be in 
 evidence. 
 
 “For mercy’s sake let me alone,” said an 
 “ elderly ” man who had become somewhat in- 
 terested in the new thought, but who had 
 made very little headway because faith and 
 works were strangers; in other words, be- 
 cause he had become possessed by the idea 
 that all he had to do was to sit on the veranda 
 and declare his freedom. 
 
 “ Let me alone, ” he went on impatiently. “ I 
 need no exercise. I can trust my God to do 
 all this work for me,” and he went on trusting 
 something that he called God. It wasn’t God. 
 It was pure and unadulterated laziness. 
 
 This man’s wife took a different view of 
 
Il6 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 things. She realized at once that there was 
 something for her to do as well as to say. In 
 order to make the word effectual she must do 
 the deeds. This woman, who had by wrong 
 thinking drifted into the state of infirmity 
 called old age, had a world of work to do in 
 order practically to demonstrate that she was 
 on the up-grade , and this knowledge kept her 
 alert in every fibre of her being. 
 
 One day her husband, who had been dis- 
 cussing metaphysics with a neighbor, turned 
 to her and said: “Why don’t you say some- 
 thing, mother? ” 
 
 “I’ve been saying something for seventy 
 years,” she replied, “and now I’m doing 
 something. ” 
 
 After this she took a three-mile walk, and 
 came back to her dinner hungry and rosy, 
 and with a light in her eyes that shed a radi- 
 ance upon everything about her. Her hus- 
 band sat in his arm-chair, and divided his 
 time between evolution, re-incarnation, arid 
 the power of the individual ego. He hobbled 
 into the dining-room and ate voraciously of 
 everything on the table, affirming that the 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 II 7 
 
 person who refused to indulge his appetite to 
 the utmost was not a good scientist. 
 
 Well, one day he fell in a heap after one of 
 these hearty meals. Medical verdict, “ Heart 
 failure after a severe attack of indigestion.” 
 
 The minister who attended the funeral 
 probably told the surviving friends that “ man 
 was of a few days and full of trouble,” and 
 that “ God had taken this useful citizen, this 
 dear husband and father, to himself.” 
 
 What could be more false or more ridicu- 
 lous? This work of undoing was entirely 
 performed by the man himself. He profaned 
 “the Temple of the Living God,” and kept on 
 profaning it after having declared himself a 
 Christian metaphysician. 
 
 I am not acquainted with any man who calls 
 himself a scientist who has the habit of drink- 
 ing spirituous liquors, but I do know many 
 professed scientists, both men and women, 
 who eat intemperately. They tell you that 
 God has provided all the materials, and that 
 they have a perfect right to everything that is 
 to be found in their Father’s kingdom. Here 
 again : “ Man has sought out many inventions,” 
 
1 18 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 and while God has provided the original sub- 
 stance, it does seem as if the devil had 
 been employed to make some of the com- 
 binations; for between the grease and the 
 gravies, the mix-ups of different portions of 
 the flesh of animals, the sickening concoctions 
 for which even the French chefs are puzzled 
 to find names, the lovers of simple food find 
 themselves badly handicapped when away 
 from their own tables. These things are all 
 good in themselves and where they belong, 
 but they are not good for us when stirred up 
 together, except as the working out of a nat- 
 ural law is good by reason of the experience 
 that we derive from it. The effects of intem- 
 perance in eating are as marked as the effects 
 of intemperance in drink, and quite as demor- 
 alizing. After a careful and unprejudiced ob- 
 servation I firmly believe that if the race had 
 been intelligent in the matter of food, we 
 should have giants and double centenarians 
 walking our streets to-day. They might have 
 beaten Noah and Methusaleh in the matter of 
 longevity. From Noah to David was a steady 
 decline. Considerable of a tumble from 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 I I 9 
 
 nine hundred and sixty-nine and nine hun- 
 dred and fifty to three-score years and ten, 
 with forty years as the average number. 
 
 There is no doubt in my mind that this fall- 
 ing-off was occasioned by the encroachments 
 of what most people call civilization. Trouble 
 commenced as soon as this era of simplicity 
 was invaded by the complex. The first stew 
 may have been responsible for the first stom- 
 ach-ache and the anxiety that naturally fol- 
 lowed such an unprecedented condition. One 
 thing is sure, there has been plenty of stew- 
 ing ever since, both in the pot and in the 
 feelings of men. Aches and pains and griefs 
 and fears have predominated. The healthy 
 person has been the exception for more years 
 than we know how to count, and to-day the 
 man or woman who lives to be one hundred 
 years old is counted a curiosity. He may be 
 stone deaf, or blind as a bat, and too feeble to 
 get up and down without help, but he has ex- 
 ceeded the record, broken the law of three- 
 score and ten, and people will travel miles to 
 congratulate him. But this isn’t life. He is 
 of no use. He has no enjoyment. Nobody 
 
120 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 wants him, and when the flickering breath at 
 last stops, it is recognized as a good thing for 
 all concerned. 
 
 O friends, can you not see what stupid 
 nonsense all this death and dying is? And 
 can it be possible that you are so dull as not 
 to be able to feel what an important part the 
 proper selection, quality, and quantity of food 
 exert upon your lives ? 
 
 “ But what are you going to do with the 
 ninety-first psalm? ” some friend will ask. 
 
 “ I am going to love and cherish it, to read 
 and reread it, and, better than all, to be- 
 lieve it. 
 
 “ ‘ He that dwelleth in the secret place of 
 the Most High shall abide under the shadow 
 of the Almighty. ’ ” 
 
 Where is the man that so dwelleth? He 
 certainly cannot be the man who is all the 
 time thinking of his dinner and suffering 
 from the effects of it. “ The secret place of 
 the Most High ” must be a place of ease and 
 comfort, of absolute faith and trust. No per- 
 son can either trust or repose who is domi- 
 nated by his appetite, who eats indigestible 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 12 I 
 
 food or too much food. To be in this secret 
 place is to be in the kingdom of heaven. No 
 pestilence can come nigh such a dwelling. 
 Everything conspires for peace, because dis- 
 cord cannot live in this atmosphere. 
 
