Hen.rst Fountain 
 
 W V^S* 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 
 in 2007 with funding from 
 
 Microsoft Corporation 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/efficiencyoflifeOOmorrrich 
 
» • • 
 
 • * * 
 
 Dr. Andrew Malcolm Morrison 
 
 ( This photo taken after the Author *s hundredth birthday.) 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 AT 
 
 100 
 
 YEARS AND MORE 
 
 BY 
 REV. ANDREW MALCOLM MORRISON 
 
 PubKshedby 
 
 AUSTIN PUBLISHING CO., 
 
 Los Angeles, Cal. 
 
Copyright, 1921 
 By Andrew Malcolm Morrison 
 
CHAPTER I 
 REMARKABLE CASES OF LONGEVITY 
 
 A GREAT French expert, Dr. Metchnikoff, 
 declares that no one need grow old. Of 
 course, time will elapse, and the number 
 of a man's years will increase, but he 
 need not experience any loss of vitality. 
 
 The reason why we decay, according to the 
 Doctor, is because we suffer from a distressing 
 complaint which he has named "macrophagocy- 
 tosis." Now what do you think of that? And 
 Dr. Metchnikoff vows he can cure it. In a hun- 
 dred years, he says, there will be no such thing 
 as death from old age — it will be abolished, as 
 many other diseases are being stamped out by 
 Medical gentlemen. Lordy ! Please excuse the 
 infantile profanity. Medical gentlemen stamping 
 out disease! Well, sir, that "jars" me sure. He 
 says death will soon have few opportunities "of 
 getting one in on us." 
 
 I'm not so sure that this is a very desirable 
 prospect. If people go on being born, and other 
 people meanly avoid dying, there will soon be a 
 state of competition, and congestion, quite un- 
 endurable. 
 
 Moreover, murder would receive quite an 
 impetus, and DeQuincy's suggestion "that it 
 should be regarded as a fine art" would be car- 
 ried out. There would be a run on poleaxes: 
 and a murderer who made a slight clearance in 
 the jungle of humanity, instead of being regarded 
 as a criminal, would be rewarded from the poor 
 
 489538 
 
6 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 box; or, perhaps, Knighted. I am inclined to 
 think the present system, which allows the Doc- 
 tors "to polish off" a decent number of victims 
 every year is, on the whole, a better plan. 
 
 In November, 1898, the Journal Des Debats 
 published a statement showing the number of 
 Centenarians then living in Europe; a statement 
 which was accepted, and reproduced by the 
 "mighty Mulhall." The total was 1,498, and the 
 manner of their distribution was thusly : Ireland, 
 578; Spain, 401; France, 243; England, 146; 
 Germany, 75; and Scotland, 46; apparently in 
 the countries not named, there were no 100-year- 
 olds. There may be good reason for this, but I 
 confess I cannot understand it. 
 
 SjC SfC 5|C «fC 3|C 3|( 
 
 I wonder if Ireland is proud of her preemi- 
 nence in this respect, and of the fact that she 
 had almost five times as many centenarians as 
 England, and more than twelve times as many 
 as Scotland. Perhaps her brave sons regard it 
 as a grievance. I look on it in this way — it is 
 notorious that many of the young people emi- 
 grate from Ireland, and thus, if the old did not 
 persist in living there would be no one left. But 
 I will present a better reason for Irish longevity 
 as we proceed. I will show that Irish longevity 
 is a thing of morals, dietetics, and climate. They 
 hold on in the interest of patriotism, and in de- 
 fiance of the Saxon. They remain as a garrison, 
 keeping at bay alike John Bull, and that grisly 
 
 monster known as the king of terrors. 
 
 ****** 
 
 It may be that men live to a great age in 
 Ireland because of the sustaining power con- 
 tained in the potato. There is a proud old song 
 beginning : 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 7 
 
 Crest of the O'Shaughnashane, 
 That's a potato plain; 
 Long may your root every Irish-man know ! 
 Pats long have stuck to it, 
 Long bid good luck to it. 
 Whack for O'Shaughnashane. Tooly whang 
 
 Ho. 
 And so, possibly it is this vitalizing root that 
 enables Pat to face the still, sad music of hu- 
 manity for 100 years and more. Or it may be 
 that the native pugnacity of our Irish friends 
 causes them to sing out "Never say die," and to 
 
 mean it. 
 
 ****** 
 
 Then there is the puzzling case of Scotland. 
 Why are Centenarians so scarce in that land of 
 the mountain, and the flood? It is enough to 
 make the Caledonian both stern, and wild. Well, 
 thoughtful observers have suggested two reasons. 
 First, the long life is a rather expensive business. 
 In a general way, a man who dies when he is 
 fifty expends less money. That is to say "He 
 bangs fewer saxpences" than the man who lives 
 to be 100. It would be unphilosophical to say 
 that the man who dies saves money; but he cer- 
 tainly ceases to spend money, and this fact ap- 
 pealing to the "metapheezical," and economical 
 instincts of a great people, may have brought 
 Centenarianism into disrepute in Scotland. 
 Shakespeare may have been thinking about some- 
 thing of the sort when he wrote about "The 
 calamity of too long life." 
 
 Let no one say that a man or woman is neces- 
 sarily old when 100, for this is not the case. 
 There have been some notable instances of people 
 showing that one may have a long life, and a 
 merry one. Look at that noble and excellent 
 
8 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 lady, the Countess of Desmond, who was killed 
 in the 146th year of her age, by falling from a 
 cherry tree. There is no sign of decrepitude or 
 decay about a lady, who, when she has scored 
 almost a century and a half, can scramble up a 
 tree like a squirrel. And Tom Parr lived to be 
 152, and died after a dinner party at Lord 
 Arundel's, on which occasion I understand that 
 Thomas had been the life and soul of the party. 
 He probably overdid the thing a little, and of 
 course accidents may happen under the best reg- 
 ulations. Then there was the case of Madam 
 Rovero, who passed away in 1741. She was then 
 164, and left a son aged 116. 
 
 I have been unable to find out whether the 
 poor little fellow grew up or whether the shock, 
 occasioned by the premature death of his Mamma 
 cut him off early in his centenarianism. 
 
 John Riva of Venice, was also an interesting 
 gentleman, as he was 116 when he died, AND 
 HE LEFT A SON OF 14! Eh! What do ye 
 think of that now? Able to reproduce himself 
 at the age of 102 ! Say, "that's goin' some." Eh ! 
 
 It is said of John that "he chewed citron bark 
 daily," but the statement that he said, "I can live 
 as long as I chew," lacks confirmation. 
 
 According to Pliny, there were in the part 
 of Italy between the Apennines and the river Po, 
 in the year 76 A. D., fifty-four people 103 years 
 old; fifty-seven, 110 years; two, 120 years; four, 
 130 years ; four, 135 years ; and three, 140 years. 
 That is what Pliny says. 
 
 Real men and women, have lived 100 to 150 
 years in this present life during the current 
 Centuries. I will proceed to give their history, 
 habits, manner of life, supposed causes of their 
 longevity, and how we all may attain longer life 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 9 
 
 and greater efficiency than we can now possibly 
 have under present dietetic, industrial and social 
 habits. I have from history established the fact 
 of many having lived to the 100 years and over, 
 and still being efficient, and enjoying life, with- 
 out the querulous broken heartedness of old age. 
 
 Real men and women have lived to 100 and 
 176 years in this present life during the past 
 and present centuries. And many such are now 
 living, and are neither short-stepped nor wheezy. 
 We have quite a number of men and women past 
 90, and some of them approaching the 100, in 
 the Centenarian Club of Los Angeles, of which 
 I am proud to be a member. 
 
 Say, Friends, I am not about to speculate, or 
 to discuss opinions, whether Physiological, or 
 Psychological. I am determined to give you 
 actual history. The speculator and myself don't 
 harmonize very well. The philosophers have 
 made me very tired; especially the "Nu-thot" 
 variety, and "The great within" men. 
 
 Now for real history. A certain Doctor, and 
 a very eminent one at that, has been giving us 
 counsel in the health department of the News- 
 papers. He asserted in one of these "Health 
 Lessons "that no proof ever had come forth to 
 prove that anyone had lived 100 years." Well, 
 we'll see before I'm through. For, as Burns says, 
 "Facts are chiels that winna ding, and dare na 
 be disputed." 
 
 Also, when lately lecturing in one of the 
 churches in Los Angeles on "Sanctification by 
 the Spirit," a certain official of the Church, fol- 
 lowed by reading a diatribe from some profes- 
 sional crank who, like the famous author of 
 "Health Lessons," asserted that no one ever had 
 lived 100 years, and demanded from me some 
 
10 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 particular proof that what I asserted was true. 
 
 Well, sir, 1 was delighted, quite charmed, with 
 the incident. It was proof to me strong as Holy 
 writ, that I was a living example of my doctrine 
 of "Sanctification by the Spirit." Had it not 
 been so, my unregenerated IRISH would immed- 
 iately have introduced a new soul to St. Peter. 
 I now know beyond a doubt that I am "sanctified 
 by the Spirit." 
 
 I begin the record of these remarkable lives 
 by choosing my first examples from the Irish, 
 which I believe is universally acknowledged to 
 be the most celebrated for Longevity among the 
 races of the earth. I am repeating the record 
 of a ceremony peculiarly Irish. It is the celebra- 
 tion of the 78th anniversary of the marriage of 
 two Irish peasants who, after 78 years of wed- 
 lock's trials and disturbances, were still sweet- 
 hearts, with unwrinkled forehead. 
 
 New York, April 14th, 1918. "Married for 
 seventy-eight years, believed to be the oldest liv- 
 ing married couple in New Jersey. Mr. and Mrs. 
 John McCandless, of Elizabeth, New Jersey, are 
 still sweethearts, as they were years ago in the 
 old days, when they wooed beside the Blarney 
 stone in Ireland. 
 
 "We are enjoying the Spring breezes," said 
 Mr. McCandless, who is 98 years old. "I love 
 the Spring, for it was in this season of the year 
 that I won my greatest happiness — my wife." 
 He turned to the little woman by his side, who 
 looks to be 60, rather than 96 "Little did we 
 think eighty years ago when we met, that we 
 should live to have sixteen great-grand children, 
 did we dear? However, I recall your vow that 
 you would live with me ' until the stars forgot to 
 shine, and the waves forget to roll/ Complete 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 11 
 
 the stanza which you said, — and the old lady 
 answered: 'I am forever thine, and to thee I 
 give my heart and soul/ " She smiled teasingly, 
 as she added, "I said that only because it rhymed 
 with the first two lines." Note. — There are no 
 divorces in Ireland, and that helps some in Lon- 
 gevity. See? 
 
 On October 27th, 1916, there was living in 
 Kansas City, Mo., a Negro, James Mitchell, 99 
 years old, who registered that morning in Ar- 
 gentine. Mitchell was a bachelor until he was 
 97 years old. Then he married a very young 
 woman, Polly Red. Mitchell is a gardener and 
 works hard every day. He is, of course, a Re- 
 publican. He told Chas. A. Payne, the city clerk, 
 that since he was set free he had never missed 
 voting at a Presidential Election, and at only two 
 State Elections. Mitchell was born in Mississippi. 
 He came West after the war. He is a property 
 owner. 
 
 Now this gentleman knows nothing of Psy- 
 chology, Health exercises, Divine breath, etc. He 
 knows something of hard work, tho. He must 
 have been a vigorous youth at 97, when he was 
 able to bewiggle Polly Red, a very young, vivacious 
 and vigorous damsel, into wifehood. Honest 
 now, don't you think so? 
 
 Now I leave the wise "Health-Guides, and 
 Mental-Therapeutists" to fix this up. It's beyond 
 me, and I know Mitchell knew nothing about any 
 of them. 
 
 Now, here's another: Boston, February 11th, 
 1915. For the first time in many years, Thomas 
 McNab, the 95-year-old Weymouth man, who has 
 been paying court to Mrs. Alice Clark, 74 years 
 of age, of Northampton, today stood before the 
 forge in his blacksmith shop in Union street, 
 
12 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 Weymouth, and worked at his trade making high 
 grade tools now used in Automobile manufactur- 
 ing. 
 
 McNab returned to Weymouth, after spending 
 several days at the home of his prospective bride's 
 daughter in Northampton, with the statement 
 that the wedding had been postponed for a brief 
 time at the request of his future step-daughter, 
 who, he said, desired her mother to wait until 
 the discussion over the coming event had died 
 down a little, and McNab made more money ! ! 
 
 Now, whose business was it, I wonder? Say, 
 people will be busy about everyone's business but 
 their own. O these gossipers! Say, if there is 
 no hell, there ought to be one, for the gossip needs 
 eternal discipline, and even with it all his michief- 
 making instinct cannot be controlled. 
 
 Now here is a woman who leads the proces- 
 sion, as is the privilege of the angelic sex, God 
 bless 'em. 
 
 Healdsburg, Cal., Jan. 29th, 1917. Grandma 
 Electa Kennedy celebrated her 104th birthday to- 
 day. She enjoyed an automobile ride with Dr. 
 A. J. Swisher around the Plaza, and handled the 
 wheel of the machine during the journey. She 
 is the oldest Fraternal woman in the world, being 
 a member of the Sotoyome Chapter, Order of the 
 Eastern Star. 
 
 Now this is no "Camouflage." This thing 
 actually happened. All the good don't die young. 
 
 I have quit following the "Will-'o-the-wisp" 
 of speculative philosophy, and "sich." I now pay 
 no attention at all to theories. I must have facts. 
 Then on the facts, each brother and sister of the 
 incomprehensible race called "human" can oper- 
 ate their own particular thinker as the "Sub- 
 conscious" compels. 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE IS 
 
 The various speculations in the "Unknow- 
 able" remind me of a showman in old England 
 once. He introduced his scenes thusly: "Look 
 to the right, and you'll see Daniel in the Lion's 
 Den. Daniel is not one bit afraid of the Lions, 
 and the Lions are not afraid of Daniel." A youth 
 in the crowd called out, "Mister, vich is Daniel, 
 and vich is the lions?" "Ah, vich you please, 
 you pays your money, and you takes your choice." 
 
 But I must make another little extract from 
 Ireland. From Castlebar, County Mayo, comes 
 the news of the death of James Conway, a farmer 
 who attained the age of 112 years. The father 
 of James Conway did not die so young, for his 
 years were six score and six. That is 126. The 
 grandfather's age was 130 years. These statis- 
 tics are the less unlikely because in the same 
 county an old man died not long ago who was 
 proved to have attained the age of 120 years. 
 
 James Conway remembered the French in- 
 vasion, in 1798, which was led by General Hum- 
 bert, who won the battle known as "the Races of 
 Castlebar." 
 
 Now I have been always telling you that the 
 people of Ireland live long, and have no knowl- 
 edge of senile decrepitude. And it's a fact. But 
 I think one reason is because the race is specially 
 favored by Providence in the production of "the 
 potato" and SHAMROCK. Also, there is a com- 
 mandment to Israel which contains a promise of 
 long life for obedience. "Honor thy father, and 
 thy mother, that thy days may be long in the 
 land." In no country can you find this com- 
 mandment in deeper reverence than in Ireland. 
 
 But here comes the Negro again. Memphis, 
 Tenn., Nov. 10th, 1916. "Great is the excitement 
 among the Negro population in the vicinity of 
 
U EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 Wick avenue, for "Mammy" Evelina Mosby has 
 retired from her Laundry labors, after a century 
 passed at the tubs, and will, hereafter, devote her 
 energies to ironing, and sewing only. At present 
 "Mammy" Mosby is only 115 years old, but she 
 is adding daily to her record, and hopes in the 
 course of time to reach the 120 mark. 
 
 Notwithstanding her advanced age Mrs. Mosby 
 is as "spry" as her "baby" son Tupp Mosby, aged 
 75, with whom she resides, together with her 
 daughter and granddaughter, the last named of 
 whom is Mary Warren, who is maid at the Union 
 Depot. Another son, Henry, who has attained 
 the age of 80, is considered old enough to shift 
 for himself, and is keeping house with his wife, 
 near his mother's residence. 
 
 COOKED FOR WASHINGTON 
 Recapitulating her history to a reporter for 
 the News-Scimitar, "Mammy" Mosby cites the 
 fact, that she was born in Memphis, when the 
 town consisted of only a couple of dwellings, and 
 a number of Indian Tepees, the only store in the 
 settlement being a general emporium, kept by 
 Captain Bell, on the bank of the Mississippi. 
 
 For years she lived as a slave in the house of 
 Nick Perkins, and on his death, and the subse- 
 quent marriage of Mrs. Perkins to Dudley Dunn, 
 she became a member of the Colony of 200 
 negroes owned by the Dunn family. 
 
 By far, the most vivid recollection of the old 
 woman's memory is that she once enjoyed the 
 honor of cooking dinner for Gen. Washington, 
 who passed through the "city," and stopped a day 
 at the Dunn home, where he is said to have been 
 most hospitably entertained. "And I'll never 
 forget him," says "Mammy" solemnly. 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 15 
 
 After some years with the Dunn family 
 "Mammy," who was known as Evelina Dunn, 
 was married to Billy Mosby, the latter taking his 
 patronymic from the family of Samuel Mosby, 
 his owner, who then lived in the vicinity of what 
 is now Alabama street. In course of time twelve 
 children were born, but the number of grand- 
 children and great-grand-children for whose ex- 
 istence she is responsible, is far beyond the 
 powers of her calculation. 
 
 LOST COUNT OF THE DESCENDANTS 
 
 "Lord bless you, chile," she said, "I cannot 
 begin to tell you the number. They are scattered 
 over Tennessee and Mississippi till I've clean lost 
 count ov 'em." 
 
 Altho her son, and daughter, and grand- 
 daughter are all in good circumstances "Mammy" 
 has stuck to the washtub, and has long been held 
 up as an example to much younger women. She 
 is also accounted the champion ironer of her 
 colour in Memphis; in addition to which she can 
 thread a needle without difficulty, and disdains 
 the use of glasses. 
 
 "Mammy" Mosby will celebrate her 116th 
 birthday June the 15th, next, when a great cele- 
 bration is promised. 
 
 It is related that at the death of a son some 
 years ago, at the ripe age of 80, "Mammy" turned 
 mournfully to her husband and remarked : "There, 
 Bill, I alius feared we'd never be able to raise 
 that boy." 
 
 LIVED 106 YEARS, DIED IN SLEEP 
 
 Mount Vernon, Ills., Nov. 10th, 1916. Have 
 you ever heard of William Greer, familiarly 
 known to the people of Jefferson County as 
 "Uncle Billy?" He died during sleep at his home 
 
16 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 near this city, having been confined to his bed 
 only about three days. He was a native of Ken- 
 tucky, and was born on Nov. 24th, 1800, and 
 would have been 106 years old, had he lived a 
 few days longer. 
 
 He was raised on a farm in the "Bluegrass 
 State" when that country was wild and unde- 
 veloped. 
 
 And to the day of his death, he never tired 
 of telling the stories of pioneer life. He was 
 married, of course. No bachelor can attain to 
 Longevity. I will explain the Psychological and 
 Physiological reasons why no "old bachelor" can 
 live long, as I proceed. 
 
