Quit Your Worrying!, George Wharton James [most recommended books txt] 📗

id="id00651">I saw strong men weep with deep emotion at the procession of automobiles conveying the happy though generally silent throngs on one of these occasions, and "K.C.B." must have felt the showers of blessings that were sent in his direction from those who saw and appreciated his beautiful helpfulness.

There is nothing to hinder any man, woman, youth or maiden from doing exactly the same kind of thing, with the same spirit, and bringing a few hours of happiness to the needy, thus driving worry out of the mind, putting it hors de combat, so that it need never again rise from the field.

Every blind asylum, children's hospital, slum, old lady's home, old man's home, almshouse, poor-farm, work-house, insane asylum, prison, and a thousand other centers where the poor, needy, sick and afflicted gather, has its lonely hearts that long for cherishing, aching brows that need to be soothed, pain to be alleviated; and there is no panacea so potent in removing the worries of our own life as to engage earnestly in removing the positive and active ills of others.

People occasionally ask me if I have any hobby that has helped me ward off the attacks of worry. I do not believe I have ever answered this question as fully as I might have done, so I will attempt to do so now. One of my first hobbies was food reform and hygienic living. When I was little more than twelve years of age I became a vegetarian and for nine years lived the life pretty rigorously. I have always believed that simpler, plainer living than most of us indulge in, more open air life, sleeping, working, living out of doors, more active, physical exercise of a useful character, would be beneficial. Then I became a student of memory culture. Professor William Stokes of the Royal Polytechnic Institution became my friend, and for years I studied his system of Mnemonics, or as it was generally termed "Artificial Memory." Then I taught it for a number of years, and evolved from it certain fundamental principles upon which I have largely based the cultivation of my own memory and mentality, and for which I can never be sufficiently thankful. Then I desired to be a public speaker. I became a "hobbyist" on pronunciation, enunciation, purity of voice, phrasing and getting the thought of my own mind in the best and quickest possible way into the minds of others. For years I kept a small book in which I jotted down every word, its derivation and full meaning with which I was not familiar. I studied clear enunciation by the hour; indeed as I walked through the streets I recited to myself, aloud, so that I could hear my own enunciation, such poems as Southey's Cataract of Lodore, where almost every word terminates in "ing." For I had heard many great English and American speakers whose failure to pronounce this terminal "ing" in such words as coming, going, etc., used to distress me considerably. Other exercises were the catches, such as "Peter Piper picks a peck of pickled peppers," or "Selina Seamstich stitches seven seams slowly, surely, serenely and slovenly," or "Around a rugged rock a ragged rascal ran a rural race." Then, too, Professor Stokes had composed a wonderful yarn about the memory, entitled "My M-made memory medley, mentioning memory's most marvelous manifestations." This took up as much as three or four pages of this book, every word beginning with m. It was a marvelous exercise for lingual development. He also had "The Far-Famed Fairy Tale of Fenella," and these were constantly and continuously recited, with scrupulous care as to enunciation. My father was an old-time conductor of choral and oratorio societies, and was the leader of a large choir. I had a good alto voice and under his wise dicipline it was cultivated, and I was a certificated reader of music at sight before I was ten years old. Then I taught myself to play the organ, and before I was twenty I was the organist and choir-master of one of the largest Congregational churches of my native town, having often helped my father in the past years to drill and conduct oratorios such as The Messiah, Elijah, The Creation, etc. When I began to speak in public the only special instruction I had for the cultivation of the voice was a few words from my father to this effect: Stand before the looking-glass and insist that your face appear pleasant and agreeable. Speak the sentence you wish to hear. Listen to your own voice, you can tell as well as anyone else whether its sound is nasal, harsh, raucous, disagreeable, affected, or in any way displeasing or unnatural. Insist upon a pure, clear, natural, pleasing tone, and that's all there is to it. When you appear before an audience speak to the persons at the further end of the hall and if they can hear you don't worry about anyone else. Later, when I had become fairly launched as a public speaker, he came to visit me, and when I appeared on my platform that night I found scattered around on the floor, where none could see them but myself, several placards upon which he had printed in easily-read capitals: Don't shout—keep cool. Avoid ranting. Make each point clear. Don't ramble, etc.