 Many people are approximating to this 
 kingdom, and there may be a few who reside 
 there more or less permanently. It is the only 
 safe place and is well worth striving for, but it 
 can never be reached through the gratification 
 of an appetite, though all food partaken of 
 should be enjoyed. One should never eat un- 
 less one is hungry, and to fill one’s stomach 
 with undesirable stuff for the sake of sociability 
 is a sin and a shame. Dinner parties with their 
 endless courses and abominable messes, to say 
 nothing of the insincerity and the striving for 
 effect which generally obtain, are responsible 
 for more senility and decay than people sup- 
 pose. Who can fail to grow silly, weak in 
 the legs, and large in the abdomen, who is in 
 the habit of spending three hours a day swal- 
 lowing raw beef, chopped flesh, stuffed birds, 
 calves’ brains, lambs’ kidneys, grease galore, 
 pastries, creams, and wines? 
 
122 PREVENTION AND CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 Such a performance once a month would 
 soon provide me with a ticket of leave. If 
 obliged to go through such a menu, even 
 / would pipe my feeble lay to these words : 
 
 “ I would not live alway, 
 
 I ask not to stay, 
 
 Where dish after dish 
 Comes sliding this way.” 
 
 And yet no one enjoys good things — whole- 
 some things — more than the writer, or the 
 lightness and brightness of a properly served 
 meal. But the cannibalistic and gormandizing 
 tendencies which to a degree — not a very ex- 
 aggerated degree — once distinguished me are 
 no longer in evidence. 
 
 Let us not be deceived, my friends, by the 
 specious reasoning of those persons who are 
 seeking the higher life, but who do their 
 preaching beside the flesh-pots of Egypt. To 
 enjoy our God, to make the most of our lives 
 and constantly to grow in grace and health, 
 youth and beauty, we must keep our bodies 
 clean and pure. Anything that pollutes the 
 body brings everything undesirable in its 
 train — sickness, sorrow, old age, and death. 
 
CHAPTER XI. 
 
 THE IGNORANT WORD. 
 
 Every man must be a law unto himself. 
 He always is this, whether he knows it or not. 
 The word of the person stands, whether that 
 word be spoken for health or disease, immor- 
 tal youth or old age. 
 
 The true word is the word of intelligence. 
 This word speaks for health and happiness in 
 a thousand different ways, while the ignorant 
 word constantly materializes in error. 
 
 I am perfectly willing to admit that the 
 truth of these statements is an exceedingly 
 difficult one to grasp; and why should it not 
 be, when all the ages have taught us some- 
 thing exactly opposite? Considering precept 
 and tradition, man has proved himself a pretty 
 brave fellow. Taught to believe that the 
 scourges of sickness and death were placed 
 upon him by God from the very start, he has 
 shown considerable grit and courage in man- 
 
124 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 aging the infernal conditions as well as he 
 has. In living — or rather staying — and dying 
 in ignorance, he has proved himself worthy of 
 the brightest and most felicitous immortality. 
 When one reflects upon the depths of degra- 
 dation and despair which a mistaken concep- 
 tion of God has brought to God’s children, it 
 seems a miracle that there could have been 
 found one single man in the whole misunder- 
 stood universe able even for a few years to do 
 a stroke of work or perform an act of kind- 
 ness. But in the face and eyes of the cursed 
 present and the equally uncertain and cursed 
 future they have indeed performed heroic 
 deeds. 
 
 The fact of the matter really is, that if all 
 these people had absolutely believed in hell 
 after death, and the necessity of sickness and 
 poverty, they would not have tried to evade, 
 ignore, and overcome them as they certainly 
 have. These things have been fought val- 
 iantly though ignorantly, showing plainly 
 that deep down in the heart of man the voice 
 of a reigning God was steadfastly sending 
 forth its protests. Little by little has the race 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 125 
 
 awakened from its hideous nightmare dream, 
 and now at the close of this most remarkable 
 century, the most wonderful in every respect 
 of any that has preceded it, there are to 
 be found men and women who know that the 
 true reign of the true God has commenced. 
 
 God is known for what he is, and not for what 
 
 « 
 
 the ages have ignorantly taught. 
 
 The ignorant word is not uttered so often 
 as formerly. In many instances we find it 
 curiously changed and modified. It may be 
 just as illogical as ever, but there is an inter- 
 rogation mark after it, or an atmosphere of 
 indecision prevades it. Thoughts are projec- 
 tiles, and the God-power that is now behind 
 this God-thought is loading and discharging 
 with the most accurate and beautiful preci- 
 sion. Folks are being hit in every part of the 
 earth, and wondering what is the matter with 
 them. They are getting wicked, they tell 
 their friends and neighbors. They do not care 
 so much about forms and ceremonies. It is 
 hard work to sit through an hour’s sermon. 
 The old hymns have an alien sound, and the 
 once eloquent long prayer is simply sounding 
 
126 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 brass and tinkling cymbal. It is all very 
 strange. They have never had anything to 
 do with these new-fangled doctrines. They 
 are not acquainted with any scientists. What 
 can it mean? they ask. 
 
 It means that it is in the air, and there is 
 no escape from it. It means that the God in 
 one man is literally obliged to wake up the 
 God in another man, and that the telepathic 
 signals of science are being felt and compre- 
 hended in greater or less degree by every 
 really intelligent man and woman on the 
 globe. 
 
 Is not this a grand and a comforting out- 
 look? And, thanks be to God who giveth us 
 the victory, it is all true ! 
 
 In this wonderful meantime how shall we 
 more quickly and completely change the 
 ignorant for the intelligent word? How shall 
 we learn to call things by their right names 
 instead of the names that we have been 
 taught to call them? To accomplish this in- 
 volves a complete change in our lives; and 
 this is not always or often an easy process. 
 
 One very ignorant word that we have 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 127 
 
 spoken for ourselves and others is that of 
 ownership. The most awful thought that can 
 be presented to most persons is the true one, 
 that they do not own their children. 
 
 “Unclutch and let go entirely,” a wise 
 teacher told one of her students, who had 
 been the victim of intense anxiety for many 
 years. 
 
 “Let go of what? Let go of life?” the 
 woman asked. 
 