 Mr. Greer resided in his native state until 
 1844, when he emigrated to Illinois with his 
 family, and settled on the farm where he died. 
 He was a successful farmer, but, not being 
 obsessed with the spirit of grab, and being both 
 generous and charitable, and having his greatest 
 happiness in helping others, his open-handed 
 generosity prevented him from laying up much 
 property. 
 
 He was the father of six children, all of whom 
 besides the wife and mother, died before he died. 
 His married life was one of perfect happiness, 
 the demon discord never having paid a visit to 
 their domestic nest, and he had the rare privilege 
 of celebrating with the wife of his youth, their 
 67th wedding anniversary. 
 
 But say, now here's a screed. He never used 
 intoxicating liquors! O Lordy, and he was a 
 Kentuckian. He also used Tobacco very spar- 
 ingly. And to his freedom from Narcotics, and 
 to the fact that he always ate and slept regularly, 
 he attributed his long life and robust health. A 
 word is sufficient to the wise. Go thou and do 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 17 
 
 likewise, omitting the grog and the tobacco. See ! 
 
 Now I am about to transcribe the history of 
 the man whose life and work are the most won- 
 derful of modern history, and there is no cam- 
 ouflage about it either. He is Captain Diamond. 
 He has lived in three Centuries, according to 
 A Republic Special, Berkeley, Cal., and still 
 likes to have fun. He can ride a bicycle, box, 
 and peddle books, and is said to look much 
 younger than he did forty years ago. I quote 
 from the Republic Special: Berkeley, Cal., June 
 15, 1917. "There are old men, and old men, but 
 Captain Goddard E. Diamond, who confesses 
 coyly to 111 years, is an old man who is able to 
 do things. 
 
 Captain Diamond's friends are now watch- 
 ing the Sunday-School picnic- calendar to see 
 what picnic he will attend next — for he went 
 to one the other day, and had as much fun with 
 the girls as any young fellow of 80 or 90 years 
 could have. 
 
 "Well, why shouldn't I have fun?" asked 
 Captain Diamond, and they had no answer for 
 him. 
 
 Captain Diamond looks like a man of 50. He 
 has to ascribe his longevity to something of 
 course, and his answer is "abstemious living." 
 For more than eighty years he has eaten no meat, 
 and used neither tea, nor coffee. Liquor and 
 tobacco he has never tasted in his life. 
 
 He eats freely of fish, eggs, cheese, and milk, 
 but with these exceptions, his diet is vegetables. 
 He avoids white flour, and his staples are bread, 
 and mush made from the entire wheat, oat and 
 barley meals. He eats much fruit. 
 
 Hot water is his chief beverage, and his 
 dietary fad is the copious use of olive oil. It must 
 
18 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 be real olive oil, however. He would rather eat 
 machine oil than the concoctions of cottonseed, 
 peanut, and seasame oils, that are commonly sold 
 as olive — or at least that were sold under that 
 name before the passage of the pure-food law. 
 
 AN ACTIVE MAN 
 
 Captain Diamond is not merely an old man; 
 he is one of the most active men in the com- 
 munity. He practices daily calisthenics, and has 
 long served as a trainer in that course, teaching 
 younger men to take on the youthful agility that 
 he has himself. 
 
 He is a skillful bicycle rider, and a skilled 
 boxer as well. Not half the men of half his age 
 could last five rounds with him within the roped 
 ring. His skin is as clear, his eyes as bright, and 
 his step as elastic as those of the average sound 
 and healthy man of 50. 
 
 Pictures of him, taken during the Civil War, 
 really look older than he does today. He says, 
 that during the war he was unable to regulate his 
 diet and his habits as he wished, and that his 
 health suffered in consequence. 
 
 Still, with the exception of a short illness that 
 resulted from exposure and privation while the 
 great fire was raging in San Francisco, the Cap- 
 tain has had but one illness in 87 years. This 
 was yellow fever in 1852 while he was in Florida. 
 His illness, 87 years ago was inflammatory rheu- 
 matism. But this was evidently a great blessing. 
 It was his difficulty in obtaining relief that led 
 to his adoption of the vegetable dietary to which 
 he has since adhered. Ha! See! Note! Verb. 
 Sap!! 
 
 He had been treated for two months by a 
 physician without any improvement. He dis- 
 missed the Doctor, and began the use of Olive oil 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 19 
 
 as a food, and as an embrocation, and eliminated 
 meat from his diet. Two months later he was 
 well, and rheumatism has never troubled him 
 since. Wise Guy! 
 
 Captain Diamond learned the trade of steam 
 engineer while a young man. He was called a 
 skilled engineer up to the time he quit the trade, 
 which was while he was in his 98th year. For 
 thirteen years he had held only two positions — 
 seven years as engineer of the Occidental Hotel 
 in San Francisco, and six years in the same 
 capacity at the Baldwin Hotel in the same city. 
 
 In all that time his most serious mishap was 
 one that compelled him to shut down the elevators 
 in the Baldwin Hotel for three hours. He says 
 he could go back to the trade today if he wished, 
 but since he quit it at 98 he has earned his living 
 by selling books and earned a good living, too. 
 
 He generally travels on foot, and handles his- 
 tories, and encyclopaedias, and also the story of 
 his own life — a book of 130 pages, recounting his 
 adventures, and describing the hygienic system 
 by which he regulates his habits. 
 
 "The big fire" left him with only the clothes 
 he wore, and 56 cents in his pockets. But he 
 accepted aid from the relief workers for only 
 about a month, and then went out "to get a new 
 start," as he said. 
 
 Captain Diamond's long life has held many 
 vicissitudes and adventures. He has been ship- 
 wrecked twice, and he crossed the plains in an 
 emigrant wagon. During the Civil War he served 
 as engineer in several gunboats. 
 
 Captain Diamond sees no reason why he 
 should not live another Century. He never felt 
 better in his life, and there are people in San 
 Francisco who formed his acquaintance thirty 
 
20 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 years ago, who say that he looks younger now 
 than he did at that time. Only recently he under- 
 went a medical examination, and the Physician 
 closed his report with this paragraph: "The 
 physical examination of Captain Diamond reveals 
 a remarkable preservation of tissue integrity and 
 function activity. There is no factor, or combi- 
 nation of factors, which would even remotely 
 suggest any approach of dissolution, and if no 
 intercurrent complication supervenes, it would be 
 purely speculative to hazard an opinion as to his 
 probable future span of life." 
 
 The Captain was born at Plymouth, Mass., 
 on May 1st, 1796. His ancestry was a mixture 
 of English, Irish, Scotch and Dutch. His mother's 
 maiden name was Allen, and she was niece of 
 General Ethan Allen, of the Revolutionary Army. 
 His father, Joseph Diamond, lived to be 108. 
 Runs in the family. Say — something in heredity. 
 Eh! 
 
 Captain Diamond never went to school, but 
 learned to read after he had grown to manhood. 
 His early years were spent on a farm, and he 
 believes his constant outdoor life, and his daily 
 exercise, with plough, scythe, hoe and flail were 
 principal factors in laying the foundation for his 
 century of activity. 
 
 He took part in the construction of the Erie 
 Canal. He was one of the first engineers on the 
 Iron Mountain Railway in Missouri. He was 
 never married. (Poor fellow, if he had been 
 crowned with the joys of wedlock, and the charm 
 and inspiration of womanhood, he might have 
 reached the full two centuries). 
 
 Up to the date of the fire in San Francisco he 
 had many papers verifying the story of his long 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 21 
 
 life. These have been seen by hundreds of people 
 who have no doubt of their verity, and who be- 
 lieve that Captain Diamond has really lived in 
 three Centuries. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 MORE CASES OF LONGEVITY 
 
 But now I encounter the sad duty of record- 
 ing the demise of the really wonderful example 
 of human ability, to hold on to life on the earth 
 plane. Captain Diamond passed on as he had 
 attained 118 years of age. I quote from a special 
 to the Tribune: "San Francisco, August 14. 
 Capt. Goddard E. Diamond, 118 years old, passed 
 away at the Crocker Old People's Home, Pine 
 and Pierce streets, tonight. 
 
 Captain Diamond was proud of the great age 
 which he had attained, and in recent years his 
 birthday anniversaries were the occasion of much 
 rejoicing among his friends at the home. 
 
 He was born in Plymouth, Mass., in 1796, 
 within a stone's throw of the traditional landing 
 place of the Pilgrims. His father was a soldier 
 in the war of 1812. 
 
 And now let me introduce an old gamekeeper, 
 a child of France, who will tell us how he attained 
 to 90 years of age. 
 
 The narrative dates from Paris, France, Oct. 
 4th, 1918. 
 
 "France has the most remarkable gamekeeper 
 in the world. His name is Laroche, and he lives 
 near La Rochelle. He belongs to the large tribe 
 of Laroches in France, from whom are descended 
 the Roches of England and America. He is 90 
 years old, and is the senior gamekeeper, not only 
 in France, but in the world. 
 
 He has had TWENTY-FIVE children! nine 
 
2U EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 of whom are living. Their respective ages are, 
 63, 60, 57, 55, 51, 46, 44, 40, 39. He also has 
 sixty grand-children and forty great-grand-chil- 
 dren. 
 
 He has been gamekeeper for sixty years, and 
 believes he is good for ten more. He has lived 
 his whole life in one commune, and has never 
 been out of it. He has travelled in a train only 
 once. Altho still in active service he receives a 
 pension of $80 a year from the commune. This 
 he gets, not as a gratuity, but as a right. He is 
 a member of the Municipal Council. Not long 
 ago he offered his resignation, but it was declined 
 unanimously. 
 
 Here is his rule of life, as explained by him- 
 self: 
 
 "I always get up at 5 o'clock, winter and 
 summer. I retire at 9. I go every day to the 
 village, thus walking four, or five miles. 
 
 "I eat sardines, fish, cheese, and very little 
 meat. I put a great deal of water in my wine. 
 I never smoke. 
 
 "My limbs are excellent; I have a good eye; 
 the other would have been equally good had not 
 a snake squirted its poison into it twenty years 
 ago. The only time I have ever been in a train, 
 the engine driver was killed. I have not been in 
 one since. I feel as energetic as in my maturity. 
 I have a good head of hair, but have lost a few 
 teeth." 
 
 Say! That's goin' sum! Ain't it? Now 
 honest ! 
 
 A tree lives in two worlds — earth and air at 
 the same time. Man also lives in two worlds — 
 physical and spiritual ; and the existence of either 
 is impossible without the combining and co-work- 
 ing of both. 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 25 
 
 That which is evolved we call "Nature." That 
 which is involved we call God. Are they not 
 both one? Is not the evolved that which was 
 involved, and are not both one ? And are not you 
 yourself a product of the process, and hence 
 Divinely begotten? 
 
 Now comes another Irish topnotcher. you 
 can't keep those Irish in the ditch. See? "North 
 Adams, May 13, 1917. Mrs. Mary O'Connel, 103 
 years old, probably the oldest woman in Berkshire 
 county, passed away at her home in Clarksburg, 
 after an illness of a few days. She was the 
 widow of Thomas O'Connel, who died a few years 
 ago at the age of 105 years." Eh? Irish, do ye 
 see? the Irish get there when it comes to 
 keeping young for 100 years or more. See? 
 
 "Mrs. O'Connell was born in Ireland, and 
 came to this country with her husband when 
 North Adams was but a village. They made 
 their home in Clarksburg and vicinity for more 
 than 75 years. 
 
 "Mrs. O'Connell was particularly alive and 
 active, and was seldom even slightly indisposed. 
 Since the death of her husband Mrs. O'Connell 
 had lived alone on her small farm, and had done 
 all the farm work in connection with it." Eh! 
 Pretty good for a young lady of 100. 
 
 "During the spring and summer seasons, and 
 as late as last fall, Mrs. O'Connell walked from 
 Clarksburg to her husband's grave in Southview 
 cemetery, a distance of more than three miles. 
 She had never ridden on the electric cars, nor 
 could she be persuaded to do so. She never would 
 ride to her husband's grave in a carriage, altho 
 her neighbors were always willing to allow her 
 to have the use of a horse at any time. 
 
 "Mrs. O'Connell possessed all her faculties up 
 
26 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 to the time of her departure. She could talk in- 
 telligently on topics of history, and read the 
 Gaelic language. She could also recount many 
 tales and legends connected with the building of 
 the Hoosac tunnel. 
 
 "She was a devout member of St. Francis' 
 Church and, even during the coldest days of last 
 winter seldom missed a Sunday in going to mass. 
 She leaves two sons, John and Daniel O'Connell, 
 of this city. She leaves five grandchildren and 
 six great-grandchildren." 
 
 My readers will observe that in these records 
 of remarkable longevity I am not recording ex- 
 amples among the rich, and those who are clothed 
 in fine linen, and fare sumptuously every day. I 
 am choosing to reduce to history the unimportant 
 peasantry of the earth, and the obscure. Also, 
 I am dealing with FACTS, not fancies. I have 
 no use for speculations, and the so-called science 
 of Metaphysics is absolutely beyond my grasp. 
 
 I am here reminded of a certain "Nigger" 
 who expressed himself on the "Philosophies," 
 thusly : "When I say tumble over mill-dam, come 
 down ker-splash, dat am blank-verse. When I 
 say tumble over mill-dam, come down ker-slam, 
 dat am poetry; but when I tell you sumfin' dat 
 I don't understand, and dat you don't under- 
 stand, and dat nobody else can understand, dat 
 am metaphysics." 
 
 Now here are two boys by the name of Lewis. 
 They are brothers. One is named Frank. He is 
 a juvenile of 97 years. The other is his brother 
 named Joseph. He is a juvenile of 94. They 
 are two ancient mariners who are snoozing out 
 their peaceful life at their home in Oakland, Cal. 
 
 These gentlemen attribute their longevity to 
 the fact that they each sleep 18 hours a day. 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 27 
 
 Frank "hits the hay" at 3 p. m., and arises at 
 10 a. m. Joseph goes to bed a little later, for he 
 has to keep the school children out of his barley- 
 patch. But he makes it up the next morning, 
 and takes his beauty sleep till noon. 
 
 "Yes, plenty of sleep is the thing," said Frank. 
 "That, and not being pestered with a wife. The 
 kid, there, (pointing to Joseph) had a wife once, 
 and I expect to outlive him by 20 years." 
 
 The two Lewis boys are hale and hearty after 
 a life at sea. They are comfortably fixed, and 
 are getting ahead fast by saving two meals a day, 
 and fuel and lights. 
 
 I quote these two as an illustration of the 
 various ways that lead to the same goal. These 
 centenarians know nothing of physical exercises 
 for strength; nothing of dietetics; nothing of 
 metaphysics ; nothing of "The I am" ; nothing of 
 "the great within." They evidently do know tho 
 that rest is the great recuperator. And say, they 
 are right by a great majority. 
 
 The tranquil mind is the leader in Longevity, 
 and without his almighty aid all other aids are 
 the merest camouflage. Hail the angel of peace, 
 and the goddess of the smile. These are life's 
 best angels, and the guards of Longevity. But 
 alas, as things are now, the entertainment of 
 these two angels of life is quite impossible to the 
 race. He must get to the condition of things in 
 Ireland where every man owns his own little 
 cottage and land, and pays no rent. See? 
 
 Now in contrast with the men who attain 
 longevity by inactivity and sleep, I introduce a 
 "percontra" who never had either rest or peace. 
 In peace he never would have been known. War 
 saved him for a world's admiration. 
 
28 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 Now I am introducing you a true story of a 
 wonderful gentleman whose home is in San Diego, 
 Cal. O he's not at all obscure. He is well, and 
 widely known. I am quoting the public record 
 of a ceremony which the gentleman performs 
 every year as his birthday arrives. 
 
 The extract I give is now three years old. 
 The gentleman lives now, and performs the same 
 ceremony every year when the day of his birth 
 arrives. And say, there's no camouflage about 
 it either. The thing is absolute and positive 
 truth without any doubt, and without any sus- 
 picion of fraud. 
 
 This is how the account appeared in the local 
 papers: "Surrounded by a coterie of friends — 
 many of them members of the San Diego Rowing 
 Club — 0. J. Stough, one of San Diego's oldest 
 citizens, yesterday celebrated his 97th anniver- 
 sary by taking a dip in the Pacific with other 
 members of the rower's organization, posing for 
 the "movie man," and entertaining numerous 
 friends at his palatial home at an informal smoker 
 in the late afternoon. 
 
 The oldest young man in this community arose 
 yesterday morning at 6 o'clock, his usual hour, 
 partook of a light breakfast, worked for a few 
 hours in the beautiful garden surrounding his 
 home, prepared for his morning's swim at the 
 San Diego Rowing Club's out-of-doors pool, and 
 at 11 o'clock jumped into the water, with hun- 
 dreds of friends looking on in astonishment, for 
 he swam like a man who never knew what it was 
 to be on terra firma. 
 
 Following this extraordinary stunt, for it was 
 extraordinary for a man 97 years of age to be 
 found swimming around in the Pacific, "the young 
 man" donned his street attire and soon was the 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 29 
 
 recipient of a shower of congratulations from the 
 many who know him to love him. 
 
 After the Hearst-Selig photographer finished 
 taking moving pictures of the rowing club mem- 
 bers in action in the water, Mr. Stough posed for 
 him long enough to allow an excellent picture to 
 be made, which, with the other moving pictures 
 of the swimmers, rowers and divers, will be sent 
 to all parts of the United States. 
 
 In the afternoon, after Mr. Stough had again 
 rested by strolling through his garden, he wel- 
 comed numerous friends, who came to wish him 
 many returns of the day. And he was the 
 YOUNGEST MAN among the many, for, like a 
 boy, he played, and laughed, incidently smoked a 
 number of big black cigars as a fitting finale of 
 a great day — his 97th birthday." 
 
 Now here's another case of a man outraging 
 science, and triumphing over tradition. Science 
 tells us that smoking is suicide. Here is a boy 
 of 97, who capsizes the whole thing, and laughs 
 at science while hilariously trampling her most 
 profound laws. But seriously I personally advise 
 you not to follow his example in the matter of 
 smoking. Tobacco evaporates a deadly poison 
 named nicotine. Don't use it. Besides it is a 
 filthy habit, and expensive at that. See? 
 
 The domestic quiet, contemplative life is 
 doubtless conducive to longevity, but occasionally 
 there occurs a case which upsets all laws of con- 
 templative quietness, and domesticity. I am now 
 about to introduce you to Gen. D. E. Sickles, a 
 veteran of the Civil War. Gen. Sickles was born 
 in New York City, October 20th, 1820. He died 
 3rd May, 1915, at his home, 23 Fifth avenue, 
 New York, being 94 years old. He had been 
 quite ill since March, when he suffered a hemor- 
 
30 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 rhage. In April there was another hemorrhage, 
 and the General was confined to his bed. On the 
 morning of 3rd May there was a marked im- 
 provement in his condition, but at 4 o'clock in 
 the afternoon he began to sink. Three hours 
 later it was apparent that death was near. The 
 last rites of the Roman Catholic Church had been 
 administered on Saturday by the Rev. Father 
 Avard, of St. Joseph's Church. He died at 10 
 o'clock. 
 
