Rensselaer Republican, Volume 19, Number 3, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 September 1886 — Does Overwork Kill? [ARTICLE]

Does Overwork Kill?

We read every little while of some man who has killed himself with overwork. We do not much believe in the theory. A good many are killed by worry, a good many by dissipation, but not many by work, for work is the fate of man, and nature prepared him for it He may through his work neglect regular food, exercise, and bathing, or when tired he may brace himself up with artificial stimulants, and some morning he may break down, but that is not the work of the engine but the abuse of the boiler. Or he may have a worry about business or about fame, and these may fret the life out of him; but it is no more due to hard work than when the sand of a muddy stream cuts the boxes out of a water-wheel. It is said that Secretary Manning has been prostrated by overwork. A glance at his picture will reveal that he was wound up for a hundred years’ run, and if he is disabled it is because the boiler was neglected and permitted to burn out where it could not be patched, or with a 100-horse-power boiler he ran with full pressure a 50-horse power engine until the valves gave way. A man’s body is so delicate that the prick of a bare bodkin may break all its adjustment and cause it to fall back to 41iist, and yet that delicate mechanism was adjusted originally for a full voyage, and unless it is in some way abused it will carry its freight safely over all the deeps of life. It will withstand both labor and disease better than care. There is a story going around of two poorhouse inmates in the East who are each 114 years of age. The secret is that when, half a century ago, they were sent to the poorhouse they knew that their future was provided for, and they gave up worrying and grew fat.— Salt Lake Tribune.