 “ No, you can’t let go of that. Life pos- 
 sesses you. In other words, you are life — 
 not a good type of intelligent life at present, 
 but getting there. I mean unclutch, and let 
 go of your children entirely.” 
 
 “Oh, I never thought that you could say 
 that to me ! ” was the sad, almost tragic re- 
 sponse. “ Why, there is no torture that I 
 should not deserve if I shirked the responsi- 
 bility of my children. I brought them into 
 the world; they are surely mine.” 
 
 “ Nothing is yours but yourself. That is 
 all yours. You have no right to prevent the 
 unfoldment of individuality in those children, 
 or rather in those men; and this you have 
 
128 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 been and are still doing. I am sure that 
 things will speedily mend if you will let them 
 go their way.” 
 
 “Oh! but Jimmy! Think of Jimmy with- 
 out his mother’s hand to guide him, his 
 mother’s heart to sympathize with him when 
 he is in trouble,” wailed the fond parent. 
 
 “Jimmy ” was the prodigal who never made 
 long trips from home, but was constantly go- 
 ing and constantly coming, and so repentant 
 when money gave out. More fatted calves 
 had been killed and roasted for Jimmy than 
 one could count, and he knew that he should 
 always find his mother watching by the win- 
 dow, all ready to light the fagots for the feast. 
 She had weakened and sickened and aged in 
 this process of expectancy, but Jimmy didn’t 
 see it. Jimmy was having a good time, or 
 thought he was, in wasting his mother’s sub- 
 stance in riotous living; and the foolish parent 
 labored under the mistaken idea that she was 
 guiding Jimmy. 
 
 How many mothers do we see as this mir- 
 ror is held up to view? Oh, the awful sacri- 
 fice of calves on this altar of ownership! 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 129 
 
 Such ignorance is enough to make the an- 
 gels — yea, and the archangels cry their eyes 
 out; and they certainly would do so if they 
 did not see that these mothers and these 
 Jimmies could learn their lessons in no other 
 way. 
 
 This special parent was slowly awakening, 
 and had made a few notable conquests in 
 other lines, but when Jimmy’s dethronement 
 was suggested, the mother heart took fright 
 at once. It was no use to ask her to let go of 
 Jimmy. She could agree to any other sacri- 
 fice, but not this one. 
 
 This is a fine example ot one sort of clutch- 
 ing, and there is not a reader who will not 
 have some such mother and child in mind. 
 Now, money was not good for Jimmy, and so 
 many fatted calves were tiresome, even to the 
 prodigal, whose only desire was to steady up 
 for a spell in order to start out again with full 
 pockets, in search of that will-o-the-wisp hap- 
 piness which always had and ever would mock 
 and elude him. 
 
 To let go of one’s children is indeed a very 
 new doctrine, but it is the only thing that will 
 
130 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 bring peace to either parent or child. For 
 ages it has been considered the imperative 
 duty of parents — especially of mothers — to 
 sacrifice themselves for their offspring. This 
 sacrifice consisted in the renunciation of 
 health, wealth, happiness, good looks, and 
 everything that makes life desirable. The 
 mother who does not worry about her stray- 
 ing child is heartless ; but was there ever one 
 who did not? and was this worry ever known 
 to bring a single prodigal to repentance? 
 
 True growth is impossible when one sel- 
 fishly clutches anything — husband, wife, 
 children, friends, lovers, or money. Every 
 earthly thing should be held with a loose 
 grasp, not on the theory which has so long 
 prevailed that an angry God will remove all 
 our idols, but upon the principle that as long 
 as we are holding on to one thing with all our 
 might, we are hermetically sealed against the 
 reception of every gift worth having. 
 
 Motherhood is a very sacred and beautiful 
 thing, but there is a marvellous difference 
 between true motherhood and sentimental 
 motherhood. Jimmy’s mother is a type of 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 131 
 
 the foolish and selfish mother, and the family 
 is numerous. Jesus is thought by many to 
 have spoken very harshly to his mother, 
 when in answer to her question of where he 
 was going, and why he did not come home, 
 where all young men ought to be found, he 
 replied: “Wist ye not that I go about my 
 Father’s business? ” 
 
 I always supposed that this settled it for all 
 time with Mary. She like other mothers 
 wanted her boy under her wing, but this was 
 not his place, and in those memorable words 
 he made her understand the situation. This 
 response of our elder brother would be a good 
 one for parents to make to their children. 
 Could they only see plainly enough to say to 
 them : “ I nursed you and brought you to man- 
 hood and womanhood as faithfully as I knew 
 how. You have chosen your path, which is 
 not my path. It is not a good one, and I 
 have warned you against it. Now work out 
 your own salvation. / go about my father’s 
 business.” 
 
 This would be sensible as well as highly 
 scientific. Our calf-fed prodigals would then 
 
132 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 keep on eating husks, or would earn food 
 more in consonance with their appetites. 
 
 The motherly endeavor to avert the effect 
 of a cause has made no end of mischief. It 
 never was done and never can be, except by 
 the use of influence, the payment of money, 
 or by some covering-up process. This may 
 seem to work for a while, but there is not one 
 case in a thousand that was ever radically 
 helped by such means. 
 
 “If you write another book on progressive 
 lines, do take up the parent and child ques- 
 tion,” a friend has written. “Is there any 
 way to make mothers more sensible? Fath- 
 ers, it seems to me, are either too strict and 
 cruel or too indifferent. Many of them do not 
 seem to care in the least what becomes of their 
 sons; and so the whole awful responsibility 
 devolves upon the mothers. I have so many 
 sweet and noble friends who are weighed 
 down to the very earth by disobedient and 
 dissipated children, that I find myself con- 
 stantly casting about for some one to say the 
 sensible lifting word, /know that they should 
 be allowed to go their own way, that every 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 133 
 
 sentimental prop should be withdrawn, and I 
 also know that they are all forging along by the 
 hardest road toward their own true estates. 
 But you cannot make the average suffering 
 mother believe this. You know it is true, do 
 you not? ” 
 
 Yes, indeed, I know it, and I wish I could 
 stamp upon these pages some thought in 
 this regard so helpful and comforting that it 
 would lift every sorrowing mother out of the 
 vale of tears into the bright sunlight of faith 
 and joy. 
 