 Daniel Edgar Sickles, Major General retired, 
 was the last of the great commanders of the Civil 
 War. He responded to Lincoln's first call for 
 volunteers. He raised regiment after regiment. 
 He led them into battle, always with consummate 
 bravery and distinction. At the last he turned 
 the tide at Gettysburg, and earned a soldier's 
 immortality. So I believe he is now very much 
 alive, notwithstanding the Russellites' creed that 
 all souls are dead till the coming of Christ in the 
 millennium. No, siree, General Sickles is very 
 much alive just now, and no doubt enjoys many 
 happy hours in the company of those with whom 
 he once contended in deadly conflict. See? 
 
 Gettysburg made General Sickles famous. 
 That terrific engagement crowned a long life filled 
 with excitement, adventure and tragedy. From 
 his youth up he was active, and the changing 
 years saw him engaging with the same enthu- 
 siasm in arms, diplomacy, politics, and that inter- 
 course with his fellows which is the privilege of 
 a man who has seen much of life, and got honor 
 through merit. 
 
 (Now what do you think of those Mollycoddles 
 who teach us that long life is dependent on a 
 humdrum lethargic existence? Eh?) 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 31 
 
 When the veterans of Gettysburg, both the 
 Blue and the Grey, gathered around peaceful 
 campfires,they acclaimed him as the hero of that 
 engagement decisive of the whole campaign, and 
 of the destiny and government of The United 
 States. Wherever they met his name has run 
 through their stories. Of late years when his old 
 age was troubled, he always found relief from 
 vexation in meeting former comrades and talk- 
 ing over with them the days when his business 
 was in columns of marching men. 
 
 He was a congressman from New York when 
 the war began. He was a Democrat, and had 
 not voted for Lincoln, but he went to the Pres- 
 ident and offered his services. 
 
 He saw his first engagement early in 1862. 
 He succeeded Hooker in the command of a divi- 
 sion of the third army corps, and led the division 
 in the battles of Antietam and Fredericksburg. 
 In November of 1862 he was made a major gen- 
 eral of volunteers, and had command of the third 
 corps of Chancellorsville, when General Lee set 
 forth on his determined march to the North. 
 General Meade had succeeded Hooker, and Gen- 
 eral Sickles' corps was ordered to Emmetsburg. 
 After the first day's fighting at Gettysburg, Gen- 
 eral Howard called for help. 
 
 The second day found General Sickles in com- 
 mand of the Union left. An hour before the 
 battle began, and without waiting for orders, 
 Sickles took a position on peach orchard ridge. 
 
 They called that portion of the battlefield the 
 bloody angle. The fight there lasted from 3 
 o'clock till 7 at night. Many men perished there, 
 more than in the other two days of the battle. 
 Half an hour before the fight ended a shell shat- 
 tered General Sickles' knee. He buckled a strap 
 
32 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 round his leg and staid on his horse until the last 
 gun was fired. His leg was amputated that night. 
 
 After he had recovered from his wound, Lin- 
 coln sent him on an inspection trip through the 
 South, and he was with Sherman's army on the 
 march to the sea. After the war he was military- 
 governor of the department of the South, which 
 included the two Carolinas. 
 
 I have been particular in giving you the par- 
 ticulars of the life of General Sickles. Why? 
 Because his life upsets all the philosophy, which 
 the Savants of earth have given us, as the laws 
 of health and longevity. Hygiene was absolutely 
 impossible in war. The whole mentality was 
 engaged in conceiving destruction and murder. 
 Hatred was the ruling passion, and the slaughter 
 of his fellowman controlled all his emotions. Yet 
 he lived in the body 94 years ! 
 
 But I suppose we must leave its solution to 
 the universal dictum that "there are exceptions 
 to all rules." Nevertheless, I believe there are 
 certain hygienic laws which very materially aid 
 in health and longevity, notwithstanding an oc- 
 casional unaccountable contradiction. 
 
 There are Philosophers who tell us that a 
 mysterious something which they call "vitality," 
 takes up its mysterious residence in the brain at 
 birth. This mysterious activity controls and 
 manages the life, and determines the longevity 
 of the person in whose skull it locates itself. That 
 the individual wearing the skull cannot by any 
 means, either increase, or diminish the mysterious 
 governor; that he will work till he finishes you 
 up : and you can by no means influence his oper- 
 ations. See ? 
 
 Here is an opportune time for me to get in 
 a little "fact" on tobacco. I have long since quit 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 33 
 
 dreaming in philosophies. The wise, and scien- 
 tific men have had their day in fooling me. Now 
 I am a disciple of facts. Now here's a little fact 
 by a gentleman, who smoked for 25 years, and 
 then quit. Here is what he says to the editor 
 of The Tribune: "Editor, The Tribune. In 1838, 
 when only seven years old, I formed the obnoxious 
 tobacco habit. During the succeeding twenty-five 
 years I made a nuisance of myself to the public, 
 with which I was obliged to come in contact. 
 
 At the age of 32 I cut loose from the tobacco 
 habit, and during the past fifty-two years have 
 had ample time to see the absolute nothingness 
 to be derived from tainting the blood with nico- 
 tine; also the total cost of the tobacco used. 
 
 During the twenty-five years I was an abject 
 slave of the tobacco habit, it cost me on an aver- 
 age of 25 cents per day, $6 per month, or $72 
 per year. 
 
 For twenty-five years the cost was $1800. So 
 that in the last fifty-two years I have saved $3740, 
 and have not disgusted anyone by smoking or 
 chewing, nor have I robbed my system. In this 
 I take a pardonable pride." R. A. W. Riverside. 
 
 Pretty spry fellow this at 84. Eh? Isn't he 
 now, honest? This is the most powerful argu- 
 ment against the use of tobacco that I have ever 
 met. The party who can resist the power of the 
 appeal couched in this testimony may be given 
 over to his own innate stupidity. Time were lost 
 reasoning with him. Let him be given over to 
 salt. 
 
 Now here is another record of tolerably vig- 
 orous life at the age of 106. The fact is con- 
 veyed by leased wire to "The Examiner" 
 
 PIKEVILLE, Ky., Aug. — . Aunt Cosy 
 Hopkins, 106 years old, and perhaps the oldest 
 
BU EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 woman in Kentucky, was admitted as a member 
 of the Free Will Baptist Church, and baptized 
 by immersion in the Big Sandy River, by Rev. 
 N. T. Hopkins. The aged woman lives on Her- 
 ald's Branch, a tributary to the Sandy River; 
 and a place in the river near the mouth of this 
 creek, was chosen for the baptismal ceremony on 
 account of her advanced age. 
 
 So there now, at a century, and over, spiritual 
 birth can occur, and the physical adjuncts there- 
 to, can be performed. God in his word to us tells 
 us concerning the righteous man "With long life 
 will I satisfy him, and show him my salvation." 
 
 Now here is another record of a centenarian, 
 and no camouflage either. And say, she is just 
 one of the ordinary common people. She did no 
 stunts of any kind to help her live long. 
 
 She neither practiced deep breathing, nor per- 
 formed genuflexions, nor muscle stretching, nor 
 body bending, nor any particular kind of eating, 
 neither fasting, nor eating uncooked food. But 
 she just lived, an* lived an' lived. Neither did 
 she take any particular style of food. She just 
 lived like a plain, ordinary female according to 
 the class in which she was born, and lived. Her 
 name was Mrs. Rethea Porter. She was born in 
 slave days, and lived in the same house for twen- 
 ty-two years. She died at the age of 112. 
 
 She was born in Louisiana in the old slave 
 days, and won her freedom by the result of the 
 Civil War. She came to Los Angeles twenty-two 
 years before her death, and lived all that time 
 at 485 Mountain View avenue, where she died. 
 
 Mrs. Porter reared eight children, had nine 
 grandchildren, and ten great-grandchildren, to 
 whom she often sang the old ante-bellum songs 
 "befo' the war." She was a prominent member 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 35 
 
 of the Second Baptist Church, at Pico and Paloma 
 streets, and for ten years never missed a service 
 at Church. Likely the normal life which accom- 
 panies church fellowship had quite an influence 
 on the longevity of this remarkable female. See? 
 
 Now comes for consideration a gentleman who 
 on the celebration of his 90th birthday gives us 
 some good advice, as to how to keep young. The 
 gentleman's name is Cyrus Mason Parsons; he 
 is called "the grand old man of Claremont, Cal." 
 Over a dozen grandchildren, and several great- 
 grandchildren assembled to pay homage to the 
 reverend head of the family. 
 
 Mr. Parsons, who was a pioneer settler of 
 Iowa, and who was prominent in many ways, 
 both there where he founded the town of Big 
 Rock, twenty-five miles from Davenport, and in 
 Claremont, where he has lived for a number of 
 years, said last night that he never felt younger. 
 Ha, there's it. Don't think yourself old. See? 
 Don't let the idea of old age get a grip on you. 
 See? 
 
 His remarkably good health, and clear mind, 
 he attributes to several things: First, that he 
 is given to taking long walks. Say, he's a wise 
 guy. Eh? Secondly, that he is an inveterate 
 reader, from which practice he has derived much 
 pleasure and profit. Thirdly, that he has so many 
 smiling young faces about him. Say, the old 
 man is right here. The smile is the real secret 
 of achievement, and the invariable accompani- 
 ment of success in all directions. But let it be 
 real smiles; the veritable outflow of a generous 
 and pure soul. For the smile can be trans- 
 mogrified ; but not the real genuine smile. A man 
 can "Smile an' smile, and be a villian." But the 
 real smile cannot be imitated. The smiling face 
 
36 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 is the index of the true heart, and like pure gold 
 cannot be counterfeited. See? 
 
 Mr. Parsons has four sons living, fourteen 
 grandchildren, and five great-grandchildren. 
 
 Now here comes another really, truly cen- 
 tenarian, and no mistake about it either. A cor- 
 respondent of "The Vienna Zet declares that 
 while passing through Volhynia, he discovered a 
 peasant who had lately celebrated his 113th birth- 
 day. The peasant distinctly remembered seeing 
 Napoleon at the head of his army on the march 
 to Moscow. The man appeared to be in excellent 
 health. Now there's one for you. A peasant 
 aged 113 and in excellent health! Please don't 
 regard what we call old age as associated with 
 imbecility. Regard it as a ripening for the next 
 step higher in the evolution of man, whose life 
 is infinite, and development eternal. But say, I 
 don't know a thing about eternity, and have no 
 apparatus attached to my thinker in this incar- 
 nation, by which I am able consciously to realize 
 it. See? But without apprehending, and with- 
 out understanding, I can trust the word of my 
 Father. See? 
 
 Now I am quoting from the Examiner of 
 Los Angeles, of Friday 3rd, June, 1917: "Six 
 special guests sat near the head of the table yes- 
 terday when Dr. P. C. Prugh of San Gabriel, 
 gave a dinner to celebrate his 94th birthday, and 
 the combined ages of these guests and the host 
 was 663. 
 
 "They were all members of the Centenarian 
 Club, and yesterday's birthday party will be fol- 
 lowed by another at the home of S. H. Taft, the 
 veteran editor of "The Bay District Investigator," 
 at Sawtelle, today. 
 ' "The members of the club present at yester- 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 27 
 
 day's meeting were, Dr. J. M. Peebles, 95 ; Spurges 
 Selleck, 94; Senator Cornelius Cole, 96; A. A. 
 Annis, 96; Dr. A. M. Morrison, 97; S. H. Taft, 
 91, and Dr. P. C. Prugh, 94." 
 
 Say, that's a pretty good record, and there is 
 no camouflage about it either. I was of the party. 
 That party was three years ago. Some of them 
 have gone up higher since. There was Taft, the 
 active organizer of the Club, about a couple of 
 years after this, who climbed up a tree armed 
 with a saw to lopp off a branch. Say, there's not 
 much sign of senile imbecility in a man who can 
 make his way up a tree by climbing a la squirrel. 
 But Brother Taft missed his grip somehow, and 
 fell to the ground, so injuring himself that re- 
 covery was impossible, and so he went up higher. 
 No doubt whatever but from the surrounding in- 
 visible he meets with us as usual. I know that 
 I have seen him myself. I also aided in the 
 services of his burial, and very distinctly recog- 
 nized him among the "Heavenly Host" who were 
 present on that occasion. Because we are never 
 alone. A "great cloud of witnesses" is always in 
 attendance. At least Paul says so in the 12th 
 Chapter of Hebrews. And say, I believe Paul. 
 Since then the Club has lost Selleck, Annis and 
 Prugh. It is still represented tho by the follow- 
 ing good men and true, and quite a bevy of women, 
 God bless them, who are the very life and soul 
 of our Club. These are the names and ages of 
 the ladies of our Club, without whose motherly 
 presence and aid, I question much if we could 
 have a Club at all. The Club meets once monthly. 
 We discuss important questions of the day, and 
 give out our wisdom to aid the progress of the 
 world. Our very efficient Secretary is Mrs. E. F. 
 Witter, without whose wise and efficient guidance 
 
38 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 we could not exist. See? say, God did a great 
 thing for man when he created woman. Scot- 
 land's greatest poet, the immortal Burns, ex- 
 presses it thusly: "His prentice hand he tried 
 on man : but then he made the lasses 0." 
 
 And now I have the proud privilege of pre- 
 senting to your admiration one of my own illus- 
 trious name. He is Peter S. Morrison. At the 
 juvenile age of 101 he quits tobacco, as he intends 
 to live 99 more years. This is the record : 
 
 After nearly three-quarters of a century's 
 indulgence in tobacco in various forms, "Daddy" 
 Morrison has foresworn allegiance to My Lady 
 Nicotine, because he wants to celebrate his two 
 hundredth birthday. 
 
 "Daddy is known on the books of the Pisgah 
 Home, 6026 Echo street, Los Angeles, as Peter 
 S. Morrison. He is 101 years old, but he looks 
 more like 70, and says he feels like 50. To bear 
 out the illusion that he is only half way to the 
 century mark, 'Daddy' engages in various forms 
 of manual labor. He spends part of the day 
 working in the garden, washes and mends his 
 clothing, takes a hand at dishwashing, and makes 
 himself generally useful round the house. 
 
 "I have just learned conclusively that tobacco 
 is bad," said "Daddy" yesterday. "Since I swore 
 off, my wind is better, and my work does not tire 
 me. I smoked and chewed tobacco for a good 
 many years, and I felt the loss of it when I quit. 
 But I am getting used to it now, and feel so 
 much better that I don't intend to start again. 
 It took me a long time to find out that it is harm- 
 ful to the young. I want to live to be an old man, 
 you know," he added with a wink. 
 
 Morrison came to Los Angeles from New 
 York State, and likes California so well that he 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 39 
 
 expects to remain here the remainder of his life, 
 which he fully expects to continue at least until 
 he has passed all old age limits known to science. 
 
 Just a remark here between the lines. Poor 
 Morrison was poor, very poor in this world of 
 abounding plenty. Had it not been for that man 
 of wondrous faith in Christ, the late lamented 
 Dr. Yoakum, Morrison would have found it a 
 rather tough job to round out the second cen- 
 tury in Los Angeles, or anywhere else in this 
 great country of limitless riches. See? 
 
 Now I have another wonder to present, in 
 the case of an Irish woman. I am quoting from 
 The London Bureau of the Post Despatch of 1917. 
 "Irish woman, 118 years old, recalled incidents 
 of Rebellion of 1798. Spent a laborious life, and 
 was never attended by a Doctor until her last 
 illness." Say, my friends, there is no question 
 in my mind but this is the secret of her won- 
 derful longevity. Now for the record. "London, 
 January 21st. Mrs. Catherine Leonard died a 
 few days ago, near Cappamore, County Limerick, 
 at the age of 118. She was born in 1790. 
 
 She had a faint recollection of the Irish re- 
 bellion of '98, in which some of her relatives lost 
 their lives. Her father's house was burned by 
 the Yeomanry, and the family had a narrow 
 escape. 
 
 She often told about Daniel O'Connell and his 
 eloquence. Well, she had a very ample theme, 
 for say, O'Connell was eloquent. He was Irish, 
 you see; a people in whom oratory in its most 
 exalted spirit is indigenous. 
 
 Mrs. Leonard married when she was 17 years 
 old, and raised fourteen children, most of whom 
 migrated to Australia or America. Ya, at that 
 time there was no home in Ireland for the Irish 
 
40 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 peasant. I know, for I was one of them myself. 
 See? It is stated that Mrs. Leonard had twenty- 
 two grandchildren, and forty-seven great-grand- 
 children. 
 
 She had a vivid recollection of the repeal 
 movement, and almost starved to death during 
 the tithe war. 
 
 Two sons were killed in the American Civil 
 War, one fighting on the side of the North, and 
 one on the side of the South. Say, no wonder 
 General Sherman, another brilliant Irishman, 
 said, "War is Hell." 
 
 Mrs. Leonard spent a laborious life, and never 
 was attended by a Doctor until her last illness. 
 I suspect her long life may be partly explained 
 by this. The Doctor's attendance would most 
 certainly have helped her very materially to get 
 home at a considerably earlier period. She de- 
 clined to apply for an old age pension, saying it 
 was not worth while. Now there's the Irish 
 again, do you see, my friends? 
 
 One of her sons lived to be 96; another was 
 80 years old when he died, and two daughters 
 were 78 and 73, respectively. 
 
 One of her daughters, who is still living at 
 this date, is 96 years old, and a grandson is 61 
 years old. Say, you can't beat the Irish. Now 
 what d'ye think of Dr. Osier and his chloroform 
 at 60, Eh? 
 
 Now I have another quotation from the same 
 sources as the above. 
 
 London's oldest platform speaker addressed an 
 audience at the Salvation Army's Barracks in 
 Mayes Road Wood Green, when a dinner was 
 given to the old people of the district. 
 
 She was Mrs. Clark, and in spite of her 104 
 years she was as sprightly as the youngest there, 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 41 
 
 altho she might easily have been the mother of 
 the oldest among them. 
 
 Her years sit lightly on her, and she ate a 
 hearty dinner of roast beef and plum pudding, 
 and was the life and soul of the table, whose 
 head she graced. 
 
 Her sight and hearing are unimpaired — she 
 never wears spectacles — and her ears are quick 
 to catch any remark, particularly if it be about 
 herself. And she has a lively faculty for shrewd 
 repartee. 
 
 The old lady's speech was the feature of the 
 evening. The quavering old voice was hard to 
 hear at first: and once the old memory played 
 its owner false. 
 
 But a platform speaker of 104 is a person 
 to whom all may be forgiven, and not a sound 
 was heard as she told her audience how pleased 
 she was to see them there, and, becoming rem- 
 iniscent, how she had given all her children a 
 good schooling, and taught them to shun strong 
 drink. "I gave 'em water," said the ancient dame 
 succinctly, and was cheered to the echo. 
 
 Say, think of it; 104 years old, and an orator 
 using no spectacles, nor ear trumpets! Eating 
 roast beef and plum puddin', but drinking water, 
 cold water. See? No question the teetotalism, 
 and the general jolliness and sweetness of dispo- 
 sition were very great aids in arriving at the 
 104th milestone. If you would live long, be 
 sweet, and again I say, be sweet. Nothing poi- 
 sons life at its very fountain equal to a disposi- 
 tion to find fault, and be antagonistic to every- 
 thing, and to be continually criticising your 
 friends, neighbors, and the world generally. Say, 
 keep sweet. Be sweet. Be sweet, dear girl, and 
 let who will be clever. 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 GENERAL PRINCIPLES OF LONGEVITY 
 
 Now it is my privilege to introduce a young 
 lady of 90. I do this the more joyously and con- 
 fidently as I happen to have the honor to know 
 the lady personally. She is Mrs. M. A. Pierce, 
 who celebrated her 90th birthday anniversary on 
 Jan. 2, 1917. She is the oldest member of the 
 Wednesday Morning Club, having been elected to 
 honorary membership in that organization. For 
 a number of years she has maintained a live 
 interest in the activities of the club, graduating 
 when in her 82nd year, from the Shakespeare 
 section with high honors. 
 
