Happiness as Found in Forethought Minus FearthoughtFletcher, Horace
Philosophy
Happiness as Found in Forethought Minus Fearthought
Fletcher, Horace
Fear; Happiness
They all agree that it is dangerous to change the patient's linen,
dangerous to sponge the body, dangerous to give him cold water; milk
is feverish, meat is too strong. A shadow of fear seems to hang over
everybody. The pulse is counted, the temperature is taken. Nurse or
nearest friend wants to know aloud the report of the watch and the
thermometer. The doctor answers aloud, and all look grave. And so
it goes on day after day, thoughts and images of pain and sickness
and danger and death being impressed and reflected upon the mind
of the patient, and the great, sound, glorious spirit within finds
it impossible to break through this dense atmosphere of material
superstitions, fear, ignorance, and folly, and restore its own body to
health and happiness.
The true sanitarian will remember in his treatment the tremendous
power of words and ideas upon the sick. He will never indicate by his
language, his looks, or his conduct that he thinks the patient is very
ill. He will cleanse his own mind of morbid fears and apprehensions,
and reflect the stimulating light of hope on all around him. The
suppression of anxiety, and even sometimes of sympathy, is necessary.
His sickness should not be discussed before the patient, or any other
case of sickness alluded to. The doctor's opinion of the case should
never be asked, and never given within the patient's hearing. Erase,
as far as possible, all thoughts of disease, danger, or death. The
sick-room should not be darkened and made silent. It should be made
cheerful and natural, as if no sickness existed. It should have fresh
air, and cool water, and the fragrance of flowers, instead of the odor
of drugs. Hope, and not fear, should be the presiding genius of the
place.
The mind-curers and the Christian Scientists say that almost all acute
diseases can be cured without medicine by the simple dissipation of
fear from the mind of the patient, of his friends, and of his doctor.
Whether this be true or not, it is very certain that when an epidemic
is threatened or prevailing, the people who are constantly talking
about and discussing the disease, the newspapers which daily report its
progress and fatality, and the doctors and nurses who ventilate their
experiences, who predict evil, speak ominously and enjoin all sorts of
precautions, are themselves fomenters and carriers of the disease,
infectious centers to the whole community.
Education can do much, but it is useless to expect the total
eradication of fear without the aid and guidance of the religious
principle. Fear is the cry of the wounded selfhood for something he
has suffered or lost, or is about to lose. "Perfect love casteth out
fear"--the perfect love of God and the neighbor. He who is in bondage
to the senses has everything to dread. He alone is free from all
apprehensions whose heart and mind are stayed upon the living God. He
truly "sits under his own vine and fig-tree, with none to make him
afraid."
APPENDIX B.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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