 There is one supreme debt that these wo- 
 men owe to themselves and afterward to hu- 
 manity. It is to live instead of die, to recu- . 
 perate instead of disintegrate; and this can 
 never be accomplished when they are mind- 
 ing other people’s business, even though 
 these other people are what they are pleased 
 to call “ bone of their bone and flesh of their 
 flesh,” their “very own children.” Respon- 
 sibility ends, or should end, when these chil- 
 dren mark out their own way and elect to 
 follow it. This road may apparently lead to 
 Tophet, but it doesn’t. It is Tophet all the 
 
134 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 way along, to be sure, and there is always a 
 fetching-up place, which is a merciful place 
 after all, because the lesson that could not be 
 learned in any other way is doubtless learned 
 there. Effect has followed cause, and the 
 grand summing-up is inevitable : 
 
 “ Loose him and let him go. Ephraim is 
 joined to his idols. Let him alone.” 
 
 It is impossible to reach these foolish ones 
 by words of warning, or of advice however 
 unselfish and well intentioned, and anxious 
 thought is worse than meddling words. But 
 many a wanderer has been brought home to 
 stay by means of the free and loving thought. 
 One case where every influence had failed was 
 touched and reclaimed by the total renunci- 
 ation of responsibility by both father and 
 mother, and the steadfast holding of this 
 thought: “You are free to choose your own 
 way. Our desire is for your highest good, 
 and that good we believe you are evolving. 
 You are your own master, and we are simply 
 your loving friends.” 
 
 One never-to-be-forgotten day this son 
 walked in and said to his mother : “ Do you 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 135 
 
 know I have felt very queer lately? It has 
 seemed to me just as if you and father had 
 unriveted a link in a very strong chain and 
 set me free.” 
 
 “That is precisely what we have done,” his 
 mother replied. 
 
 “ Do you mean that you have left me free to 
 get drunk? ” was the next question. 
 
 “Yes, free to get drunk or to do anything 
 else you may feel like doing.” 
 
 “ And father too. Does he feel the same 
 way? ” 
 
 “ And father too.” 
 
 “ Do you know, mother, that I don’t believe 
 I could drink another drop to save my life? I 
 know I never shall.” 
 
 “ But why ? ” 
 
 “ Ask somebody who knows more than I 
 do; but I somehow feel like a man." 
 
 There are other instances as marked as this, 
 showing not only the power of thought to 
 touch the spot, but the wonderful desire and 
 longing of every human soul for liberty. 
 
 How many dear ones have been held in 
 bondage by persistent nagging and anxious 
 
136 PREVENTION AND CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 thought we do not know, but their number is 
 legion. 
 
 “ Loose them and let them go.” To do this 
 we first loose ourselves. The rest is easy. 
 
 This subject has been taken up in consider- 
 able detail because of the ravages which have 
 been wrought upon the mothers of the world 
 by a mistaken idea of their responsibility. 
 
 There is no prevention and no cure for old 
 age while such conditions obtain. 
 
CHAPTER XII. 
 
 DUTY. 
 
 Duty, as generally understood, is an abom- 
 inable word, and wields an abominable influ- 
 ence. Look at it as it stands before you. 
 What character is there in these four 
 letters — Duty ? 
 
 “ Du ” — signifying do — at least that is my 
 interpretation of it — “ ty ” ty — duty. 
 
 Do, do, do, and keep on doing for every- 
 body but yourself. You are not concerned in 
 it. It is simply your business to do whether 
 you like it or not, or whether you are able to 
 do it or not. Duty-doing in the common ac- 
 ceptation of that term is body-dying. Flat, 
 feeble, and sentimental though the word is, it 
 holds more suicide than almost any other 
 word in the language. It has brought de- 
 crepitude and old age to those who were 
 young in years, and has ruined countless 
 lives. 
 
THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 138 
 
 The most of what goes as duty is a mis- 
 taken sense of responsibility. We constitute 
 ourselves our brother’s keepers, and it is 
 always proved, when too late to be of any 
 service, that the majority of these brothers 
 would have been a great deal better off if 
 left to themselves. 
 
 “ Do unto others as you would have others 
 do unto you.” 
 
 Think of it a moment ! Can we not all say 
 with perfect truth that the principal desire of 
 our lives is now, and always has been, to be 
 let alone? Have we relished interference? 
 Have we enjoyed being told when to get up 
 and when to sit down, when to go out and 
 when to come in, what to eat and what not to 
 eat, what companions to choose and what per- 
 sons to avoid? Have you amiably accepted 
 this advice from your friends, your husbands, 
 your wives, your sisters and brothers, your 
 children? And how about you parents — you 
 who are holding on to your “ own flesh and 
 blood ” with the clutch of desperation ? 
 
 You know you in your turn have chafed under 
 it, rebelled with all your soul against it, many, 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 1 39 
 
 many times, and most of you will recall that 
 you have done a thousand things that you 
 would never have thought of doing if you had 
 not been sure of opposition from some quarter. 
 
 Now, there is nobody on earth who likes 
 such interference any more than you do. 
 We find many simpletons who are forever 
 asking advice and never taking it; but they 
 don’t count. They fly hither and yon, and 
 finally — it may take a long time — come to the 
 conclusion that the oracle is within them- 
 selves. 
 
 How many times have we heard these tried 
 ones exclaim, and how many times have we 
 spoken the very same words, “Oh, if I only 
 knew my duty in this matter!” No strain is 
 oftener heard than this one, and it must be 
 admitted that it is sometimes exceedingly 
 difficult to know how and just where to draw 
 the line. That a few persons are very selfish, 
 apparently utterly destitute of the milk of 
 human kindness, goes without saying, but 
 they are not in evidence very often after all. 
 The majority of the people we meet are con- 
 stantly on the lookout for opportunities to be 
 
140 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 kind, hunting jobs of misery as it were. It is 
 a remarkable thing to note how fast these 
 chronic sympathizers grow old. They take 
 Mrs. Smith’s typhoid to bed with them, and 
 rise in the morning quite proud to say that 
 they haven’t slept a wink all night. 
 