 During her earlier life Mrs. Pierce developed 
 an interest in questions of public welfare, which 
 has never waned, and this, together with her in- 
 tellectual research, has kept her mind young and 
 vigorous. See? Now mark this well. One of 
 the secrets of long efficient life lies couched right 
 here. "She developed an interest in questions of 
 public welfare." Now don't forget this if you 
 wish for a vigorous long life. 
 
 Until fourteen years ago she was a resident 
 of Springfield, Mass., the scene of her many 
 worthy endeavors; and among the pioneers of 
 that place she has many warm friends. Again 
 I say unto you, "Be sweet," Get friends, get them, 
 get them. They will be health to thy soul, and 
 renewal to thy body. 
 
U EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 For years Mrs. Pierce has made her home 
 with her son and daughter-in-law, Mr. and Mrs. 
 C. C. Pierce. 
 
 I now quote from the Examiner of Sept. 18, 
 1916: "Cornelius Cole gives party. Ages of 
 host and guests, 1516 years. Former U. S. Sen- 
 ator is host to Octogenarian and Centenarian 
 Clubs on Birthday. 
 
 "Hale, happy, hearty, and looking fully thirty 
 years younger than his family Bible says he is, 
 Cornelius Cole, formerly bond representative and 
 United States Senator from California, celebrated 
 the 94th anniversary of his birth with a dinner 
 party to fellow members of the Octogenarian and 
 Centenarian Clubs. 
 
 "It was indeed a merry affair, and a youthful 
 one, too, despite the fact that the combined ages 
 of Senator Cole and the sixteen of his oldest 
 guests made up the great sum of 1516 years. 
 
 "These guests of Senator Cole were : Captain 
 L. A. Ross, 81 years old; Dr. Marshall F. Price, 
 82 ; P. E. Brown, 81 ; Dr. F. H. Moore, 85 ; Rev. 
 S. H. Taft, 91 ; Sturges Selleck, president of both 
 the clubs, 94 ; J. P. Garlick, 92 ; Dr. A. M. Sher- 
 man, 90 ; Dr. J. M. Peebles, 95 ; Gen. J. S. Wilcox, 
 84; Dr. L. W. Beck, 85; Rev. P. C. Prugh, 94; 
 M. L. Rogers, 88; A. A. Annis, 96; Dr. A. M. 
 Morrison, 96, and Dr. H. L. Canfield, 88. 
 
 "In addition to these octogenarians and nona- 
 genarians, the wives of many were present, while 
 among the other guests was the widow of the 
 late Judge Alexander Campbell, who was one of 
 the few men living in recent years who attended 
 Senator Cole's wedding in San Francisco on Jan. 
 6th, 1853, to Miss Olive Colegrove. 
 
 "Senator and Mrs. Cole, who is 83 years old, 
 have had nine children, seven of whom are still 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 45 
 
 living, many of them in the immediate vicinity 
 of their parents' residence at 6121 Lexington 
 avenue, where yesterday's celebration was held. 
 With one exception all of the living children, as 
 well as a number of grandchildren and two great- 
 grandchildren, were present. 
 
 "Descendants and relatives of the couple, 
 most of whom were present yesterday, include 
 Mrs. Emma Cole Brown, a daughter: her chil- 
 dren, Cornelius Cole Brown, and Mrs. Marjorie 
 Brown Mather, and the latter's two children, 
 Bibi and John Mather; Seward Cole, a son, and 
 his three children, Eleanor, Cornelius B. and 
 Seward Edward Cole. Mrs. Willoughby Cole, 
 widow of their son, Willoughby, and her son, 
 Willoughby Cole; Mrs. Lucretia Cole Waring, a 
 daughter, and her daughter, Olive Waring; Mrs. 
 James G. McLaughlin, of New York, a daughter 
 who has three children, Comerford, Cornelia and 
 Gregory McLaughlin, while the latter also has 
 two children, Schyler Cole, a son; Mrs. Reginald 
 H. Jones, a daughter, and two children, Sarton 
 and Rhoda Jones; and George T. Cole. All ex- 
 cept Mrs. McLaughlin and her children and 
 grandchildren were present. 
 
 "Many were the pleasant reminiscences ex- 
 changed among Senator Cole and his elderly 
 guests, before whom an elaborate repast was 
 spread, but the Senator himself was rather re- 
 luctant to take any time from listening to others 
 about himself. He was cornered long enough to 
 obtain a brief biography. He was born in Lodi, 
 Seneca County, N. Y., Sept. 17th, 1822. He 
 graduated from the Wesleyan University in Mid- 
 dleton, Conn., in 1848, and on May 1st of the 
 same year, he was admitted to the practice of 
 law. He crossed the plains to California in 1849. 
 
W EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 In 1862 he was elected to the 38th Congress. He 
 was at Lincoln's side when the famous Gettys- 
 burg speech was delivered. In 1866 he was 
 elected United States Senator. 
 
 "Senator Cole, and former United States Sen- 
 ator George F. Edmunds, of Vermont, now living 
 in Pasadena, are the only living members of the 
 Congressional court, which heard the impeach- 
 ment trial of President Andrew Johnson. 
 
 "In 1861 he came to Southern California, set- 
 tling at Colegrove, now a part of Los Angeles 
 and which was named by his children after their 
 mother's maiden name. 
 
 "The Senator gives nothing in particular 
 credit for his long life. Thank heaven he is no 
 faddist. He does nothing to excess which is 
 perhaps the real secret. He has no plans for 
 the coming year, except to keep on attending to 
 business every day as has been his custom. 
 
 Now I quote from Dr. S. J. Crumbine, Secre- 
 tary of Kansas State Board of Health: "Our 
 great-grandchildren will live to be 150 years old. 
 There is even a chance for our children, and 
 their offspring. Dying at from 50 to 70 years will 
 be looked upon as an ancient and tragic custom 
 by people of the 21st Century. A man at 100 
 then is going to be just as active in business as 
 the person of 50 or 60 today. On attaining that 
 age he can retire and spend half a century in 
 the pursuit of quiet happiness, before friends and 
 relatives will follow his earthly remains to the 
 cemetery. 
 
 The trick is to have all parts of the human 
 body to wear out at once, just like the famous 
 one-horse shay, which with each part as good as 
 every other part did not collapse until all wore 
 out simultaneously. 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE U7 
 
 It was the oft-declared opinion of the great 
 Metchnikoff that we should live up to 140 years, 
 barring accidents and disease. The human body, 
 being a perfect machine, should decay in its en- 
 tirety at once. All parts were built to continue 
 their functions till the whole machine had worn 
 out. 
 
 THE CENTENARIAN WILL BE COMMON 
 
 By the thorough adoption of known and prac- 
 tical reforms human life in America can be 
 lengthened more than a third. The centenarian 
 won't get his picture in the newspapers within 
 a few decades. He'll be too common. 
 
 Disease and poverty bear a very strong rela- 
 tion to each other. Ten per cent increase in the 
 wage of the workingman usually means a 10 
 per cent decrease in sickness. 
 
 In an address before the Association of Life 
 Insurance Presidents, Prof. Irving Fisher, of 
 Yale University, said: "Human life is long or 
 short precisely according to the hygienic condi- 
 tions under which it is lived." He gave data 
 showing that human life in America could, by 
 the adoption of hygenic reforms, be lengthened 
 over one-third. 
 
 I believe Metchnikoff is authority for the 
 statement that one out of every 2500 of the Bul- 
 garian mountain people live to an age of 100 and 
 over. The centenarian in the Bulgarian moun- 
 tain district is evidently as numerous as the 75 
 and 80-year-olds in this country. Eh? 
 
 Prof. Lorand, of Carlsbad, declares that any- 
 one who is the offspring of healthy parents has 
 it in his power to live to the age of 100, if he is 
 temperate in eating, and especially in drinking. 
 He will have the best prospects for this result if 
 he is careful that all food which he eats is per- 
 
48 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 fectly fresh, and contains the greatest possible 
 amount of unaltered curative substances. The 
 food must also taste good. 
 
 It is not unreasonable to suppose, in view of 
 the above facts, that a century hence it will not 
 be more uncommon to see people who are 100 
 years of age and over, aye 150, than it is now to 
 meet 70 and 80-year-olds. See? 
 
 I now present a very remarkable instance of 
 longevity in a lady who died at the advanced age 
 of 107 in Los Angeles. Her name is Mrs. Juana 
 de Rubio. She died at the residence of her 
 daughter, Mrs. Lucy Forbes, West 59th Place. 
 She lacked but six years of seeing her hundredth 
 wedding anniversary, having been married at 
 the age of 13. 
 
 Mrs. Rubio was the mother of twenty-five chil- 
 dren. Evidently fruitfulness in the production 
 of offspring is no hindranec to health and length 
 of days. A large number of her children fell 
 victims to an epidemic of smallpox in the early 
 days of Los Angeles. Those surviving are, Mrs. 
 Forbes, Mrs. Frances Berry, of 908 Irolo street; 
 Mrs. Ed Butler, of El Monte ; Mrs. F. N. Staples, 
 and David Rubio. 
 
 I am careful in presenting these names of her 
 children lest some unbeliever should accuse me 
 of camouflage. It has been printed on scientific 
 authority that no human ever did, or can reach 
 100 years of life on earth. And I have been 
 called a liar myself. See ? And yet I didn't knock 
 the gentleman down. So I hope you will recog- 
 nize me as a fully sanctified Christian. 
 
 Mrs. Rubio was active in mind and body until 
 within a month of her death. Her eyesight had 
 failed, but otherwise her faculties were unusually 
 keen, and she had a remarkable memory that 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE U9 
 
 covered nearly a century of Los Angeles history. 
 
 Mrs. Rubio was born in San Diego, and lived 
 there until her marriage. She came to Los 
 Angeles when it was hardly a village. The Rubio 
 family was one of the oldest Spanish families in 
 Southern California, and originally its members 
 owned thousands of acres of now valuable lands. 
 
 This is a remarkable case illustrating the pos- 
 sibilities of natural living, and the possible length 
 of life to man on the earth plane, whose living, 
 habits and morals are according to God's revela- 
 tion to man. As to his morals on the earth plane, 
 God tells us that wisdom is the producer of all 
 good things. 
 
 I am impressed here by the Spirit to make 
 quite an extended quotation from the Bible. It 
 fits in here most appropriately, and is so much 
 superior to all the science of man as the spiritual 
 is superior to the material. I quote from Pro- 
 verbs Chap. 3rd: "My son, forget not my law; 
 but let thine heart keep my commandments : For 
 length of days, and long life, and peace shall they 
 add unto thee. 
 
 "Let not mercy and truth forsake thee: bind 
 them about thy neck; write them upon the table 
 of thine heart : 
 
 "So shalt thou find favor, and good under- 
 standing in the sight of God and man. 
 
 "Trust in the LORD with all thine heart ; and 
 lean not to thine own understanding. 
 
 "In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he 
 shall direct thy paths. 
 
 "Be not wise in thine own eyes: fear the 
 Lord, and depart from evil. It shall be health 
 to life's fountain, and marrow to thy bones. 
 Honor the Lord with thy substance, and with the 
 first fruits of all thine increase. So shall thy 
 
50 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 barns be filled with plenty, and thy presses shall 
 burst out with new wine. 
 
 "My son, despise not the chastening of the 
 LORD; neither be weary of his correction: for 
 whom the Lord loveth he correcteth; even as a 
 father the son in whom he delighteth. 
 
 "Happy is the man that findeth wisdom, and 
 the man that getteth understanding. For the 
 merchandise of it is better than the merchandise 
 of silver, and the gain thereof than of fine gold. 
 She is more precious than rubies: and all the 
 things thou canst desire are not to be compared 
 unto her. Length of days is in her right hand; 
 and in her left hand riches, and honor. Her ways 
 are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are 
 peace. She is a tree of life to them that lay 
 hold on her: happy is every one that retaineth 
 her." 
 
 I have made this lengthy quotation from the 
 Bible because it contains the directions which God 
 himself has given to man so that man's life on 
 earth may be in all things as successful, and 
 happy as the Father of all intended and designed. 
 But alas, man has by disobedience and rebellion 
 frustrated the intentions and wishes of the 
 Father, and has brought upon himself all the 
 miseries under which earth groans, and all the 
 diseases which hasten death. The rich robber 
 also has stolen the common heritage, and the 
 poor robbed of their fair share of their Father's 
 bounty, perish in starvation and die before their 
 time. 
 
 The case of Mrs. Rubio suggests some reflec- 
 tions on Longevity, which will demolish some of 
 the "fads" which the wiseacres have been crowd- 
 ing on us for some decades. She knew nothing 
 at all of "the no breakfast plan." She knew 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 51 
 
 nothing at all of the wonderful life-elongating 
 properties of the "raw food craze." She was 
 absolutely ignorant of the life-extension qualities 
 of "deep breathing," nor did she know anything 
 at all of the death destroying power of standing 
 erect, and bending her body so that with the tips 
 of her fingers she could touch the ground at least 
 a dozen times first thing every morning. She 
 knew nothing at all about how many "chews" 
 she should give her food before she let it descend 
 into the Pylorus. Nor did she know anything of 
 the awful consequence to the stomach and body 
 when she swallowed a mouthful of drink with 
 her food. And as for the poisonous effects of 
 coffee, and their obliteration by "Postum" the 
 simple lady knew just "nothin'-at-all," like my 
 illustrious fellow countryman, Pat. Moreover, 
 she knew nothing of "Calories, carbo-hydrates, 
 proteids, or mineral salts," and how they should 
 be scientifically arranged so as to become foods 
 and not poisons. She knew nothing of oxygen, 
 hydrogen, carbonic acid, or carbon dioxide. Nor 
 did she know anything of the rejuvenating effects 
 of the bath, nor was she at all acquainted with 
 the life-prolonging exercise of grasping a beam 
 above her head, and pulling herself up by grasp 
 of her hands, and letting herself down till toes 
 touched the ground at least twelve times every 
 morning. She knew nothing of the marvellous 
 revelations of Science, yet she lived 107 years, 
 and mothered twenty-five children. She pro- 
 duced and mothered twenty-five babies; attended 
 to all motherly and womanly functions, lived 107 
 years, and all without any scientific aids to Lon- 
 gevity. Now, what do you know about that? I 
 tell you she was a wonder. 
 
 But say, she was just an illustration of the 
 
52 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 natural span of life which God now desires for 
 his children, if they would only behave them- 
 selves. See? 
 
 But there is one feature in the life of Mrs. 
 Rubio which must not be ignored. She was born 
 in such circumstances in relation to those things 
 necessary for sustenance, that she had no worry 
 about "something" to eat. See? Worry about 
 this is now very prevalent. And why? Well, 
 because the real good business men, the brainy 
 fellows you know, have just grasped a little more 
 than their share, and the "weaker brethren" are 
 left to worry. Now, long life and worry, are 
 incompatible, and never can co-exist. One of 
 them must vacate the ranch. Worry, and lon- 
 gevity are irreconcilable enemies. Therefore, 
 "swat" worry, if you can. 
 
 My readers will please observe that I am not 
 selecting wonderful lives of the records of ages 
 past; nor am I selecting examples from the 
 "Nobility, and Gentry," save the mark! No, I 
 am recording the lives and habits of men and 
 women who have lived to "long life" amongst us, 
 many of whom are living now. My object is to 
 show from real present examples, that 100 years 
 of earth life is quite normal, and should be at- 
 tained by all, and without any extra contortions 
 and manipulations to attain it. I am also show- 
 ing that Longevity is not at all associated with 
 either physical or mental imbecility. See? I am 
 writing history of the "common people, or the 
 "hoi polloi." And I am dealing with facts, not 
 metaphysical, and matterless guesses. 
 
 Now here is another: 
 
 AGE KEPT HIM FROM THE CIVIL WAR 
 
 I quote from the Examiner of Jan. 9th, 1921 : 
 "Wheeling, (W. Va.,) Jan. 8. George Crow, who 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 53 
 
 was rejected because of his advanced age by a 
 recruiting officer when he sought to enlist for 
 military service in the Civil War, died at the 
 family home, Denver Hill, near Littleton, W. Va., 
 last night. Mr. Crow recently celebrated his 
 108th birthday anniversary by riding eight miles 
 on his horse to the home of one of his sons." 
 
 Pretty good for an old man. Eh?. No sign 
 of the imbecility of old age here. See? 
 
 Now here is another of those young-old chaps 
 who make "fiddle-faddle" out of our common 
 ideas of the mental declension attendant on old 
 age. I quote from the local press: 
 
 "Schenectady, New York, June 29, 1820. 
 Washington Bissel, 100 years old, is perhaps 
 America's oldest lawyer. He received the degree 
 of doctor of laws from Union College here at its 
 124th Commencement. He is the oldest alumnus, 
 having graduated in the class of 1846. Dr. Bissell 
 lives at Great Barrington, Mass. He is a Chi 
 Psi fraternity man. 
 
 Say, now what do you think of that? The 
 record is indisputable. Not much sign of the 
 mental imbecility, supposed to attend old age in 
 this case. No camouflage here. "Facts are chiels 
 that winna ding, and dare na be disputed," as 
 the great Burns once said. 
 
 And now here is an inventor at 91. He 
 patents a floor after forty-three years of effort. 
 I quote from the News record of the event : 
 
 After working on an invention to make 
 wedge-tight flooring for forty-three years, Samuel 
 Hedges, of 4607 Welch place, a building con- 
 tractor, 91 years old, has just received assurance 
 from Washington that a patent would be granted 
 him. 
 
5U EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 He claims that his invention will save one- 
 third in material, and add one-third in floor 
 efficiency. Hedges, who has been a resident of 
 Los Angeles for thirty-four years, gives an in- 
 teresting insight into the business of making 
 flooring nearly three-quarters of a century ago. 
 He said: "I made flooring seventy-three years 
 ago. See how it is done now, as compared with 
 then ; a fair day's work was ten boards six inches 
 wide, and 12 feet long. A day's work then was 
 twelve to sixteen hours long, winter and summer. 
 Thus, an average day's work would be, in making 
 flooring 120 feet in length and 6 inches in width, 
 which would make a floor less than 72 square feet. 
 
 "The first machine to make flooring began 
 working about sixty-three years ago, and al- 
 though they have made great improvements in 
 machines to manufacture flooring, the best they 
 can do is to make the same old wasteful tongue 
 and groove flooring that I made seventy-three 
 years ago by hand. 
 
 "One of these latest machines will turn out 
 in a day of eight hours about 8000 square feet 
 of flooring; something over one hundred times 
 what I could do by hand when in my prime. 
 However, when you consider that floor boards are 
 now only 4 inches wide, these improved machines 
 will produce 150 times the lineal per hour that 
 I could, and if they had to work sixteen hours 
 per day, as I did, they could turn out 300 times 
 the lineal feet per day that I could, and not get 
 one-half as tired." 
 