When I was about fourteen I took up phonography, or stenography as it is now known. This was an aid in reporting speeches, making notes, etc., but one of its greatest helps was in the matter of analysing the sounds of words thus aiding me in their clear enunciation.

At this time I was also a Sunday school teacher, and at sixteen years of age, a local preacher in the Methodist church. This led to my becoming an active minister of that denomination after I came to the United States, and for seven years I was as active as I knew how to be in the discharge of this work. In my desire to make my preaching effective and helpful I studied unweariedly and took up astronomy, buying a three inch telescope, and soon became elected to Fellowship in the Royal Astronomical Society of England. Then I took up microscopy, buying the fine microscope from Dr. Dallinger, President of the Royal Microscopical Society, with which he had done his great work on bacilli—and which, by-the-way, was later stolen from me—and I was speedily elected a Fellow of that distinguished Society. A little later Joseph Le Conte, the beloved geologist of the California State University, took me under his wing, and set me to work solving problems in geology, and I was elected, in due time, a Fellow of the Geological Society of England, a society honored by the counsels of such men as Tyndall, Murchison, Lyell, and all the great geologists of the English speaking world.

Just before I left the ministry, in 1889, I took up, with a great deal of zeal, the study of the poet Browning. I had already yielded to the charm of Ruskin—whom I personally knew—and Carlyle, but Browning opened up a new world of elevated thought to me, in which I am still a happy dweller. In seeking a new vocation I naturally gravitated towards several lines of thought and study, all of which have influenced materially my later life, and all of which I pursued with the devotion accorded only to hobbies. These were I: A deeper study of Nature, in her larger and manifestations, as the Grand Canyon of Arizona, the Petrified Forest, the Yosemite Valley, the Big Trees, the High Sierras, (with their snow-clad summits, glaciers, lakes, canyons, forests, flora and fauna), the Colorado and Mohave Deserts, the Colorado River, the Painted Desert, and the many regions upon which I have written books. II: The social conditions of the submerged tenth, which led to my writing of a book on The Dark Places of Chicago which was the stimulating cause of W.T. Stead's soul-stirring book If Christ Came to Chicago. Here was and is the secret of my interest in all problems dealing with social unrest, the treatment of the poor and sinful, etc., for I was Chaplain for two years of two homes for unfortunate women and girls. III. A deeper study of the Indians, in whom I had always been interested, and which has led to my several books on the Indians themselves, their Basketry, Blanketry, etc. IV. A more detailed study of the literature of California and the West, and also, V. A more comprehensive study of the development of California and other western states, in order that I might lecture more acceptably upon these facinating themes.

Here, then, are some of the hobbies that have made, and are making, my life what it is. I leave it to my readers to determine which has been the better—to spend my hours, days, weeks, months and years in getting my livelihood and worrying, or in providing for my family and myself, and spending all the spare time I had upon these many and varied hobbies, some of which have developed into my life-work. And I sincerely hope I shall be absolved from any charge of either self-glorification or egotism in this recital of personal experiences. At the time I was passing through them I had no idea of their great value. They were the things to which something within me bade me flee to find refuge from the worries that were destroying me, and it is because of their triumphant success that I now recount them, in the fervent desire that they may bring hope to despondent souls, give courage to those who are now wavering, uncertain and pessimistic, and thus rid them of the demons of fret and worry.

Now that I have come to my final words where all my final admonitions should be placed, I find I have little left to say, I have said it all, reader, in the chapters you have read (or skipped.) Indeed I have not so much cared to preach to you myself, as to encourage, incite you to do your own preaching. This is, by far, the most effective, permanent and lasting. Improvement can come only from within. A seed of desire may be sown by an outsider, but it must grow in the soil of your soul, be harbored, sheltered, cared for, and finally beloved by your own very self, before it will flower into new life for you. That you may possess this new life—a life of work, of achievement, of usefulness to others—is my earnest desire, and this can come only to its fullest fruition in those who have learned to QUIT WORRYING.

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