Rensselaer Union, Volume 2, Number 37, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 9 June 1870 — How People Live Too [ARTICLE]

How People Live Too

Thb word “fast ";h«feJirtterly.obtained a peculiar significance a tendency to general high giving and indulgence in sensual pleasures. A man of reckless cxpendit’jfe, who indulges himself in all that can gratify his sensual tastes, is a “ fast man ” in the common sense of tb> term. This expressive adjective bag also been applied to those who habitu ally risk money in games of chance, and ’ nas j n gome instances been coupled w ith the names j?f others, who speculate in doubtful stocks. We have crqne to. the conclusion that sensual indulgence, exciting games of chance, dr speculation in fancy stocks, are not the only ways jn.which men may life too fast. Many a godly and devout divine is ; a fast man. Many an editor, lawyer, merchant, or scientific hum, against .Whom no thought of suspicion exists--as'to the -’soundness of hu moral character 1 , is fast an as just, though net ’“ln so’reprehensible a sense, as the mAnSzho wastes his substance in riotous Jiving. Fast living in-the sense of such living as shortens life, is a much more common evil than it isgpnerally regarded. We have been hn observer of faces and character for a long time, as we have had opportunity in cars, stage coaches, and our daily intercourse with ■ men, and we believe that in the vast majority of cases it would be found that the rapidity of the pulse in Americans is above the normal, standard. Every man’s life may be measured bv pulse-beats. He will live, accident excepted, to make a definite nutr.’oer of these, and his life will be tth'.wtened ir proportion to the excess of Work performed by his vital organs, in a given time. Excitement, physioal L or mental, is the •cause of the rapid nite, at . which most American people are living. The love for excitement is a vice, as positively evil in its effects as the love for strong drink, licentiousness, or gambling. - It matters not what kind of excitement; all excitement is fast living, and begets a feeling of exhaustion in intervals of indulgence, •wliioh clamors for relief from some other form of stimulant. Thus it is that the universal demand for ■artificial stimulants has Increased, until there is perhaps not one in a thousand who does not resort to something of this kind. Alcohol, absinthe, opium, hashish, tobacco, coffee, tea, or whatever else it may be, is taken to support the system under the effect of nervous prostration, to supply in another form the excitement which it craves. Now all this is just the reverse of what should be this case. Instead of seeking excitement, health and long life demand that we should shun it. The natural, h< althy condition of the mind and body is that of unruffled calmness. If excitements occur, they should be exceptional, not the rule of life. As soon as they become a necessity there is a diseased state of mind and body, apd the candle begins to burn at both ends.— -Scientific American.