 While few men 91 years old enjoy as good 
 health and strength as does Hedges, yet neces- 
 sarily, he has not the vigor and strength of yore. 
 However, he is still on the job, for while the great 
 flooring mills are busy making the same old style 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 55 
 
 of flooring he made seventy-three years ago, he 
 is using his brains, and in the past six or eight 
 years has invented what he calls the "Wedge 
 Tight Flooring," and has recently received the 
 assurance from Washington that he would soon 
 be rewarded with a Patent fully covering his 
 claims, and protecting him against all comers. 
 
 The world is Psychologized on the feebleness 
 of age, and its general incompetency. What is 
 now needed is to destroy the Psychology of the 
 inefficiency of years, and enfeeblement of time, 
 and "forget it." See? Dr. Osier, professionally 
 dogmatizing, declared that all men who venture 
 in unscientific persistence to reach 60 years of 
 age should be chloroformed. However, the Doc- 
 tor failed to take his own medicine, when the 
 fateful 60 came to himself. O dear! How this 
 world has been blessed by the wisdom of the 
 "wise" and the ravings of the scientific. May 
 the good Lord send us deliverance before com- 
 plete idiocy enwraps us all in its variegated man- 
 tle of imbecility. There are three things which 
 are more enthusing to give, than to receive. They 
 are kicks, medicine, and advice. Now, mark this, 
 and behave yourself accordingly. 
 
 My effort in this book is to antagonize the 
 general Psychology of age, and restore the Psy- 
 chology of the dominance of "The Spirit." For 
 the Spirit giveth life, and overcometh death. Let 
 us forget age, with its querulous broken hearted- 
 ness, and inefficiency, and let us cast out the 
 demon that has so generally psychologized us 
 with the idea of feebleness and incompetency as 
 the natural accompaniments of years. See? 
 
 An illustration of my meaning: I shall now 
 give you a report from The Examiner of Los 
 Angeles, containing an account of a meeting of 
 
56 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 "twelve old wise men," aged from 81 to 92. 
 These (imbeciles who should have been chloro- 
 formed thirty years previously) held a luncheon 
 at the home of Daniel Hawk, 1305 Winfield street, 
 Los Angeles, Cal., to honor him on the arrival 
 of his 85th birthday. There were twelve guests. 
 The paper recording the event calls them the 
 "twelve old wise men." And here is the account 
 as given by the newspaper : 
 
 "The twelve old wise men, a unique Los 
 Angeles organization, whose youngest member is 
 81 years old, and whose oldest is 92, yesterday 
 celebrated the approaching 85th birthday anni- 
 versary of one of their number, Daniel Hawk, 
 with a luncheon at his home, 1305 Winfield street. 
 
 "Eleven of the 'wise men' were present, Silas 
 Judd, 89, of Azusa, not being able to attend be- 
 cause of illness in his family. The members in- 
 clude in their number a clergyman, two doctors, 
 a judge, and a general. They are as follows: 
 Sturges Selleck, 1345 Toberman street, 91; R. A. 
 Lock, 1349 Oak street, 84 ; G. W. Bowman, 1227 
 Winfield street, 82; Gen. John H. Wilcox, 5357 
 Virginia avenue, 82; Judge Eugene H. Bonfils, 
 2940 Howard street, 85 ; Daniel Hawk, 1305 Win- 
 field street, 85; the Rev. H. L. Canfield, 316 Ken- 
 sington place, 85; Dr. A. W. Sherman, 266 Ar- 
 cadia avenue, 88 ; Dr. A. L. Beck, 1835 Twelfth 
 street, 84; A. J. Whitmore, Fourth avenue, 91, 
 and T. H. Loyhed, 1443 Winfield street, 83. 
 
 "With witty stories, culled from eleven long 
 lifetimes of experience, the diners regaled them- 
 selves around a table decorated with carnations 
 and roses, and General Wilcox displayed a copy 
 of the emancipation Proclamation of President 
 Lincoln, written in script, the shading of which 
 formed a realistic portrait of Lincoln. 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 57 
 
 "The Rev. H. L. Canfield, aged 85, read an 
 original poem which he had written for the occa- 
 sion. Here it is: 
 "Our years are going with increasing swiftness, 
 
 The stream of time glides rapidly away; 
 And on its flowing tide it ever bears us, 
 
 Nearer the sunset of our life's short day. 
 But as the stream rolls on its current deepens, 
 
 And more serene and peaceful is its flow; 
 Unlike the noisy gurgling of the streamlet, 
 
 In the dim morning of the 'long ago/ 
 The shallow transient pleasures of our childhood, 
 
 The merry laughter, and the careless play, 
 Fail to content us when with opening manhood, 
 
 Crude thoughts, and childish things are put 
 away. 
 Our childish hopes so vain, our friendships fickle, 
 
 Our cup of bliss so often dashed with tears, 
 Give not one-half the solid satisfaction, 
 
 Found in experience of riper years. 
 The joys of wedded life, the peace abiding, 
 
 That make our home a Paradise below; 
 The helpful sympathy and Love confiding, 
 
 Such as the truly wedded only know. 
 The honest toil, the noble strong ambition, 
 
 The lofty courage, unalloyed by fears; 
 Unflinching loyalty to truth, and duty — 
 
 These make the bliss of our maturer years. 
 If these are crowned with hopes of life immortal, 
 
 Awaiting us when life's work is done, 
 No danger can alarm, or fears annoy us, 
 
 As the tide bears us toward the setting sun. 
 Then let the years fly with increasing swiftness, 
 
 And let time's stream glide rapidly away, 
 Since on the bosom of its flood it bear us 
 
 Nearer the portals of the eternal day. 
 Where hope at last shall change to glad fruition, 
 
58 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 And life, and love, and joy, shall never cease ; 
 Where all time's babbling brooks, and flowing 
 rivers 
 
 Merge in the boundless ocean of God's peace." 
 
 Well, reader, there isn't much of the so-called 
 querulousness and broken-heartedness of old age 
 exemplified at this meeting of nonagenarians. 
 Now is there? Honest. And say, the whole 
 thing is truth absolute, and no camouflage about 
 it. 
 
 Now here is another sweet girl dancer at the 
 sprightly age of 81. She is Mrs. Helena A. Sheets. 
 At 81 she does her own housework; and likes to 
 attend Balls. 
 
 How many women are there in the Southland 
 who dance the tango at 81 years of age? And 
 how many are there of that age who have had 
 fifteen children, do their own housework daily 
 and, when the occasion arises, do not miss a dance 
 on the program at a lodge social? Mrs. Helena 
 A. Sheets, of 111-A Carr street, is one. 
 
 "Dancing? I always loved to dance. I taught 
 my children and grandchildren the steps that hap- 
 pened to be in vogue when they wanted to learn. 
 It's healthful exercise, and I expect to dance for 
 many years to come," says Mrs. Sheets. 
 
 Before the Civil War, Mrs. Sheets danced the 
 quaint quadrilles of the time. She lived in the 
 South much of her life. She was in great demand 
 as a dancing partner before her marriage, which 
 was when she was only 15. 
 
 Her little granddaughter, Leontine Sheets, is 
 her latest pupil. Leontine is the daughter of 
 G. M. Sheets, manager of the Golden State Moose 
 lodge No. 29. Mrs. Sheets and Leontine fre- 
 quently are seen dancing the latest dances at the 
 social affairs given by the lodge. 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 FACTS AND PHILOSOPHY CONCERNING 
 LONG LIFE 
 
 Now I think it is time to give you some secrets 
 of health, telling you how overwork induces 
 fatigue, which in turn breeds disease. I quote 
 from ROYAL S. COPELAND, M. D., F. A. C. S., 
 Commissioner of Health, New York City: 
 
 "Good health, to a very great extent, depends 
 upon the proper amount of exercise and muscular 
 effort. Undue effort, and overwork show their 
 effects in various ways. 
 
 The blood pressure may be altered. In one 
 case there may be a material increase of pressure. 
 In other cases there may be a lowered pressure 
 — this is particularly true of women. 
 
 Long continued overwork will so lower the 
 resistance of the body as to render it liable to any 
 passing infection. Such a person may pick up 
 typhoid fever, or pneumonia. 
 
 Even though the tired-out individual does not 
 suffer from some acute illness, his bodily vitality 
 may be so depressed that the heart no longer 
 does its work properly. As a result of the 
 weakened heart action, the blood moves slug- 
 gishly through the body, the wastes and poisons 
 are not removed, the kidneys become diseased, 
 old age comes on apace, and life actually may be 
 materially shortened. 
 
 You and I know when we are tired. We may 
 feel tired, and look tired, but is there any way 
 
60 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 actually to prove that we are tired? 
 
 If you draw a blunt object, like the top of 
 your fountain pen, down the front of your arm, 
 bearing on considerably, it will make a white 
 streak. Watch that streak for a few moments. 
 It will be seen to disappear, the skin resume its 
 natural color, and then turn red. 
 
 The speed at which this transformation takes 
 place is determined by the reaction of your blood 
 vessels. If you are tired you will note the slug- 
 gishness of the change. If you are full of "pep" 
 this reaction takes place at once. 
 
 You cannot burn the candle at both ends. It 
 is impossible to cheat nature. You may think 
 you are strong enough to work all day, and dance 
 all night. You can't stand the pace for long. 
 
 When I was a little boy I lived in a town to 
 which a great astronomer came to win his bride. 
 Later, he became a world-known figure in his 
 specialty. He knew all about the stars. He had 
 the table of logarithms by heart. Give him the 
 dimensions of a building, and instantly he could 
 tell the number of feet of lumber necessary to 
 build it. 
 
 This man was not satisfied to study the stars 
 at night. The nights were too short. He con- 
 ceived the idea of digging a deep well and setting 
 up his telescope there. The scheme succeeded. 
 He could see the stars by daylight! 
 
 What happened to the man? 
 
 Great as he was, wonderful as was his mathe- 
 matical mind, his body could not endure such 
 wicked demands upon its resistance. In a few 
 weeks he contracted pneumonia and died. 
 
 OVERWORK AND FATIGUE FOSTER DIS- 
 EASE. Unless the heart and kidneys and other 
 vital organs are given a chance to rest, the re- 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 61 
 
 sistance of the body breaks down. If you would 
 live long and prosper, take the rest nature de- 
 mands. 
 
 Now we come to record the topnotcher. The 
 record is indisputable, and the history is unim- 
 peachable truth. The record, and history, and 
 triumphs of the man are written in our National 
 records, and his services to humanity are an 
 imperishable part of the history of Christian 
 heroism. I quote from the Los Angeles Times : 
 
 One step to full Century. Preacher is Nation's 
 Oldest Civil War Veteran. At Ninety-nine writes 
 book on Philosophy. Five generations covered 
 by the same roof. 
 
 Rev. David Jordan Higgins carries with ease 
 his 99 years. He has a powerful body, all muscle 
 and bone; and his head is that of a philosopher. 
 He has the eye of a seer who looks down the 
 vista of a nation's progress, and he laughed a 
 soundless laugh as he stood in the doorway of 
 his home at No. 915 Maple street, Pasadena, 
 where he came to round out his Century. 
 
 "You can rummage around in my past, and 
 see if you can find anything interesting. But 
 I'm all through with the past! I'm living in the 
 present, for my future was taken care of over 
 ninety years ago. 
 
 "I was a boy of seven and my mother was 
 reproving me for a childish prank, and said: 
 'You mustn't do it again, for you know you are 
 God's little boy!' And I answered rebelliously : 
 'I know you, and I know father, and I know the 
 neighbors, but I don't know God.' 'Well you had 
 better get acquainted with him and make sure 
 you are his little boy.' And so I went out into 
 the barn, and sat down on the golden straw, and 
 looking up into the sky where I thought God 
 
62 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 lived, called out : 'Say, God ! I don't know you ! 
 But I'd like to get acquainted with you, and find 
 out if I'm your little boy !" 
 
 RECEIVES ANSWER 
 
 "In over ninety years I have never been able 
 to figure out how I got the answer, but in the 
 twinkling of an eye, I knew that I was God's 
 little boy, and I've never doubted it from that 
 day to this. I've often been a bad little boy, but 
 today at 99 I'm still God's little boy!" 
 
 Stand up, David Jordan Higgins, and tell us 
 what you have done in your ninety-nine years! 
 But he had no need to stand and tell of his life, 
 for it is written in the records of his country. 
 
 David Jordan Higgins is the oldest veteran 
 in the United States. He was a colonel in the 
 Twenty-fourth Ohio Regiment, and gave three 
 years of honorable service. He went out a strong, 
 vigorous man in the full tide of successful min- 
 istry, and he came home bent double with the 
 privations of army life. 
 
 STILL PREACHES 
 
 David Jordan Higgins is the oldest active 
 minister in this country, and has attended church 
 for ninety-five years, and for forty-six years has 
 never missed a session of Sunday school. He 
 annually preaches the sermon for Old Folks' Day 
 in Pasadena. This year he talked on the inner 
 life of man, and before the service he called for 
 the veterans, and the boys in blue and gray re- 
 sponded to the call. Half the congregation stood 
 up, when he asked for those over 60 to rise. 
 There were many over 70, a number over 80; 
 Mr. Higgins rounded the quartet of those over 
 90. It was a most impressive moment in the 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 63 
 
 history of the Lake Avenue Methodist Church of 
 Pasadena. 
 
 David Jordan Higgins is the oldest producing 
 author in this country. His newest book, "The 
 Psychological Study of Human Nature," is on the 
 press. Another book is nearly finished, and his 
 "American Life During the Nineteenth Century" 
 is in the public libraries. His "How to Continue 
 Young for a Century," is a fascinating document. 
 
 BUILDER OF CHURCHES 
 
 Mr. Higgins is the oldest builder of Churches 
 and parsonages, and probably no minister of the 
 present age has built as many as Mr. Higgins, 
 as three-quarters of a century ago skill in car- 
 pentry was an important adjunct to pulpit min- 
 istrations, as the country was new, and the 
 people poor. He was also prominent in educa- 
 tional affairs, founded a seminary, was a radical 
 abolitionist, and a tireless worker for prohibition. 
 
 Mr. Higgins is the oldest man who daily uses 
 a typewriter. He comes in alone to attend the 
 ministers' meetings in Los Angeles every week. 
 He began life on the coast of Maine, and hopes 
 to end the journey on the Pacific Coast. At 97 
 he crossed the Continent, and declares "It is in 
 my contract to celebrate my Centenarian birth- 
 day with my old Conference in Minneapolis next 
 year." 
 
 Five generations live in one home with his 
 daughter, Mrs. E. I. Spencer, of Pasadena. Mr. 
 Higgins has baptized his children, his grandchil- 
 dren, his great-grandchildren, and on the head 
 of his great-great-grandchild has poured the re- 
 generation fluid. 
 
 David Jordan Higgins squares his life by his 
 creed, "Look up ! Lift up ! Get up !" 
 
U EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 I have just been reading the life and labors 
 of a wonderful preacher and Evangelist named 
 Taylor. The book was published in New York 
 by Hunt and Eaton, 150 Fifth avenue, 1895. It 
 is entitled, "Story of my life, An account of what 
 I have thought, and said, and done in my min- 
 istry of more than fifty-three years in Christian 
 Lands, and among the Heathen, written by my- 
 self," by William Taylor, Bishop of the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church for Africa. Edited by John 
 Clark Ridpath, copiously Embellished with orig- 
 inal Engravings, and Sketches by Frank Beard. 
 I give all this so that the truth of the extract 
 which I am about to copy cannot be questioned. 
 I don't want to be accused of camouflage, or 
 writing pure inventions when I am talking about 
 100 years and over of efficient human life in the 
 present Century, and to prove that I am not feed- 
 ing my readers fairy tales, as I have been accused 
 by one gentleman, who, notwithstanding my 
 "Irish," is still in the flesh. See? 
 
 The incident that I extract from Bishop 
 Taylor's "Story of my life" is thusly: "Having 
 spent a few days in and about Franklin, Brother 
 Busey and I set out on horseback to go to quar- 
 terly meeting at Rehobeth, in the western part 
 of what is now known as Highland. 
 
 We had a great "Quarterly Love-Feast" Sab- 
 bath morning at 9 o'clock. Among our young 
 converts at that meeting was James McCourt. 
 He was a Scotchman by descent but had been in 
 America for nearly one hundred years. At the 
 time he was "born again" he lacked three months 
 of being 99 years old ! We will meet the old man 
 again on my next circuit." 
 
 This meeting occurred as predicted, and is 
 thus described by the preacher : "One day, when 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 65 
 
 preaching at Red Holes I saw in my congregation 
 James McCourt, who was saved a year before at 
 our quarterly meeting at Rehobeth, on Franklin 
 Circuit, at the age of 98 years and 9 months. 
 So now he was 100 years old, less three months. 
 At the close he ran up and shook hands with me. 
 
 "You are abiding in Jesus, Father McCourt?" 
 
 "O yes, Brother Taylor, and he is becoming 
 more and more precious to me every day." 
 
 "How wonderful that he has spared you so 
 many years, and in such vigor!" 
 
 "Yes, I never had the headache in my life, 
 and no serious illness of any sort. I walked 
 across four mountains today to hear you preach 
 once more before you leave your circuit." Mean- 
 time he tripped along by my side in a glee of 
 talk like a boy. 
 
 "If the Lord spares me three months longer 
 I will complete my hundredth year. Dr. Buckner 
 says he is going to have a celebration on my 
 birthday, completing a century, and have me run, 
 to see how fast a man of my years can get over 
 the ground." 
 
 I have quoted from Bishop Taylor in this 
 record of James McCourt, to prevent any sceptic 
 from accusing me of lying. It is dangerous to 
 call ah Irishman a liar, because d'ye see, he has 
 a knack of handling the Shillalah. 
 
 Bishop Taylor continues his reminiscence of 
 James McCourt as follows: "I was wonderfully 
 interested in the dear little man, one of my first 
 young converts, but I saw him no more. About 
 thirty-five years after I met Brother Bevans and 
 wife in Chicago. They were well acquainted with 
 James McCourt. 
 
 "Well, Brother Bevens, tell me about him." 
 
66 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 He replied: "I was at the celebration Dr. 
 Buckner got up on the centennial of James 
 McCourt. The old man was in perfect health, 
 happy in God, and cheerful as a lark. The friends 
 made up a purse of $100 to give him as a token 
 of their love and respect for him, but they said, 
 "We want to see you run, and if you run 100 
 yards in five minutes we will give you a present 
 of $100." The distance was measured carefully, 
 and the signal for starting sounded, and the old 
 man ran the hundred yards in three minutes, 
 instead of five." 
 
 When the dear old man was 103 years old he 
 came out to Queen Ann County, northwest of 
 Chicago, to visit some of his grandchildren. A 
 good old Christian man, who had the happy art 
 of cheerfulness that made everybody about him 
 cheerful. After a visit of several months, when 
 he wanted to return to Virginia, the railway com- 
 pany were so pleased with his spirit and bearing 
 that they gave him a free pass back to his home. 
 He lived four years after that, and died in the 
 Lord at the age of 107 years." 
 