 Oh, yes, there is a great deal of pride that 
 inheres in this sort of care for others, so you 
 need not shake your heads. We have not 
 been wholly free from it. 
 
 This misunderstanding of the “ Do unto 
 others as you would have them do unto you ” 
 command is a fertile wrinkle-producer. It 
 just ploughs lines into “the human face 
 divine.” And why does it do this? 
 
 First, because of a peculiar poison which 
 this mental condition produces in the body; 
 and next, because of the habit of drawing and 
 contorting the countenance into sympathetic or 
 agonized expression. So you see there is an 
 outside as well as an inside to attend to. Some 
 so-called scientists stoutly deny this proposi- 
 tion . They may be very particular about the fit 
 of their gowns, and their hats may be adorned 
 with the finest imitation of the floral kingdom, 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 141 
 
 but the face — oh, that is a different matter. 
 The face must be let entirely alone. It is not 
 scientific to soften the skin, although it may 
 be as dried up and as weatherbeaten as an 
 old barn-door. I have always taken an en- 
 tirely opposite view. Whatever will help one 
 more perfectly to express the wholesomeness 
 and the beauty which all desire to show forth 
 is as proper and legitimate a thing to use as 
 is water for the cleansing of our bodies. 
 
 “Oh, I wonder if she believes in rouge!" 
 some of our readers will exclaim. 
 
 That is a question to be left to individual 
 taste and good sense. I do not think that 
 either rouge or powder is necessary to any 
 skin. If I did, I should certainly use it, and 
 ask no one’s consent to do so. To my mind 
 both of these materials are harmful. They 
 clog the pores and produce roughness and un- 
 sightly eruptions. But there are most grate- 
 ful and wholesome emollients, which help to 
 keep the cuticle fresh and to soften the hard 
 lines which sickness, trouble, and the mind- 
 ing of other people’s business have produced. 
 
 There is no more imperative duty in this 
 
142 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 period of the world’s history than for women 
 to look their very best, and it is their business 
 to employ any truly healthful process to facili- 
 tate that most desirable end. 
 
 It is true that if we had been living in con- 
 scious unity with the divine we should need 
 no external aids. Also that if we are now 
 living in such harmonious relations we shall 
 presently be free from blemishes. But there 
 is a big gap to fill up, a great chasm be- 
 tween the days of our ignorance and the 
 dawn of our intelligence, between the days 
 when we scattered the seeds of wrinkles and 
 weakness and old age and that beautiful morn- 
 ing when we awoke to the knowledge that 
 there was not the slightest need of any of 
 these things. But error seed brought forth 
 an error harvest. As you look at yourselves 
 you see nothing but the evidences of de- 
 vastation. What shall you do? — leave it so, or 
 endeavor to supplement the inner processes by 
 whatever sweet and gracious means that your 
 newly awakened consciousness may suggest? 
 
 There is but one sensible answer to this 
 question. Do what you call your duty by 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 143 
 
 yourselves, and endeavor to appear to others 
 as young, as pretty, as sweet and attractive as 
 possible. 
 
 It is not true that, because you have com- 
 menced to think good and logical thoughts 
 and practise upon mental science lines, you 
 can immediately put to rout every nega- 
 tive condition. When you are told that you 
 or anybody else can drink any deadly draught 
 without harm, don’t run to the drug store for 
 poison in order to try the experiment ; and if 
 you contemplate treading on adders, keep on 
 your shoes and stockings. Right there is 
 where the mind comes in, though some radi- 
 cal scientists will not admit it. That such 
 harmony is our potential possession I have no 
 doubt, but the adders of our own nature are 
 the enemies we need to tread on. When we 
 encounter the snakes of jealousy, envy, and 
 untruth in others and do not feel a sting or a 
 pang, we can begin to think about going out 
 into the byways and highways to hunt for 
 other adders to step on. But we really shall 
 not need to do this in order to get a diploma 
 in the overcoming class. 
 
144 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 The mind that is engaged in the work of 
 renewing will open itself to light from every 
 
 i 
 
 quarter. It will desire wisdom beyond every 
 other possession, and wisdom will surely and 
 steadily flow in. The willing soul desirous of 
 truth has only to keep still and listen. It 
 need not discuss metaphysics or rush to the 
 rescue of maligned metaphysicians. It real- 
 izes first of all that it has its own work to do, 
 and that this work is of such mighty import 
 that there is no time to spare in the officious 
 business of solving the problems of other 
 people. 
 
 Duty does not stand for kindness or affec- 
 tion. Remember that. The very pronuncia- 
 tion of the word suggests something hard and 
 disagreeable. “It is my duty to take care of 
 this or that relative,” says some one. “He 
 has no one else to help him. What will you 
 do with that horn of the dilemma? ” 
 
 It is impossible to answer such a question 
 because one has no knowledge of the especial 
 circumstances. It might be the worst thing 
 that could befall this man to be cared for in 
 this way. It might not be ; but this I am sure 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 145 
 
 of — if duty is all there is in the case, it must 
 be a hard position for any one to occupy. 
 
 It takes wisdom to discover what responsi- 
 bilities to assume and what ones to disregard. 
 It is easy to theorize, but we are all occasion- 
 ally confronted by conditions that we cannot 
 put aside, because for some reasons these con- 
 ditions are our own to meet and manage to 
 he best of our ability. If we are willing to 
 be possessed by love and guided by wisdom 
 we shall make easy work of things that at first 
 sight seem very disagreeable. Whatever we 
 make a task of and sigh and cry because we 
 have it to do, is a destroyer of health and a 
 shortener of life. If we would grow younger 
 instead of older, what we must not do is to 
 load ourselves with the burdens of others. It 
 is a hard habit to break, and may seem to 
 some of our readers like very heartless advice. 
 Old things must pass away, and old habits 
 must be broken. This is the only way to in- 
 sure health, wealth, happiness, and immortal- 
 ity in the flesh. Old age is a foolish phan- 
 tom, which intelligence is bound to chase out 
 of existence. 
 
CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 FOOD AND EXERCISE. 
 
