University of Virginia Library

Our modern Eves

"Where ignorance is bliss, 'tis folly to be wise," says

the English poet, and there is truth in his sentiment. The action of mortal mind on the body was not so injurious before inquisitive modern Eves took up the study of medical works and unmanly Adams attributed their own downfall and the fate of their off- spring to the weakness of their wives.

The primitive custom of taking no thought about food left the stomach and bowels free to act in obedi- ence to nature, and gave the gospel a chance to be seen in its glorious effects upon the body. A ghastly array of diseases was not paraded before the imagination. There were fewer books on digestion and more "sermons in stones, and good in everything." When the mechanism of the human mind gives place to the divine Mind, self- ishness and sin, disease and death, will lose their foothold.

Human fear of miasma would load with disease the air of Eden, and weigh down mankind with superimposed and conjectural evils. Mortal mind is the worst foe of the body, while divine Mind is its best friend.