EFFECT OF THOUGHT ON HEALTH AND THE 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 soon shatter the nervous system.
Strong, pure, and happy thoughts build up the body in vigour 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 microbe.
If you would protect your body, guard your mind.
If you would renew your body, beautify your mind.
Thoughts of malice, envy, 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, and 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
inharmonious 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 deathbed.
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 thoughts 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.