 Now, I don't suppose anyone will have the 
 audacity to accuse me of camouflage in this record 
 of age. The testimony is by an eminent Bishop 
 of the Church. Also it is confirmed by many 
 witnesses. There is no evidence of senility in 
 the record. 
 
 McCourt knew nothing of gymnastics, nor did 
 he practice any peculiar calisthenics whose aid 
 is indispensible to longevity. No peculiarities in 
 diet, or in exercises lent their powerful assistance 
 to the prolonging of life. 
 
 That he was "born again" at 100 years of age 
 is a remarkable proof of the eternal youthf ulness 
 of the human spirit, and that it never suffers 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 67 
 
 from senility, and knows nothing of the lapse 
 of time, but like its parent, GOD, is from ever- 
 lasting to everlasting. God breathed into man's 
 nostrils the breath of Life, and so man is the 
 offspring of God, and hence himself eternal. 
 
 Another characteristic worthy of note in the 
 life of McCourt: He was always of gentle and 
 obliging manners, kind, courteous and helpful to 
 a degree. The smile is a powerful aid to health 
 and life. The frown and snarl are life destroyers. 
 Anger is destructive, and passion is an annihil- 
 lator. The one is an angel of life, the other is 
 a demon of death. Therefore if you would live 
 long, and enjoy many years, let love be regnant, 
 and do good to all men as you have opportunity, 
 and love even your enemies. This will do more 
 for the number of your years in the Earth-life 
 than all the exercises and genuflexions and con- 
 tortions which Physical Science and the pro- 
 fessors of Calisthenics recommend as aids to long 
 life and health. See? 
 
 In this record I am piling testimony on testi- 
 mony to show that 100 years and over of earth 
 life is no miracle, but is the birthright of hu- 
 manity, and would be the common experience 
 were it not that in our living and habits we have 
 strayed far from the inspiration of our Father, 
 God. 
 
 Now here are three women whose united ages 
 amount to 300 years, and no lies in the record. 
 I quote from the "Examiner." Lydia Sharpless, 
 107 years, the oldest voter in the United States, 
 cast her ballot at Whittier today, and announced 
 that she had voted for California "dry." Mary 
 A. Coffin, 96 years old, and Mary Holden, 97, 
 also voted the Prohibition ticket. Eh? Whad'ya 
 think of that, now? These three women, ap- 
 
68 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 proaching the Century each, still retain sufficient 
 intellect to direct them in playing their part in 
 the drama of life, so that the greatest good may 
 come to the greatest number. 
 
 Now here is a lady whose record capsizes all 
 our ideas of long life, and the scientific aids to 
 its attainment. 0, it is pitiable to see the elab- 
 orate rules of our Philosophers "knocked into a 
 cocked hat" every once in a while by some stub- 
 born, uncultivated creature who deliberately and 
 willfully just will go contrary to the dictum of 
 the "wise ones. ,, 
 
 Bridget Harney, 118, died in Milwaukee. She 
 attributed her longevity to her use of smoking 
 tobacco ! ! The paper which makes this record 
 has this additional counsel for us, viz: She was 
 doubtless an abstemious eater. No overeater 
 attains great age. You need not smoke or chew 
 to eat moderately, and live long. 
 
 Neither alcohol nor nicotine does one-thous- 
 andth part as much harm as eating more than 
 can be digested and assimilated. 
 
 Say, the guy who gives this opinion is near it, 
 mighty near it. Over-eating is without doubt the 
 cause of all disease in the multitudinous forms 
 and names by which disease now afflicts us. If 
 the inhabitants of earth would resolve to eat only 
 when hungry, and only one article of food at a 
 meal, they would easily reach 100 years of efficient 
 earth-life, but then the Doctors, poor fellows, 
 would have to hustle at some honest employment 
 for a living. See? 
 
CHAPTER V 
 LONGEVITY AND THE TOBACCO HABIT 
 
 Now here is a good place to get in the latest 
 Science on the smoking Problem. I quote from 
 the latest Science, by Louise A. Gourdain : 
 
 "The reign of the cigar, the cigaret, and 
 the pipe shows no signs of decadence; on the 
 contrary, even women, from resignation, have 
 advanced — or retrograded — to the position of 
 devotees. Accordingly science is exerting itself 
 to limit as much as possible the disagreeable 
 features of the habit. A late issue of the London 
 Lancet sums up the matter quite thoroughly. 
 
 The smoking of a cigar, pleasant though it 
 may be to the smoker, and however irreproach- 
 able its quality, is barred by most careful house- 
 wives in their drawing rooms, because its reek 
 is so persistent. The stale smell of a cigar in a 
 room is peculariarly unpleasant, and peculiarly 
 difficult to get rid of. It clings to the curtains, 
 and to most of the articles of furniture, which 
 present any sort of an absorbent surface. 
 
 It is not so to the same extent with cigarettes 
 or with pipes. In the case even of a single cigar, 
 books, papers, and textiles reek of a stale flavor, 
 and the room requires abundant airing before 
 that flavor can be eliminated. 
 
 Air is an excellent scavenger, but ozone is 
 more active in removing the smell. The effect 
 that the smoking of a cigar produces a larger 
 quantity of pungent aromatic oils than does the 
 smoking of a cigarette or pipe. In the case of 
 
70 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 the cigaret, oils are probably burnt, even if they 
 are formed; in the pipe they condense in the 
 stem, while in the case of the cigar they are 
 probably for the most part discharged into the 
 air. 
 
 In the form of a cigar tobacco would appear 
 to produce more oils than in the form of a cigaret, 
 or when burnt in a pipe. Such common observa- 
 tions are not without hygienic significance. 
 
 Pyridine, the most poisonous oil produced in 
 the semi-combustion of tobacco, is an abundant 
 product in cigar smoking, as it is also in the 
 pipe; but in the latter there is condensation, 
 While in the former there is little or none. In 
 the cigaret, so intimately in contact with the air 
 is the burning portion that the production of 
 distilled oils is, comparatively speaking, trifling. 
 
 The symptoms of tobacco smoke poisoning are 
 not necessarily due to nicotine: they are more 
 often due to pyridine, or poisoning from tobacco 
 tar oils. The tobacco heart is more often trace- 
 able to free indulgence in cigar smoking, than to 
 a similar indulgence in the pipe and the cigaret. 
 
 Young boys can smoke, to their great damage 
 nevertheless a considerable number of cigarets, 
 or even pipes, but an equivalent in cigars more 
 than satisfies their tobacco appetite, so soon are 
 the toxic effects of cigar smoking made apparent 
 to them. 
 
 The specially harmful character of cigaret 
 smoking arises from the fact that this form of 
 tobacco lends itself to constant smoking at all 
 hours of the day, and also from the extraordinary 
 substances which are used in the preparation of 
 these noxious articles in the United States." 
 
 Now, the above is pretty good as a mild re- 
 monstrance, but now I follow with a real Scien- 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 71 
 
 tific examination of this domestic, and almost 
 universal enemy to life, health, and efficiency. 
 
 Effects of Tobacco: "Come, let us reason 
 together." Especially do I want a word with the 
 boys who have not begun the use of this herb, 
 or having but lately begun are at present wres- 
 tling with the problem, mentally and physically. 
 
 In an experimental observation of thirty- 
 eight boys of all classes of society, and of average 
 health, who had been using tobacco for periods 
 ranging from two months to two years, twenty- 
 seven of them showed severe injury to the con- 
 stitution and insufficient growth; thirty-two 
 showed the existence of irregularities of the 
 heart's action, a disordered stomach, a cough, 
 and a craving for alcoholic liquors; thirteen had 
 intermittancy of the pulse, and one had consump- 
 tion. After they had abandoned the use of to- 
 bacco for six months, one-half were free from 
 all their former symptoms, and the remainder 
 recovered by the end of the year. 
 
 When Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes was asked 
 "Should we smoke?" he answered: "Certainly 
 not. Smoking is liable to injure the sight, to 
 render the nerves unsteady, to enfeeble the will, 
 and enslave the nature to an imperious habit 
 likely to stand in the way of a duty to be per- 
 formed." 
 
 The chemical elements of tobacco are decidedly 
 poisonous to the human system, and there are 
 no known antidotes. The first element is a volatile 
 oil or fat, obtained by distilling the smoke of 
 tobacco. It has the odor of tobacco and, when 
 inhaled, produces the same sensation as smoke. 
 When applied to the nose its pungency causes 
 vomiting; taken internally, it produces giddiness, 
 nausea, and a staggering walk. IT IS POISON, 
 
72 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 The second element is a volatile alkali called 
 Nicotine. It, too, is a deadly poison, next in rank 
 to prussic acid; one drop on the tongue of a dog 
 will produce death; one drop evaporated in a 
 room holding 200 people is sufficiently penetrat- 
 ing to drive them out in a few minutes. 
 
 The third element is an empyreumatic oil 
 obtained also by heat. A drop of this poison 
 placed on the tongue of a cat will cause horrible 
 agony, convulsions, and death in from two to 
 four minutes. 
 
 These three chemical substances are all de- 
 veloped in smoking either a cigar or a pipe. In 
 the residuum of a pipe long used, they exist in 
 a dark brown or tanny mass of offensive matter. 
 Think of it! If you expel a mouthful of tobacco 
 smoke through a clean white handkerchief you 
 will see, where it passes through the fabric it 
 makes a black spot. Examine this black spot 
 under a microscope of 500 diameters, and you 
 will see the crystals of nicotine, the oil globules, 
 and the acid. All of these enter the mouth, with 
 the smoke, and some of it is immediately ab- 
 sorbed, and other portions of it after a time, and 
 in this manner all of them enter the circulatory 
 system. 
 
 Now, if, after this really scientific analysis of 
 the poison tobacco, any idiot wishes to reduce all 
 his powers, intellectual and physical, to a min- 
 imum, why this is "The land of liberty." See? 
 Let him. But don't permit him to blow off the 
 poison in the air you have to live in. See? 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 EFFICIENT LONG LIVES AND THE 
 SECRETS OF LONGEVITY 
 
 My friends, I am giving you history, and not 
 speculation. Neither am I spinning yarns from 
 my own inner consciousness. Hence, it is neces- 
 sary for me to borrow from all reliable sources 
 of history and information. So I now start in 
 on a remarkable store of information prepared 
 ready for my hand by a very capable woman, a 
 very superior thinker, and the very efficient 
 Secretary of our "Centenarian Club," which 
 really owes its existence to her wise and devoted 
 management. I refer to Mrs. Witter, whose 
 residence is 953 N. Figueroa street, Los Angeles, 
 Cal. I extract from her journal in which is 
 written an account of a birthday celebration for 
 her mother, Mrs. J. F. Howard: 
 
 "Mrs. J. F. Howard, wife of Judge Howard, 
 celebrated her 92nd birthday at her home, 953 
 North Figueroa street, recently, having as her 
 guests members of the Centenarian Club. Eleven 
 of the fourteen included in the club list, were 
 present to enjoy her hospitality. 
 
 "These included the president, the Rev. S. A. 
 Taft, who is 92 years of age, with his lady; Dr. 
 Peebles (96 years) ; Senator Cornelius Cole (95 
 years), and his wife; Dr. Prugh, 95; S. Sellec, 
 94, and his wife; A. Annas, 96 years; Dr. A. M. 
 Morrison (97 years) ; C. R. Post (91 years), and 
 
7h EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 his wife; N. A. Millard, 91 years; Mrs. B. Bartlet, 
 92, and Mrs. Howard, the hostess, who celebrated 
 her 92nd natal day. 
 
 The following are the lady members of the 
 Centenarian Club, with the date of each one's 
 birth : Mrs. Mary K. Bartlett, 159 South Euclid 
 avenue, Pasadena, Cal., Dec. 12, 1825 ; Mrs. J. F. 
 Howard, 953 North Figueroa street, Los Angeles, 
 Cal., Dec. 2, 1825 ; Mrs. J. M. Vandergrift, 2619 
 Lasalle avenue, Los Angeles, Cal, March 26. 
 1826; Mrs. G. B. Pease, 6804 Bonsallo avenue. 
 Los Angeles, Cal., Sept. 16, 1827; Mrs. Eliza 
 Griffith, 2915 Halldale avenue, Los Angeles, Cal., 
 April 6, 1825 ; Mrs. Mary Eldridge, Franklin and 
 Orange streets, Los Angeles, Cal., Feb. 9, 1828; 
 Mrs. Susan Cole, 306 Lake street, Pasadena, Cal., 
 April 5, 1827; Mrs. Eliza McConnell, 810 East 
 45th street, Los Angeles, Cal., March 1, 1826. 
 
 There is a Mrs. Martha Orr Scott, at 1144 
 East Eleventh street, Santa Monica, who is 97. 
 
 The dates of birth of these ladies are given 
 so that no accusation of camouflage can be 
 brought against the record. And say, there is 
 nothing of the so-called "querulous broken heart- 
 edness of old age" visible in them. They are each 
 a center of radiant happiness and cheerfulness. 
 
 A delightful day was passed, dinner being 
 served by the host and hostess, Mr. and Mrs. 
 Witter, Mrs. Howard's children. There were 
 toasts, music, speaking and various stunts con- 
 tributed by the guests. 
 
 Cheers and good wishes were extended most 
 heartily by the thirty friends who gathered at 
 the festal board, for the continued health and 
 prosperity of the hostess. 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 75 
 
 Mrs. M. Bartlett, another centenarian, will 
 celebrate her 93rd birthday Wednesday, Decem- 
 ber 12th, at her Pasadena home with the club as 
 her guests. 
 
 Now, gentle reader, there is not much sign of 
 "querulous, broken-heartedness of old age" among 
 the hilarious friends who met to celebrate the 
 birthday of Mrs. Howard. 
 
 Now somebody asks me why I am writing 
 this book. I reply to break and bust the idiotic 
 Psychology that age brings all miserableness, and 
 is the grave of all enjoyment and achievement. 
 See. The great Dr. Osier said that every person 
 reaching 60 years should be chloroformed. But, 
 say, the Doctor didn't take his own medicine. 
 Say, my friends, don't please associate age and 
 imbecility. Please. And don't accept the Psy- 
 chology that its approach is the termination of 
 achievement, and its presence the relegation of 
 you to the rot-heap. 
 
 I would rather join with Browning in his 
 optimist invitation which very efficiently explodes 
 all the absurdities which science, and medicine, 
 and philosophy have launched against age: 
 
 GROW OLD WITH ME 
 
 Grow old along with me ! 
 
 The best is yet to be; 
 The last of life, for which the first was made ; 
 
 Our times are in his hand, 
 
 Who saith: A whole is planned, 
 Youth shows but half; trust God; 
 
 See all, be not afraid. 
 
76 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 Thy thoughts and feelings shall not die, 
 Nor leave thee when gray hairs are nigh; 
 
 A melancholy slave; 
 But an old age serene and bright, 
 And lovely as a Lapland night, 
 
 Shall lead thee to thy grave. 
 
 Now I introduce you to the topnotcher; and 
 say, there is no camouflage in this either. I am 
 extracting from the ASSOCIATED PRESS: 
 
 "Lexington, Ky., September 3rd. John Shell, 
 said to be the oldest living man in the United 
 States, today celebrated the 131st anniversary of 
 his birth here. 
 
 The aged mountaineer celebrated by taking 
 his first automobile ride. He said this was the 
 first birthday on which he did not work, and that 
 he was anxious to get back to his farm, on which 
 there is a mortgage. 
 
 His oldest child is a 90 kiddie. 
 
 Shell does not expect to see another birthday. 
 "I am getting old now," was his explanation. 
 
 Shell is exhibiting himself at a fair here, and 
 will use the money derived in paying off the 
 mortgage, he said. 
 
 Shell was first married at the age of 19, and 
 lived with his first wife for more than ninety 
 years. He lived seventy-five years in one house. 
 He is the father of twenty-nine children, the 
 oldest now being more than 90 years of age. Say 
 now what do you think of the "Feelosofers" who 
 pooh, pooh at heredity, and tell us there is noth- 
 ing in it? Eh? Don't you think they are "off en 
 their nut?" Honest now, don't you? 
 
 I feel prompted to butt in here a little with 
 a suggestion that comes to me as I copy the 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 77 
 
 record. Shell married at 19; very young, you 
 say. Ya, my friend, very young ; but say, it saved 
 him from the damnable debauchery of promis- 
 cuous carnality which is the real cause of all our 
 wickedness, imbecilities, and the creators of the 
 Hell that this earth has developed. 
 
 AND HE DOES NOT LOOK HIS AGE A BIT ! ! 
 
 Six years ago he married again at the age of 
 125!! By his second wife he has one child, a 
 boy aged 5 years. 
 
 He was 74 during the Civil War. He was 
 born near Knoxville, Tenn., and was full grown 
 when the war of 1812 began. 
 
 He bears his age well. His mind is clear, and 
 his eyesight is far better than that of many men 
 still in their youth. 
 
 Now here is another extract about Mr. Shell 
 from the Associated Press, dated July 29, 1919: 
 "Louisville, July 29. The National Geographic 
 Society has been asked to investigate the claim 
 of John Shell, a mountaineer of Leslie County, 
 Kentucky, that he is 130 years old. Shell's neigh- 
 bors corroborate the statement concerning his 
 age. Shell has nine children. 
 
 He says the oldest is 90 years old. He is said 
 to have 200 descendants in his home section^ 
 several being great-great-grandchildren. 
 
 The mountaineer, who claims excellent eye- 
 sight, steady nerves, and general good health, 
 attributes his long life to outdoor living and 
 temperate habits. 
 
 My readers will please notice that I am quot- 
 ing from actual history, and introducing no 
 guesses of my own. The very accomplished, and 
 very capable Secretary of the Centenarian Club, 
 has supplied me with a mass of clippings from 
 which I am making extracts. I have also three 
 
78 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 large scrap books full of such clippings of my 
 own selection. I make no guessing in this book: 
 "Efficiency of Life at 100 Years, and Over." 
 
 Now I give you from the same lady a true 
 account of the achievements of the most wonder- 
 ful, strenuous life, and superhuman accomplish- 
 ments of the most brilliant, and superhumanly 
 endowed man that has ever existed on this planet 
 in any clime, or period of its marvellous existence. 
 I refer to Dr. J. M. Peebles, Honorable President 
 of our Centenarian Club. 
 
 James Martin Peebles was born March 23, 
 1822, at the old homestead in Whittingham, Ver- 
 mont. He was the oldest surviving child of a 
 family of seven children. James was not more 
 than 6 years old when he went to school to his 
 uncle, Dr. Corbitt Peebles. Being active and 
 restless and willing to amuse his playmate, he 
 received many reprimands. 
 
 After finishing school, at the age of 16 he 
 taught his first school. 
 
 His parents moved to Smithville, Chenango 
 County, New York. Here, under the tuition of 
 Prof. Hulburt, he was cured of stammering, which 
 was a great joy to him, and caused a rapid de- 
 velopment of his natural exuberance. 
 
 He taught at Upper Lisle, N. Y., for several 
 terms, and attended Oxford Academy in 1842. 
 He also included medicine among his other studies 
 and graduated from the Philadelphia University 
 of Medicine and Surgery. 
 
