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As
A Man Thinketh, By James Allen
Chapter
3
Effects
Of Thoughts On Health And Body
The
body is the servant of the mind. It obeys the operations
of the mind, whether they be deliberately chosen or automatically
expressed. At the bidding of unlawful thoughts the body
sinks rapidly into disease and decay; at the command of
glad and beautiful thoughts it becomes clothed with youthfulness
and beauty.
Disease and health,
like circumstances, are rooted in thought. Sickly thoughts
will express themselves through a sickly body. Thoughts
of fear have been known to kill a man as speedily as a bullet
and they are continually killing thousands of people just
as surely though less rapidly. The people who live in fear
of disease are the people who get it. Anxiety quickly demoralizes
the whole body, and lays it open to the entrance of disease;
while impure thoughts, even if not physically indulged,
will sooner shatter the nervous system.
Strong pure, and happy
thoughts build up the body in vigor and grace. The body
is a delicate and plastic instrument, which responds readily
to the thoughts by which it is impressed, and habits of
thought will produce their own effects, good or bad, upon
it.
Men will continue to
have impure and poisoned blood, so long as they propagate
unclean thoughts. Out of a clean heart comes a clean life
and a clean body. Out of a defiled mind proceeds a defiled
life and a corrupt body. Thought is the fount of action,
life and manifestation; make the fountain pure, and all
will be pure.
Change of diet will
not help a man who will not change his thoughts. When a
man makes his thoughts pure, he no longer desires impure
food.
Clean thoughts make
clean habits. The so-called saint who does not wash his
body is not a saint. He who has strengthened and purified
his thoughts does not need to consider the malevolent.
If you would perfect
your body, guard your mind. If you would renew your body,
beautify your mind. Thoughts of malice, envy, and disappointment,
despondency, rob the body of its health and grace. A sour
face does not come by chance; it is made by sour thoughts.
Wrinkles that mar are drawn by folly, passion, pride.
I know a woman of ninety-six
who has the bright, innocent face of a girl. I know a man
well under middle age whose face is drawn into in harmonious
contours. The one is the result of a sweet and sunny disposition;
the other is the outcome of passion and discontent.
As you cannot have a
sweet and wholesome abode unless you admit the air and sunshine
freely into your rooms, so a strong body and a bright, happy,
or serene countenance can only result from the free admittance
into the mind of thoughts of joy and goodwill and serenity.
On the faces of the
aged there are wrinkles made by sympathy others by strong
and pure thought, and others are carved by passion; who
cannot distinguish them? With those who have lived righteously,
age is calm, peaceful, and softly mellowed, like the setting
sun. I have recently seen a philosopher on his death-bed.
He was not old except in years. He died as sweetly and peacefully
as he had lived.
There is no physician
like cheerful thought for dissipating the ills of the body;
there is no comforter to compare with goodwill for dispersing
the shadows of grief and sorrow. To live continually in
thoughs of ill-will, cynicism, suspicion, and envy, is to
be confined in a self-made prison hole. But to think well
of all, to be cheerful with all, to patiently learn to find
the good in all--such unselfish thoughts are the very portals
of heaven; and to dwell day by day in thoughts of peace
toward every creature will bring abounding peace to their
possessor.
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