 In the present condition of our anatomical 
 structures, our “houses of flesh,” it does make 
 a great difference to health and life what kind 
 of food we eat and how much. This state- 
 ment will he contradicted by cranks, but it 
 can be substantiated by facts, and this is more 
 to the purpose. 
 
 The proper thought given to the care of 
 our bodies will ultimately result in their per- 
 fection, and this perfecting process must of 
 a necessity carry us away from the crude, 
 coarse, and cannibalistic diet that has so long 
 obtained. It is heartening to know that 
 many people are turning naturally away from 
 the flesh of animals, while others are experi- 
 menting with the atmosphere as the source of 
 all material supply — the very substance of 
 God. These investigators claim that they can 
 
PREVENTION AND CURE OF OLD AGE. I47 
 
 accomplish more work and take more comfort 
 on an air diet supplemented by whole wheat 
 (uncooked) once a day with fruit, than they 
 ever accomplished or enjoyed in all the days 
 of their lives. 
 
 These trials and successes are beautiful 
 prophecies of a condition that will later on 
 become general. The average man will 
 not subsist on atmosphere, whole wheat, and 
 fruit, or atmosphere and nuts, but the happy 
 medium will be found where all the simple 
 and healthful products of the earth will be 
 used for man’s refining sustenance. 
 
 There is no doubt in my mind that a 
 month’s diet on atmosphere alone would be 
 the means of salvation to many a hopeless 
 soul. It would not add to the weight or in- 
 crease the amount of adipose tissue, but it 
 would give nature a chance to dispose of some 
 of the surplus material which has been the 
 cause of so much discomfort. Atmosphere 
 does not have to be cooked. A little more of 
 it than is usually taken into the lungs is in- 
 haled several times a day by certain inspiring 
 exercises, which open the pores, feed the tis- 
 
148 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 sues, and bring the body into a condition of 
 health and grace. These exercises are not in 
 the least difficult or fatiguing, and can be 
 taken in connection with more solid food than 
 that derived from the atmosphere. Those 
 persons who have been in the habit of calling 
 themselves “ very old ” have used them with 
 the greatest benefit. 
 
 “ Why did I not know of these helpful 
 things long ago?” a woman of seventy in- 
 quires. “ And why did I not know that my 
 stomach needed a rest, and that overeating 
 was the cause of all my trouble? I have paid 
 doctor’s bills to the amount of thousands of 
 dollars, and not a single medical adviser, 
 either here or abroad, ever hinted that I ate 
 too much. Dietary changes have been pre- 
 scribed, it is true, such as an exclusive diet of 
 meat or a preponderance of milk, etc., but 
 this is all. The first question always was, 
 How is your appetite? ‘You must eat to keep 
 up your strength, and three meals a day are 
 absolutely essential.’ All the time I was 
 putting on flesh, and at last became so heavy 
 that I had the greatest difficulty to move out 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 I49 
 
 of my chair. But still it was eat, eat, eat. 
 At last in despair I took up the study of men- 
 tal science and became greatly interested in 
 it. Never before had I suspected that it was 
 possible for me to say no and yes to my body. 
 Oh, it was a sublime revelation when that 
 knowledge flashed upon me! Just then a 
 friend sent me your ‘Perpetual Youth,’ and 
 that helped me to gird on the armor and fight 
 the battle out. I stopped thinking about my 
 age and all the years I had wasted, and 
 started in to do my best. But what was I to 
 do with this mountain of undesirable flesh? 
 Ah, that was a momentous question. That 
 something could be done I had no doubt, but 
 what? I consulted a healer and put myself 
 under her care. She was very much annoyed 
 when I spoke of diet and exercise. The pro- 
 per mental concentration would do the work, 
 she said. All that I needed to do was to 
 think that I had no more flesh than was desir- 
 able, and that I was absolutely free from 
 every disturbing condition. I reread ‘Per- 
 petual Youth,’ and found that 1 had some- 
 thing to do for myself that nobody on God’s 
 
150 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 earth could do for me. It was to use my 
 mind in an entirely different manner. I was 
 — as you so tersely put it in your poem — to 
 ‘get up or get out.’ I got up. I instituted 
 my own fast, and lived on atmosphere alone 
 for twenty-two days. The first three days my 
 stomach cried out bitterly, and I had all I 
 could do to keep from humoring it. The rest 
 of the time I was perfectly comfortable. I 
 took the required exercise and slept like a 
 baby. I dropped about a pound of flesh a 
 day. I should have continued this fast longer 
 if it had not been for the solicitude of my 
 family. For three months since I have eaten 
 one good meal each day, twelve o’clock being 
 the hour that pleases me best. I can wait un- 
 til one or later with perfect ease if necessary. 
 This meal is varied by means of vegetable 
 soups, beans, peas, asparagus, and other 
 vegetables, fruits, nuts, cereals, whole wheat 
 bread, ice cream, and many other perfectly 
 healthful articles of diet. I am now of nor- 
 mal weight, energetic, healthy, happy, and 
 useful. I have no age, to speak of, in these 
 days. 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 15 I 
 
 “ If I desired two or even three meals a day I 
 should eat them, but I do not need or care for 
 any more food than this midday meal pro- 
 vides. In conclusion, I will say that I do not 
 believe the combined efforts of all the healers 
 on this planet would have delivered me 
 from the grievous burden I was carrying, as 
 I delivered myself by my own peculiar mental 
 concentration, /breathed, /walked, /ex- 
 ercised. / said to my body, / am your mis- 
 tress. You have no other in the universe. 1 
 fasted, and / am free. 
 
 “ I have told you these things because of 
 my desire to help others. Do strive to im- 
 press people with this truth — the biggest 
 truth that was ever told — that they must 
 largely do their own work, and that most of 
 them are committing hourly suicide by over- 
 eating and by eating improper food. Sev- 
 eral of my friends have come into the most 
 wonderful harmony by following my example, 
 and the work is going on beautifully. There 
 is no need of helplessness, of sickness, of 
 poverty, of old age and death. This I know.” 
 
 Such accounts as the above are constantly 
 
152 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 received at this office. This one was chosen 
 to print because of its comprehensiveness, 
 and because the writer was on the so-called 
 “ elderly ” list. 
 