 James was a constant attendant of the Uni- 
 versalist Church, studied for the ministry, and 
 preached his first sermon in McLean, N. Y. He 
 was made the pastor, and remained there five 
 years. 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 79 
 
 Then at Kellogsville three years. In 1853 and 
 1855 he was pastor at Elmira, N. Y. In 1850 he 
 married Mary McConky, a teacher in the Clinton 
 Liberal Schools Institute. Three chlidren died 
 in infancy. 
 
 In 1856 he resigned the pulpit and went to 
 Battle Creek, Mich., where he founded a Sana- 
 tarium, based on the "Nature Cure," and was 
 very successful, but after about four years of 
 labor his own health gave way and, on New Year's 
 day, 1860, he sailed from New York on steamer 
 ArieL via Isthmus of Panama, and landed in San 
 Francisco March 25, 1861. 
 
 To him, this was a new world, for the western 
 coast is entirely unlike the eastern. The free- 
 dom and independence of the western coast is 
 unknown in the eastern. 
 
 After a year and a half in California he re- 
 turned to Battle Creek, Mich. In 1867, aged 45, 
 Dr. Peebles had been in Battle Creek six years, 
 and had lectured in every State of the Union save 
 three. 
 
 In 1867 Dr. and Mrs. Peebles moved to Ham- 
 mington, New Jersey. 
 
 In 1866 he was editor of the Banner of Light, 
 and wrote several books. 
 
 The Doctor has held very important pro-con- 
 sular positions in the service of the United States. 
 He has made five journeys round the world. He 
 has written a library, which if a man will read 
 and digest, he will know everything knowable on 
 earth or in the Universe. With the Bible, and 
 Peebles' books, no man needs any other teaching 
 to become possessed of all truth, social, political, 
 scientific, and religious, that is possible for man 
 to know in this "Karma!" 
 
80 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 And yet, with all this wonderful achievement, 
 the good and great Doctor has had his reverses 
 and disappointments. In 1892 he purchased a 
 sanitarium in San Antonio, Tex. While the Doc- 
 tor was absent this fine structure was destroyed 
 by fire. His magnificent library and treasures 
 of art perished in the flames. The loss amounted 
 to about $50,000, and he was now 72 years of age. 
 Rather a tough experience to attack a man at 72, 
 now don't you* think so? Eh? Yet the good 
 Doctor, unhorsed, but not conquered, started in 
 again. See? I think he is a wonderful example 
 of the power of Faith. Now I don't mean meta- 
 physical or speculative faith. I mean the real, 
 genuine thing which holds on where it cannot 
 see, and accomplishes the apparently impossible. 
 
 Now we will allow Dr. Peebles himself to tell 
 us "how he did it." 
 
 "My age is the result of my unbounded faith 
 in God, in the Eternal Christ of God; in the 
 ministry of Angels, and in the brotherhood of 
 humanity; together with a persistent will power, 
 determined life purposes, constant cheerfulness, 
 frequent bathing, deep breathing, vigorous mental 
 and physical activities, and the strict avoidance 
 of animal flesh eating, tobacco, and such stim- 
 ulants as liquors, wine, tea, and coffee." 
 
 Now I think this is a good place to record the 
 testimony of twelve Centenarians who, at their 
 meeting tell how to live 100 years. This is the 
 testimony of the men who have done it Hence, 
 there is no philosophical speculation about it. 
 Nor is there any speculative dreaming. I quote 
 from the Newspaper reporter. 
 
 "How to live a century, and grow old grace- 
 fully," the motto of the Southern California Cen- 
 tenarian Club, was told yesterday afternoon by 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 81 
 
 twelve members of the organization, in a meet- 
 ing at Christophers, 551 South Broadway, Los 
 Angeles. 
 
 All agreed that Faith in God is a vital prin- 
 ciple involved, and different groups agreed on 
 other things; but it was evident from the indi- 
 vidual testimony of the members, each of whom 
 is 90, or more, that one may grow old gracefully, 
 and either use tobaccoo, or shun it; taboo intox- 
 icants or take a little wine for his stomach's sake ; 
 eat meat, or subsist wholly on a vegetable regi- 
 men ; forget the past, or indulge in reminiscences ; 
 or do, or not do quite a number of other things, 
 without forfeiting the probability of attaining 
 the Century mark." 
 
 REV. DAVID J. HIGGINS: "To be well 
 born is the first essential. If not, take a firm 
 grip upon your own life. Keep your body clean, 
 if you want a clean mind ,and a clean soul. 
 
 Adopt a healthful diet, and be master of your 
 appetite. Take as much care of your mind, and 
 soul, as of your body. Keep your mind active. 
 Feed it with high thoughts. Forget the past. 
 Practice the presence of God. Never say die." 
 
 Dr. Andrew M. Morrison: "Laughing has 
 been the chief cause of my present age. I read 
 in the Bible that the Almighty sometimes laughed. 
 If possible, choose your parentage. 
 
 Revere woman, and respect her. Work hard. 
 Never eat two starches, or two proteids at the 
 same meal. Eat only one of each at one meal. 
 And say, don't eat the last bite. Just leave a 
 little space unfilled. Hear me." 
 
 Cornelius Cole: "The Southern California 
 climate is of great importance. In my own case, 
 my early belief in living a regular life had a 
 great deal to do with it. But about this climate : 
 
82 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 I remember old Juan Moreno, who used to live 
 down where Santa Monica is now. He was 112 
 when he came to the city, where the excesses of 
 urban existence shortened his life." 
 
 W. C. Hindman: "I never have gambled, 
 caroused, or drank. I have been careful about 
 my diet. I never eat a hearty supper, and im- 
 mediately* go to bed. I have obeyed the dictates 
 of my conscience. I have allied myself neither 
 with the Church, nor with Fraternal Orders. I 
 stand on my own opinion. I haven't taken med- 
 icine for eight years. Then I was in an accident, 
 and lost my sight. Now my sight is returning. ,, 
 
 REV. STEPHEN TAFT, (90 years) : "My 
 mother's teachings were my greatest blessings. 
 She pledged me to sobriety, and to treat all girls 
 as I would want other young men to treat my 
 sisters. , 
 
 I early promised God that the purpose of my 
 life would be to make the world better. I thought 
 of troubles and sorrows only as long as I could 
 get benefit from them. I owe my age to giving 
 myself up to the service of man, and God — it has 
 made my life rich." 
 
 NEVER WORRIES; EATS POTATOES 
 MRS. J. F. HOWARD, (91) : "I have always 
 enjoyed good health, excepting one hard sickness. 
 I can eat nearly everything in the vegetable line, 
 and am particularly fond of Irish potatoes. I 
 drink very little tea and coffee — generally hot 
 water. I have had some sorrow and trouble, but 
 never believed in worry." 
 
 HE NEVER SOWED HIS WILD OATS 
 Testimony of REV. P. C. PRUGH, (93) : "I 
 attribute my long life to my parents. As a child 
 they gave me to the Lord in baptism. I have 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 83 
 
 never sowed my wild oats. I have a good stomach. 
 I took the Teetotaler's pledge at the age of 16. 
 I never use tobacco. I have tried to be like my 
 Father. I have lived a great deal in the past. 
 I have kept the ten commandments." 
 
 MAKING OTHERS HAPPY, HIS JOY 
 STURGES SELLECK (93) : "My advanced 
 age is due, I think, chiefly to my ancestors who 
 were healthy, with no hereditary disease to 
 shorten life. I have led a quiet domestic life, kept 
 regular habits; ate whatever I wanted, and 
 digested whatever I ate. My greatest delight is 
 to make others happy, and by so doing, increase 
 my own happiness. I never worry, and I sleep 
 all night." 
 
 WAS WELL BORN AND WELL REARED 
 JAS. P. GALICK, (91) : "I give chief credit 
 for my longevity to the fact that I was well born, 
 and well reared. I have been temperate in all 
 things, never having indulged in intoxicants or 
 tobacco. But I have eaten my three square meals 
 a day. I always sleep well. I have been honest 
 in all my dealings, have lived a clean, wholesome 
 and happy life, and am at peace with the world." 
 
 HE NEVER ABUSED A GOOD STOMACH 
 A. A. ANNIS, (95) : "Milk, and fresh air, and 
 coarse bread for me. I never use liquor or to- 
 bacco. I was born with a good stomach, which 
 has much to do with long life, and I have never 
 abused that stomach since I was a boy, and ate 
 green apples. I like to walk a great deal. My 
 life has been even." 
 
 J. H. F. JARCHOW: "Climate and fresh air 
 have much to do with living long. Never over- 
 eat. Never overwork. Follow the golden rule. 
 
SU . EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 I do not eat meat, but I smoke if I want to, and 
 I take a little wine, and beer if I desire them, but 
 I never get drunk. I tried milk, but it didn't 
 agree with me." 
 
 After each number had voiced his opinion on 
 Longevity, and the aids thereto a vote was taken 
 on several matters. Tobacco was opposed by 
 eleven, and favored by one. Intoxicants were 
 frowned upon, while a little wine or beer received 
 the support of one. Seven favored coffee and 
 tea, while five opposed them. Five favored meat, 
 and seven voted against it. On deep breathing 
 one voted favorably, while the others voiced 
 sentiments for breathing "naturally." 
 
 The vote was unanimous for "not worrying" 
 but trusting in God for mental and physical 
 activity, and for the climate of Southern Cali- 
 fornia. 
 
 Now, gentle reader, I have given you a mul- 
 tiplicity of testimony from the mouths of men 
 and women still in the flesh who have accom- 
 plished the supposed impossible feat of living 
 100 years in the enjoyment of health, and vital 
 power. I do this to destroy the Psychology whose 
 hypnotic falsehood has associated mental and 
 physical degeneration with years. Don't you do 
 it, my son and daughter. Remember that as a 
 man thinketh in his heart, so is he. 
 
 Now having given you the opinions and prac- 
 tices of so many Centenarians, I will proceed to 
 lay before you the science of Longevity, which 
 I elaborated for myself. But first I think good 
 to present to you a Newspaper graviture of my 
 modest self. The article was published in "The 
 Los Angeles Record," and is from the pen of 
 that encyclopedia of wisdom, Cynthia Grey. 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 85 
 
 Now here it is. It is headed by a picture of 
 my juvenile self arrayed in official garments as 
 Bishop, and adorned with all the mysteries of 
 modern art. "If you would like to be 99, hale, 
 hearty, and happy — 
 
 "Never eat more than two kinds of food at 
 a time. Make no "never minds" if your supper 
 is entirely a minus quantity. Sleep nine hours 
 in every twenty-four. Keep the wrinkles out of 
 your soul, and your face will stay smooth. Work 
 ten or twelve hours a day, and walk as much as 
 shoe leather will permit. If you have any choice, 
 be born and bred in a mud hut, where oatmeal 
 porridge abounds, rather than in a home where 
 varieties of food stare you out of countenance 
 every time you sit down to table. Behave your- 
 self." Something very much like this only in 
 his own witty Irish mode is the menu Dr. Andrew 
 M. Morrison gives for the 99-year-old program. 
 
 Who is he? What is he? The epitome of 
 self which he writes under his photo, when pre- 
 senting to friends is this: "Andrew Malcolm 
 Morrison, Bishop of the Church of Faith, Chap- 
 lain Home Guards, Half Century Association, 
 author, lecturer, preacher, IRISH! Born June 
 4, 1820. He is neither wheezy, nor short stepped, 
 and is going in for 150 years." 
 
 "There's nothing in the trick of living," ac- 
 cording to Dr. Morrison, "except living right." 
 
 Not to know the meaning of age when most 
 folks are mouldering in their graves, is just the 
 natural result of knowing how not to eat. "I can 
 walk 25 miles today," said Dr. Morrison, "with- 
 out fatigue. I can do ten or twelve hours mental 
 work without any inconvenience to myself. If 
 I were giving rules of longevity I would say: 
 Be careful what you put into your stomach. 
 
86 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 Don't eat more than two kinds of food at a meal. 
 Make supper the unimportant meal of the day. 
 Here is a sample of one day's menu in Dr. Mor- 
 rison's home: Breakfast: Dish of oatmeal por- 
 ridge; then piece of bread and butter; cup of 
 cocoa, or coffee, as suits the whim. Dinner : 12 
 o'clock, or thereabouts; cup of buttermilk, Irish 
 potatoes, baked, and any other vegetable desired, 
 raw ; fruit of all kinds and every kind, as selected. 
 Supper: Cup of cocoa or buttermilk, and a slice 
 of bread and butter. "I usually retire about 
 10:30," explains Dr. Morrison. "I sleep without 
 turning till 7 :30. Sleep is the greatest rejuvenator 
 in the world." 
 
 "I cannot lay too much emphasis on the neces- 
 sity of people eating carefully, and frugally. 
 Most of the wickedness in the world comes from 
 people stuffing their stomachs with poisons. 
 When I was a youngster I lived as one of a 
 large family in a peasant home. We had oatmeal 
 porridge and a pint of buttermilk for breakfast; 
 Irish potatoes and buttermilk for dinner, with 
 some garden vegetable and fruit; Irish porridge 
 and buttermilk for supper, day in and day out. 
 It wasn't what we wanted, but it was all we 
 could have. And it made us clean and strong." 
 Dr. Morrison is as active now as he ever was. 
 He has recently issued a magazine. He writes 
 for periodicals. He takes an active part in the 
 Half Century Association. "I am going in for 
 150 years," he often says. "And as I don't know 
 what age means, I don't see anything to stop me 
 reaching it." Seeing, and talking with Dr. Mor- 
 rison is like scenting a breath of old-time gal- 
 lantry, and sighting a vision of the perennial 
 spring of youth." Ha, ha! Say, now honest, 
 isn't that good for Cynthia? And now to my 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 87 
 
 own summing up, and arrangement of the scien- 
 tific principles and practices by which life is con- 
 served and prolonged on earth, recognizing the 
 inexplicable law, that life is indestructible, I 
 shall so do under the heading, RUACH KAIYIM. 
 The Hebrew terms, mean Spirit of Life. 
 
 And now, before presenting my own sum- 
 ming up of what I consider the laws of Longevity, 
 I present you with the "topnotcher." I quote 
 from the Los Angeles Daily Times of May 16th, 
 1921 : "Aged Turk is still healthy. Human Pack 
 Horse is 147 years old. Has always been carrier 
 of heavy weights. Attributes Long Life to hard 
 work, proper diet, etc." 
 
 Constantinople, April 28th, 1921. "ZORA, 
 'the human pack horse/ who claims to be 147 
 years old, and still can carry 200 pounds with 
 ease, attributes his long life and health to hard 
 work and proper diet. He has always been a 
 carrier of heavy weights. 
 
 His rules of health are: Hard work, sleep, 
 cold baths at night, no tobacco, no alcohol, no 
 coffee, no meat, no oils, no butter, no drinking 
 water, but plenty of honey, hot tea, sugar, cakes, 
 bread and cheese, particularly buttermilk, or 
 clabber. Every five years he takes a three 
 months' rest in his native home in the country. 
 
 Whatever his age, Zora is a picture of health 
 and physical vigor; mentally alert, benign, and 
 frequently blessing the curious American sailors 
 who visit him at his favorite cafe on the Galata 
 water front. 
 
 He is 5 feet. 10 inches tall, deep breasted, and 
 has the carriage of a sheik. He is almost bald; 
 his face is long, and covered with a shiny nut- 
 brown skin. 
 
88 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 His eyesight and memory are good, and he 
 recalls the days when the first steamship came 
 to Constantinople. He says he worked as a 
 peasant at Bitlis until the age of 37, when he 
 went to Constantinople to work at the Turkish 
 Arsenal, and that he worked there for years. 
 
 Zora has been married four times. All of 
 his wives are dead, and all of his children but 
 two. His son, Osman, aged 97, being in poor 
 health, recently returned to Bitlis. His daughter, 
 Gouli Hanem, aged 60, is married, and healthy. 
 Zora's father died at the age of 76, and his mother 
 at the age of 83. 
 
 Zora isn't rich, because of so many expenses 
 in caring for his family. He lives in a Kurd 
 Khan, where he pays a dollar and a half a month 
 for a place to sleep, and for hot water to make 
 his tea!" Well, I swan. Wish I was thar. 
 America has developed the Profiteer so that life 
 for a poor man is impossible, "da ye see, ma 
 frens?" 
 
 "What I want is work," declared Zora. "Idle- 
 ness will ruin my health. I'll pray all my life 
 for him who giveth me work. Health, happiness 
 and wisdom come from work only." 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 RUACH KAIYIM 
 
 (SPIRIT OF LIFE) 
 
 The Patriarchs were dashing young fellows 
 during periods of life measuring several * cen- 
 turies. But now the years of human life are 
 limited to a few dozen. Whence the change? It 
 cannot be attributed to the Fall, as the "Fall," 
 so-called, happened in Eden, and the Patriarchs 
 did not appear on the scene till long after that 
 catastrophe "brought death into the world, and 
 all our woe." It cannot be attributed to any 
 change in the constitution of man, for those gay 
 young centenarians ate and drank, slept and 
 worked, loved and hated just as we do. If the 
 record of their years is true there is certainly a 
 mighty falling off in the ability of man to retain 
 possession of his outer earthly casing, commonly 
 called the body. 
 
 Now we are not of those who defy death, yet 
 die all the same. We think it good that the car- 
 cass should be cast off some time, but we do say 
 that it might be kept in good working order dur- 
 ing 100 years or more. We believe that 100 
 years is a fair average of human earthly life, 
 and believe that this average can be easily at- 
 tained by the average citizen. Of course we 
 exclude Mahatmas and Adepts and the "I am's" 
 who "galifugle" along during thousands of years, 
 and have no occupation, neither the comfort of 
 intercourse and a neighborly chat with their 
 
90 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 friends. They are too uncanny for every-day 
 business — but that the ordinary citizen might 
 enjoy life to 100 years is, in our opinion, easily 
 possible and to "shuffle off this mortal coil" before 
 that time is really reprehensible. 
 
 We will in these few pages reveal the secret 
 of how it may be done, and if this secret is faith- 
 fully lived universally, a few generations will not 
 find any who has not filled his days. "There shall 
 be no more thence an infant of days nor an old 
 man that hath not filled his days: for the child 
 shall die an hundred years old; but the sinner 
 being an hundred years old shall be accursed." 
 Isa. 65:20. 
 
 BODY BUILDING 
 
 Every man builds his own body, just as every 
 house is builded by some man, but he that built 
 all things is God. Now there are some very 
 wretched houses. These demonstrate the un- 
 skilled carpenter. There are, without question, 
 some very wretched bodies. These demonstrate 
 the ignorant botchery in body building of their 
 owners. And altho God built all things he is in 
 no degree responsible for the caricatures pro- 
 duced by his employes. He supplies perfect ma- 
 terials. The "awkward squad" using them 
 produce an "eye-sore" where there should be a 
 thing of beauty. God in the future must be 
 relieved of the responsibility of having directly 
 produced the mis-shapen organizations of men 
 and the wasp-waist woman, as well as the "self- 
 made" man. Every man is his own body-builder 
 and must select his own materials for the work. 
 Now let us help you in the selection of material 
 and also give you a little instruction as to how 
 to use the material when selected. Now remem- 
 bering that man is a tripartite organization, con- 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 91 
 
 sisting of a body, soul and spirit, let us examine 
 the materials for building and sustaining the 
 structure. The most important and essential of 
 these is 
 
 BREATH 
 
 Inspiration is breathing in. Without this 
 inspiration life cannot manifest itself on the 
 physical plane. Hence in breath there is spirit 
 which sustains the spirit. Also there is material 
 which builds up the body, and this material which 
 builds up the body is modified and deposited ac- 
 cording to the intelligence of the spirit which 
 controls it and which is the real body builder, for 
 the spirit builds and takes care of its own house. 
 
