The Age Of Man

Few men die of oíd age. Almost all die of disappointment, passion, mental or bodily toil, or accident. The common expression, "choked with passion,"' has little exaggeration in it; even though not suddenly fatal, strong passions shorten life. Strong-bodied men of ten die young ; weak men of ten live longer than the strong, for the strong use their strength and the weak have none to use. The hitter take care of themselves ; the former do not. As it is with the body, so it is with the mind and .temper. The strong are apt to break, or, like a candidate, to run ; the weak to run out. The inferior animáis that live températe Uves, have generally their prescribed number of years. The norse lives 25 ; the ox 15 or 20; the dog 10 or 12; the rabbit 8; the guinea pig 6 or 7 years. These numbers all bear a similar proportion to the time the animal takes to gror to its full size. But man, of all the animáis, seldom lives this average. He ought to live 100 years according to physical law, for five times twenty is a hundred; but instead of that, he scarcely reaches on an average four times his growing period; the cat six times, and the rabbit even eight times the standard of measurement. The reason is obvious - man is not only the most irregular and intemperate, but the most laborious and hard-worked of all the animáis. He is also the most irritable, and there is reason to believe, though we cannot teil what an animal secretly feels, that more than any other animal, man cherishes wrath to keep it warm, and consumes himself with the fire of his own secret reflections.