 Then the communications from women who 
 have spent their lives catering to appetite 
 and cooking the food for their families. 
 Some of these would bring tears from a stone. 
 The tired-to-death farmer’s wives with their 
 three meals a day and five-o’clock breakfasts, 
 to say nothing of washing and ironing and 
 scrubbing. Now there never was any legiti- 
 mate reason for all this drudgery. One meal 
 a day could well have been spared and the 
 others so simplified as to make life a delight 
 instead of a torture. 
 
 “ I knew two-thirds of the people whose 
 bodies are in this cemetery,” said a physi- 
 cian, who had studied causes, to a visitor as 
 they passed this place of weeping willows and 
 marble headstones. “ And the majority of 
 them are women who cooked themselves into 
 their graves, and men who ate the stuff the 
 women prepared. There are a few children 
 here, and a few — a very few — persons who 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 153 
 
 lived to be old in spite of their stuffing ; but I 
 always call this the cemetery of amazing stu- 
 pidity. Perhaps these places are all alike. I 
 guess they are, but you see I know this one.” 
 This reminds me of the story of the Maine 
 woman who was found weeping one day by a 
 neighbor. 
 
 “ What is the matter? ” her friend inquired. 
 
 “Vittles is the matter,” was the sobbing 
 response. 
 
 “Why, you ain’t wanting anything, be 
 you?” said her companion. “I allers 
 thought you had vittles enough.” 
 
 “Vittles enough? I should say so. When 
 I think of the vittles I have cooked for that 
 man ” — pointing to a stalwart figure mowing 
 in the field — “how many vittles I’ve cooked 
 for that man to gormandize, I’m sick as a 
 dog. And when I think of all the vittles 
 I’ve got to cook, I’m ready to lay down and 
 die.” 
 
 We meet these miserable creatures at every 
 turn, and there is not a very great difference 
 between the women who cook for the men 
 folks on a farm and the wife of the million- 
 
154 
 
 THE PREVENTION AND 
 
 aire, who, though relieved from domestic 
 drudgery, still has the responsibility of “ vit- 
 tles ” upon her mind. The chef may be up to 
 date, but the claim of her guests upon her 
 hospitality cannot be relegated to another. 
 And these women fade, grow old, and die just 
 like their country sisters. 
 
 To prevent old age one must have wisdom 
 concerning the management of the stomach. 
 If every other necessary thing is attended to 
 and that organ is ignorantly treated, the 
 result will still be decay and death. It would 
 not take long to destroy the best locomotive 
 engine that ever was made if part of its fuel 
 consisted of gravel and coal-dust, with occa- 
 sional stones and pieces of glass. A certain 
 amount of steam could be generated by means 
 of the proper coal that was furnished it, but 
 smooth and fast running would be out of the 
 question. 
 
 Smooth and fast walking, to say nothing of 
 running, is impossible to the obese person. 
 Obesity is the sure precursor of old age. 
 Obesity is heaviness, and heaviness is 
 death. Every human being can cure this 
 
CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 155 
 
 condition. There is no more need of remain- 
 ing in it than there is of floundering round in 
 a muddy puddle because one, through lack of 
 light, has stumbled into it. One may call 
 the doctor and cry, “See here, I am in this 
 horrid hole and I know not how to get out ! ” 
 It will not avail. One may sit there till 
 doomsday — ’doomsday will surely come — and 
 there will be nothing to do except to relax a 
 little more and allow the dirt to cover one 
 entirely. 
 
 Our minds are ours to govern our bodies. 
 It is possible to split a great many hairs right 
 here, and declare that mind is all, and that 
 our bodies are crude mind, and so on and on 
 into the deepest and darkest realms of meta- 
 physics. The statement is, however, a true 
 one in the largest sense. Our bodies are ex- 
 actly what our minds have made them. In so 
 far as our minds are enlightened, our bodies 
 are satisfactory. In so far as our minds are 
 ignorant, our bodies are unsatisfactory. 
 
 There is a great deal to undo and more to 
 do in this work of constant rebuilding. But 
 we have all the time there is, and there is no 
 
156 PREVENTION AND CURE OF OLD AGE. 
 
 occasion for hurry, though there is great need 
 of industry and perseverance. 
 
 “ Man does not live on bread alone, but 
 upon every word that proceedeth from the 
 mouth of God.” This is a truth which has 
 never been very clearly understood, but we 
 are just waking up to a knowledge of it. It 
 means that man may be largely fed and nour- 
 ished by his own divine thought. The failure 
 to understand this has been the cause of much 
 misery. 
 
 We must realize our power to direct our 
 own lives. Out of this realization freedom is 
 born. To know that we are the arbiters of 
 our own destinies, and can live in these bodies 
 comfortably, usefully, and as long as we 
 please, is to “ arise and shine and give God the 
 glory.” 
 
 Old age and death are the colossal lies of 
 the centuries. It is for us at the close of this 
 century to speak the Truth. 
 
GET UP OR GET OUT! 
 
 You’ve got to get up, or you’ve got to get out f 
 You can’t lie there in a heap, 
 
 With doctors and nurses poking about, 
 
 And bromides to put you to sleep. 
 
 You’ve got to get up in your soul of souls 
 And realize what you are — 
 
 A free-born child of the universe, 
 
 Perfection your polar star. 
 
 You’ve got to get up, or you ve got to get out! 
 
 You can’t sit there and boo-hoo, 
 
 Because your friend has gone from your sight, 
 
 Or the world has gone back on you. 
 
 The law of momentum will carry you down, 
 When you once start the train that way ; 
 
 But when you reverse, it will carry you up ; 
 
 It is only for you to say. 
 
 You’ve got to get up, or you’ve got to get out ! 
 
 You can’t be saved by your tears, 
 
 Nor by praying to God to ease your pain. 
 
 It’s been tried for thousands of years — 
 
 And the pain is still here, and the tears still flow, 
 And so they’ll continue to do 
 Until you look into your soul and know 
 That your God is at home in you. 
 
 You’ve got to get up, or you’ve got to get out ! 
 
 And the work is your very own ; 
 
 There is no one to hinder and few who can help ; 
 
 You’re a unit and stand alone. 
 