 The first mention we have of life declares 
 that it is breath. "And the Lord God formed 
 man out of the dust of the ground and breathed 
 into his nostrils the breath of life, and man be- 
 came a living soul." Gen. 2:7. By the word of 
 the Lord were the heavens made; and all the 
 host of them by the breath of his mouth. Psal. 
 33. 
 
 And when he had said this he breathed on 
 them and saith unto them, Receive ye the Holy 
 Ghost. John 20 :22. 
 
 Few people know how to breathe, fewer still 
 put their knowledge to daily practice. And yet 
 on breathing depends, in large measure, the 
 health, strength and purity of the whole man, 
 body, soul and spirit. Length of days, freedom 
 from disease, and spiritual inspiration are the 
 rewards of the faithful practice of right breath- 
 ing. 
 
 The breath, besides spirit, contains oxygen, 
 which is the great sustainer of animal life and 
 the great purifier. The oxygen burns up all the 
 impurities in the blood which in the lungs are 
 
92 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 exposed to the inbreathed air for this very pur- 
 pose. No blood purifier is equal to oxygen. 
 Therefore use plenty of it. 
 
 Now you need practical instructions in breath- 
 ing, and here they are: 
 
 1st. In the morning sit down quietly facing 
 the east. Rest your hands quietly on your knee, 
 close the lips, and through the nostrils draw in 
 the breath slowly until the lungs are well inflated. 
 Hold it there for a short time and then slowly 
 exhale. At one sitting do this say a dozen times. 
 
 2nd. When through with this exercise stiffen 
 each muscle of your body as you see a cat do 
 when she stretches herself. 
 
 3rd. Take a full breath and hold it, then by 
 rapid contraction of the abdominal muscles, force 
 this compressed air into all the interior organs. 
 You thus strengthen and purify all the organs 
 in the abdominal and pelvic cavities and they will 
 last and perform their duties many years longer 
 than if you neglect these exercises. 
 
 Perform all these exercises at least three times 
 daily. If you do, you will have no lung, no liver, 
 no kidney troubles and wont need a solitary dose 
 either of Pink Pills or Swamp Root. Frequently 
 during the day take a full breath. 
 
 4th. While sitting breathing, connect your- 
 self with God by such a mental expression as 
 this, "God breathes into me the breath of Life. 
 I am inhaling abundant life, my inheritance from 
 my Father's limitless bounty." Any such expres- 
 sion as will cause you to realize God's presence, 
 love and power. 
 
 It is hardly necessary to remind you that this 
 air in which you perform your breathing exer- 
 cises will undoubtedly cure any case of consump- 
 tion in the first stage, and any case of asthma, 
 or bronchitis. 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 93 
 
 THE SKIN 
 
 Is not the least important organ of the man. 
 It works like the other organs by action of the 
 spirit. It is both an absorbing and excreting 
 organ. It absorbs material from the air out of 
 which the spirit works up structure. It excretes 
 the used up material, and casts out the ashes of 
 life's furnaces so that injurious and poisonous 
 matter may not accumulate in the body and pro- 
 duce disease. It is a most important organ and 
 needs to be kept in good working order. 
 
 In an average sized man there are about 
 2,500,000 little tubes in the skin called pores. 
 These are the outlets for the poisonous exudates 
 which are being continually formed in the pro- 
 cess of building. It is manifest that we must 
 see that nothing hinders these little busy workers ; 
 as they are sewers to run off very poisonous filth. 
 We must then keep the skin not only clean, but 
 also in good working order. To do this a good 
 rough rubbing first, a sponge (cold) next, and 
 the active use of the rough towel night and morn- 
 ing is the best general skin exercise. The sweat 
 bath is useful — at times. The long bath seldom, 
 but the nude body should be exposed for at least 
 half an hour weekly to the action of sun and air. 
 These are the best skin stimulants. Nothing 
 better to stimulate and keep the skin in order 
 than a minute or two of the short forced com- 
 pressed air breathing as described in "breathing." 
 Try it and see if you don't soon start a sensible 
 perspiration. 
 
 PHYSICAL EXERCISE 
 
 If you work you don't need any special exer- 
 cise. As a general exercise there is nothing 
 better than walking. I am writing for ordinary 
 mankind, not for "freaks" or athletes. 
 
94 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 FOOD 
 
 Out of the food we eat the spirit takes up 
 certain elements out of which to build up soul 
 and body. We should therefore present the best 
 materials to the invisible worker that he may- 
 be able to erect the best structure. It is not 
 possible, having regard to the infinite variety in 
 nature to lay down anything like a general class- 
 ification of what kind of food is "wholesome" or 
 not. One eateth herbs. Let every man be fully 
 persuaded in his own mind, and there is a very 
 strong probability that each will instinctively 
 select the best dietary for himself. Personally I 
 don't think meat the best food — especially the 
 hog. The first food given to man was the green 
 herb, and fruit, etc. This seemed to support life 
 pretty well. The starvelings, fed thusly, lived 
 in vigorous health up to pretty near the thousand 
 mile stone. That they were vigorous is proved 
 by the record. They lived hundreds of years 
 "begat sons and daughters and died." The pre- 
 sumption here is in favor of vegetarianism as 
 the food of longevity. There is no such record 
 when we come to the meat eating period. See? 
 
 Well, if we are not able to positively say what 
 you should eat, we can help out a good deal on 
 how you should eat. There is quite a lot in it 
 that is practical and useful, and better than all 
 scientific — not metaphysical. 
 
 Now let us see. The saliva is a secretion 
 which performs the first act of digestion in the 
 mouth. The morsel should be masticated until 
 it is thoroughly saturated with the digestive 
 fluid of the mouth. It will then swallow easy, 
 and be in real good condition to be properly 
 acted upon by the gastric juice in the stomach, 
 and the stomach digestion will go on nicely with- 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 95 
 
 out any pain or trouble. Now if you wash this 
 mouthful down with a fluid of any kind you rob 
 it of its proper amount of digestive ferment, 
 and the work will not go on properly. Besides 
 the fluid, pouring down into the stomach, dilutes 
 and weakens the gastric juice, and soon dyspepsia, 
 and constipation, and piles, and bilious fever, 
 and chills, and liver, kidneys, and sick headache, 
 and jaundice, and 1001 evils attack you which 
 you find more powerful in their tenacity than all 
 the pills, and capsules, and powders, and boluses 
 
 that you can swallow. You played the 
 
 when you began swallowing a mouthful of fluid 
 with a bite. Quit it, good boy, and use only 
 nature's lubricant. You'll find no use for Dr. 
 Killem's calomel, nor for Dr. Switchem's Black 
 Draught (sic.) See? 
 
 Don't drink while eating. Hear me? Chew 
 good and hard, and for your life avoid the "bolt." 
 Now if you eat in that style you will find life a 
 joy forever. Don't exactly know whether three 
 set meals daily are necessary, but am perfectly 
 certain that no meal should have more than two 
 dishes, and that no person at any sitting should 
 eat the last bite. 
 
 DRINK? 
 Yes, I think so. The pure, rich distillation 
 from the bountiful breast of mother nature — 
 water, sparkling water. At least five pints of it 
 daily. Never till two hours after a meal, and 
 never to be swallowed in gulps! Slowly and in 
 sips. The water needs to be insalivated as well 
 as the food. How about hot water before meals? 
 Oh, I am not writing for invalids. What about 
 tea, coffee, etc. ? I have no opinion to offer. Pure, 
 sparkling, crystal water is nature's product for 
 
96 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 animal and vegetable thirst. You'll find it hard 
 to beat. 
 
 THE BATH 
 
 I've about said all I deem necessary on this 
 therapeutic agent, but there is a special internal 
 bath which I must recommend to your special 
 consideration. Get a good fountain syringe. 
 Heat water till comfortably warm. Lie down 
 some place. Insert the nozzle in the rectum and 
 flush out rectum and colon; use lots of water. 
 Do this once a week in health, and two or three 
 times a week when "poorly." There is always 
 danger of undigested and effete matter lodging 
 in the colon. This is absorbed into the system 
 and breeds disease. The hot water not only 
 flushes it out but also the moist heat gives 
 strength to the nerves which control the bowels. 
 This is the great secret out of which Dr. Hall 
 made about $1,000,000. I give it to you here 
 with other greater life secrets for a dollar ! Say. 
 Don't neglect this. 
 
 TOBACCO 
 
 I think in every case it is bad. Whatever 
 drug produces an appetite and craving for its 
 use lowers the nerve tone. The man who must 
 have tobacco in any form is already diseased. 
 Now I am no crank, but this is a simple physio- 
 logical fact. I would not use tobacco if I desired 
 the highest physical, mental, and spiritual man- 
 hood. The same principle applies to all narcotics. 
 DRUGS 
 
 All drugs are poisons to life, and their use 
 always injurious, without exception. 
 
 THE GENERATIVE FUNCTIONS 
 
 Procreation is the most awfully solemn, and 
 holy power of the race. On this plane we rival 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE . 97 
 
 the God-head. The responsibility of projecting 
 an immortal soul into eternal consciousness is 
 too stupendous to be lightly assumed. The special 
 machinery provided for this creation is the most 
 honorable and sacred of nature. To abuse this 
 holy organism is the most vile and enormous of 
 sins. It is to pollute and corrupt a race at the 
 fountain of its origin. Yet this is the great de- 
 basing and destructive sin of the age — aye of 
 almost all ages. To this sin may be attributed 
 all mis-shapen humanity and almost all the dis- 
 eases, murders, suicides, etc., which make a 
 tophet of this fair earth. The filthy stream, de- 
 scending through polluted channels, carries with 
 it the infernal corruption by which, through the 
 laws of heredity, God visits the sins of the fathers 
 on the children unto the third and fourth gener- 
 ation. The semen is a vital fluid whose waste 
 brings death. Unexpended it is worked back 
 into the system by absorption and gives strength, 
 and snap, and vigor to body and mind. It pro- 
 duces in the man a magnetism of rich, attractive 
 and curative power peculiar to itself. Those men 
 who retain this fluid without expending it in 
 carnal alliance are men of God-power. If you 
 will live long; if you will enjoy the highest life; 
 then use these organs only as nature intended, 
 for procreation alone. Any further use is a sin 
 against yourself, and against the coming man, 
 who must suffer the consequences of your grati- 
 fication of unholy passion, altho he was not able 
 to prevent, being then only a speck, undeveloped 
 in the great ocean of spirit life, which is con- 
 tinually projecting its parts to be individualized. 
 "Preserve your vessel in sanctification and honor." 
 
98 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 SLEEP 
 
 Don't expect to live long or be healthy with- 
 out abundance of "tired nature's sweet restorer." 
 Sleep is the food for brain cells, and the brain 
 is the worker. Don't rob him. You can't with 
 impunity take a few hours from the night to 
 lengthen the day. The practice will very ma- 
 terially shorten your own days. Eight to ten 
 hours nightly of good healthful sleep will make 
 the world skip for you. Take it. 
 
 PART II 
 
 THE MENTAL 
 
 Now having finished the physical, we come to 
 the spiritual, and mental hygiene. 
 
 Our spiritual nature connects us with God, 
 and brings us into the forces and powers of the 
 unseen. According to our own desire these forces 
 will be beneficial or injurious. There is a "Prince 
 of the Power of the Air, the Spirit that now 
 worketh in the children of disobedience." Ep. 
 2:3. There is a spirit of God that giveth life, 
 health, power to, and in all who desire. "God 
 is spirit." John 4:24. "It is the spirit that 
 quickeneth." John 6:63. 
 
 Now in obedience to the individual desire 
 these two antagonistic spirits will influence the 
 human spirit, and produce health or disease ac- 
 cording to which spirit is desired. For it is 
 desire that controls. Now if we desire the good 
 spirit, which is of God, here is the result : "God 
 that made the world and all things therein, see- 
 ing that he is Lord of heavens and earth, dwelleth 
 not in temples made with hands; neither is wor- 
 shipped with men's hands, as though he needed 
 anything, seeing he giveth to all life, and breath, 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 99 
 
 and all things; * * * For in him we live, 
 and move, and have our being; as certain also 
 of your own poets have said. For we are also 
 his offspring." Acts 17:24-28. Secure in the 
 power of God dwelling in us we cannot suffer 
 disease. If we do suffer disease it is always be- 
 cause of some disobedience. All laws of spiritual 
 health are natural, and are of God. By these 
 laws the spirit worketh in us all growth, health, 
 happiness. Violating these laws produces all sin, 
 disease, inharmony through which the spirit of 
 evil works in us the suffering by which we are 
 punished, and which suffering itself is designed 
 by the All Spirit, God, as a means of chastise- 
 ment that we may be restored. To be strong, 
 vigorous, let us walk in the spirit. This is ours 
 in answer to desire, which is prayer always ex- 
 pressing itself on the spiritual plane. Also be 
 sure that you have your closet, as Christ teaches 
 in Matt. 6:6. "Living in this spirit you cannot 
 be sick — save that you may be suffering in her- 
 edity for your ancestors' sins. And even this 
 God is able to overcome. "Because thou hast 
 made the Lord which is my refuge, even the 
 Most High, thy habitation, there shall no evil 
 befall thee, neither shall any plague come nigh 
 thy dwelling." Psalm 91 :9-10. Then breathe in 
 this spirit of God, pray for it, attract it by de- 
 sire, and faith in Jesus Christ in whom dwelleth 
 all the fullness of the God-head bodily. 
 
 This spirit is the real life. By it the tissues 
 are built up and the body made strong. It was 
 under the afflatus of the spirit that Sampson did 
 his wondrous feats of strength. Lying all around 
 you, awaiting your call, under the law of its own 
 action, is this spirit. Life limitless in boundless 
 oceans, awaits your call to fill up all your needs. 
 
100 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 In constant influx and efflux is this mighty life 
 sustaining all flesh. Breathe it in with every 
 breath in abundance, attract it by desire and use 
 it by thought. 
 
 MAGNETISM 
 is but the working of this spirit of life. In pro- 
 portion as you possess this subtle agent, in pro- 
 portion are you efficient. The brain is the great 
 store house of magnetism, which it distributes 
 to the body by the nerves. To be magnetic you 
 must faithfully carry out the rules of living laid 
 down in this book and in a short time you will 
 possess all the magnetism you can use. Mag- 
 netism is a force, therefore motion, and hence 
 vibratory, as force or motion is by vibration. 
 There is no death in all God's universe. Nothing 
 is standing still. There is no reservoir of pent 
 up magnetism in you or in any other. You are 
 merely a conductor through which it passes. In 
 continuous influx and outflow, this mysterious 
 life-bearer and form creator works in you and 
 in all animate, vegitate, and mineral nature. In 
 each, working after its kind. You draw it from 
 the sun, the clouds, the air, the earth, and all 
 your environments. You part with it to these 
 in turn. The inflow and outflow are continuous. 
 In order to be efficiently magnetic you must know 
 how to think. 
 
 THINKING 
 Thought is the origin and sustainer of all 
 force. Nothing without thought. Thought is 
 the creator out of which all things spring. No 
 instrument, no fabric, no structure, no form 
 which did not exist first in idea, before it assumed 
 substance and became tangible on the physical 
 plane. By thought, human character and nature 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 101 
 
 are builded. As a man thinketh in his heart, so 
 is he." By thought the universe is All that the 
 eye can see, the ear hear, or the hand touch is 
 the product of thought. "Through faith we un- 
 derstand that the worlds were framed by the 
 word (thought) of God, so that things which are 
 seen were not made of things which do appear." 
 
 Thought is spirit creating. So that thoughts 
 are things, living things, immortal things, im- 
 perishable things. Thought rules, governs, com- 
 pels, impels, builds up, pulls down, destroys and 
 creates. It is the active force of omnipotence. 
 "The words that I speak unto you, they are spirit 
 and they are life." — Christ. 
 
 Now in order to long life, to health, to com- 
 fort, to happiness, you must train your will, so 
 that you can command your thinking. You must 
 control and direct your thinking. It must not 
 you. As the controller you are master; as the 
 controlled you are a slave. 
 
 The health and life are controlled by thought. 
 Just think for a moment how gloom, and grief, 
 and worry depress, and finally wear out life. 
 How many people die of grief? Think of the 
 power of thought when in multitudes of cases it 
 produces instantaneous death, and in millions 
 death by the slow process of disintegration. You 
 know that thousands of people have died instantly 
 of fright, shock, grief, the result of sudden thought 
 bringing to their consciousness, news which even 
 may not have been true. Yet the thought work- 
 ing by faith, killed the physical organism. Sim- 
 ilarly joy, sudden, ecstatic, has slain its thousands. 
 
 You Must Train Your Will to Command Your 
 Emotions, and You Must Steadily Reject all 
 Thoughts of Gloomy, or Unsuccessful, or Disease 
 character or coloring, and fill, and Surround your- 
 

 102 EFFICIENCY OF LIFE 
 
 self with Thought of Health, Life Cheerfulness, 
 Happiness, Success, Triumph. If you do this you 
 will never be sick. You Cannot Be Sick, for 
 thought Creates all Things, Including Sickness, 
 and Health, and is Omnipotent. 
 
 Preserve a placid temper; a fit of anger will 
 poison every secretion, and disease the whole 
 man. Fill your whole being with love. God is 
 Love. Forgive those who sin against you. Love 
 your enemies, bless them that curse you. Thus 
 in the spirit of harmony, which is the spirit 
 of God, you shall enjoy the tranquillity of heaven, 
 the immortality of spirit, and the exhilarations 
 of perfect health, while the increasing years will 
 bring ripeness, as the glory dawns, and you will 
 pass upward full of years. 
 
 Daily, and constantly, give yourself health 
 treatments in the spirit. Assert your immortal 
 origin, possession. Say in faith, "I am spirit." 
 "I am the spirit of God individualized." "I am 
 sustained by the spirit of God." "Spirit is not 
 sick, therefore I am not sick, and cannot be." 
 "Spirit does not grow old, therefore I am not 
 old, and cannot be." Deny sickness and don't 
 permit the thought of disease to enter your mind. 
 The constant reiteration of these thoughts will 
 impress your own spirit, which is the active 
 servant of your will and, in its work of building, 
 the spirit will weave these thoughts into your 
 constitution, and you cannot be diseased, pro- 
 vided you carry out the principle of these asser- 
 tions in a life obedient to the laws of health and 
 purity. 
 
 Lastly in the silence of regualr meditation, 
 meet with, and put on God. "If ye abide in me 
 and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what 
 ye will, and it shall be done unto you." "Because 
 
EFFICIENCY OF LIFE W3 
 
 thou has made the Lord, which is my refuge, even 
 the Most High, thy habitation, there shall no 
 evil befall thee, neither shall any plague come 
 nigh thy dwelling." "With Long Life will I 
 satisfy him, and show him my salvation." 
 
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