 But the God in yourself is mighty to raise, 
 
 When you realize what you are — 
 
 A free-born child of the universe, 
 
 Perfection your polar star. 
 
 Eleanor Kirk^ 
 
THE INFLUENCE 
 
 °N ZODIAC UPON 
 HUMAN LIFE 
 
 BY 
 
 ELEANOR KIRK 
 
 The volume by the above title is the only simpli- 
 fied astrological work in the world. All other books 
 on this subject are involved, abstruse, and mathe- 
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 of the sums. 
 
 For those who are desirous of understanding them- 
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 glaring faults and puzzling idiosyncrasies, who are 
 anxious to know in what particular line their talents 
 lie, and how they can succeed spiritually, morally, 
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 door to valuable treasures. 
 
 For those who desire congenial marital relations, 
 who wish above all things to choose wisely, and for 
 those who would find a reason and a cure for the 
 miseries of their married lot, “ The Influence of the 
 Zodiac upon Human Life” will prove a friend in need. 
 
 One has only to know the month and day of his or 
 her birth to find every virtue, talent, fault, and incon- 
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 troublesome conditions, and a way of developing every 
 mental attribute. 
 
 This book shows the way of overcoming, the way 
 to bring up children, the way to make money, and 
 to secure such positions as suit the talent or the 
 genius of the individual. It gives the governing 
 planets, the gems, and astral colors of every native. 
 Its price is $1.00. 
 
 ...FIFTEENTH EDITION... 
 
 ELEANOR KIRK, 
 
LIBRA 
 
 OR WHAT THE STARS 
 
 TOLD ELIZABETH 
 
 * ★ ★ ★ ★ 
 
 A companion book to “ The Influence 
 of the Zodiac upon Human Life A 
 
 The principal characters in this romance are Libra and Cap- 
 ricorn — the former a young October woman, born in the middle 
 sign of the air triplicity ; the latter a young man born in January, 
 *he last sign of the earth triplicity. This combination gives the 
 author abundant scientific material from which to weave a most 
 fascinating and attractive story. 
 
 Richly bound in cloth, stamped on cover with the Libra 
 colors ; a beautiful and artistic volume. Sent by mail on receipt 
 of price, $1.00. 
 
 Address ELEANOR KIRK, Author 
 696 Greene Avenue, - - “Brooklyn, N. Y. 
 
 THE BOTTOM PLANK OF MENTAL B F. AI.1N C 
 
 By ELEANOR KIRK 
 
 This book is said to be the simplest exposition of the basic prin- 
 ciples of spiritual healing ever published. It has healed many 
 people. 
 
 Paper, 25 cents. 696 Greene Avenue, Brooklyn, N. Y. 
 
 INFORMATION FOR AUTHORS \ZTLT 
 
 PRICE, $i.oo. 
 
 A book full of points for those who desire to write for the 
 press, but who are unfamiliar with editorial requirements. Every 
 possible need of every writer is met in this volume, and proof- 
 reading is perfectly taught. 
 
 PERPETDAL YOHTH. By 
 
 ELEANOR KIRK 
 
 SIXTH EDITION 
 
 Deals with the right and ability of every human being to 
 secure abiding vitality here and now, without stint or limit. It 
 substitutes life for death, health for disease, wealth for poverty. 
 
 BOUND IN CLOTH. PRICE, $1.00 
 
 Address ELEANOR KIRK, 696 Greene Ave., Brooklyn, N. Y. 
 
ELEANOR KIRK’S IDEA 
 
 Publication 
 
 This journal is published for the sake of making 
 people healthy and happy. 
 
 Where there is happiness there is always health. 
 
 It introduces the reader to himself, making him 
 acquainted with his own God, resident in his own 
 breast, and equal to the work of overcoming all 
 things. 
 
 It strikes a clear and triumphant note for indi- 
 viduality and steadfastly preaches the doctrine of 
 looking at home for guidance, realizing the truth 
 of the Christ statement, “ The kingdom of heaven 
 is within you.” 
 
 Eleanor Kirk’s Idea is fearless and uncom- 
 promising. Its motto is ‘‘Truth, not Tradition; 
 Principle, not Prejudice.” 
 
 Price, $i per year. Sample copies free. 
 
 ...ADDRESS... 
 
 ELEANOR KIRK’S IDEA, 696 Greene Ave., Brooklyn, N. Y. 
 
 G umption Cards NE 0RK3INAL 
 
 1 RECIPES 
 
 ...By ELEANOR KIRK... 
 
 Price y 10 Cents 
 
 Perfect soups without meat, in which the flavor 
 and stimulus of meat are not missed. 
 Progressive dishes to match the progressive 
 times. 
 
 Healthful salads, desserts, etc., etc. 
 
 Every dish created or perfected and used by 
 
 Eleanor Kirk, 696 Greene Ave., 
 
 BROOKLYN, N. Y. 
 
WHERE 
 YOU ARE 
 
 A Book 
 for Girls 
 
 BY 
 
 ELEANOR KIRK 
 
 ... PRICE , 25 CENTS ... 
 
 In all the spiritual science literature that has been so carefully 
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 “Where You Are ” takes the girls out of the beaten, mo- 
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 Address ELEANOR KIRK, 696 Greene Avenue, Brooklyn, N. Y. 
 
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 By EDWARD HOOKER DEWEY, M.D 
 Introduction by Rev. GEORGE F PENTECOST, D D 
 
 A New Era for Woman “ r - HBALTH „T, 
 
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 Introduction by ALICE McCLELLAN BIRNEY 
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 small box; $1.00 per jar. Powder, 35 cents per 
 box. Address Miss M. G. Anderson, 588 Throop 
 Avenue, Brooklyn, N. Y. 
 

 VLSI 
 
 HOTEL 
 
 Irving Place and 16th Street 
 
 ONE BLOCK EAST OF UNION SQUARE 
 
 I. D. CRAWFORD 
 
 Proprietor 
 
 ...NEW YORK 
 
 EUROPEAN PLAN.... 
 
 $ 1.00 
 
 PER DAY 
 AND 
 
 UPWARDS 
 
 AMERICAN PLAN... 
 
 $ 3.50 
 
 PER DAY 
 
 AND 
 
 UPWARDS