It is difficult to imagine a hopeful, self-confident, buoyant man dragging around a half dead body. The mental and physical natures are so interdependent that you can not affect one without the other. Hence the ideal has ever been "A strong mind in a strong body."

What a boon is health to man, yet how easily it is squandered. In many cases a horse is better groomed and receives better care than his master. "Give me health, and a day," sings Emerson, "and I will make the pomp of kings ridiculous." This exuberant health is the very joy of living and the basis of self-confidence.

First, then, let the student assume the physical attitude of the man he would be, with erect carriage, chest high and active, the back of the neck pressed against the collar, and the manner suggesting power in reserve. In a remarkably short time, by merely "playing the part," he will establish it as a habit, and the mind itself will assume these self-same qualities. Don't forget the order: An act, a habit, a character.

A still better way is to hold in the mind a vivid picture of the physical man you would be. Think of yourself as of manly and dignified bearing, with spine strong and straight, shoulders thrown back, countenance clear and frank, the step sure and firm. Think of yourself as positive, deliberate and magnetic. Endeavor to make this picture a reality by putting all this into practice. Resolve to make the most of yourself, beginning not tomorrow but to-day–now. At this moment while you read these words, straighten yourself up, draw in a full deep breath, and ask whether this simple act does not increase your feeling of self-reliance. Avoid the "leaning" habit. Many men feel uncomfortable unless they can rest their chin on the hand, cross their legs, or find constant support for their back.

The difficult problem of how a busy man may properly exercise is still unsolved. He has tried the gymnasium, but found no inspiration there. There is no fun in exercising at a mechanical rowing machine. He has bought a "home exerciser," but after a few mornings both his enthusiasm and the exerciser disappear. He has bought a library of books on physical culture, but some of their pages are still uncut. What is he to do?

Listen:

Two minutes devoted regularly each morning upon rising, to half-a-dozen bending, twisting, and stooping movements of the arms, waist and legs, coupled with right habits during the day, will give an average man all the physical exercise he requires.

The importance of the daily bath should no longer need to be emphasized. The particular form–whether it be hot or cold, sponge or tub, at night or in the morning–may be adapted to one's particular case, but the entire surface of the body should be washed at least once a day. The reason is not so physiological as it is psychological. A clean body has a most direct and immediate effect upon one's thoughts. The mind telegraphs its message by delicate and mysterious means to all parts of the body. A bath has an intimate relation to a man's soul. Physical up building should be part of a man's every-day life. On his way to the office he can get off the street-car ten blocks away and feel the invigorating effect of walking for the rest of the way. During the day he can rise from his desk, inhale a deep breath six times or more, accompanied by a movement of the arms, and return to his duties refreshed and exhilarated. Especially can he be careful to sit up straight, to breathe deeply, and do his daily work without strain. It is a nervous age, when men do everything under pressure and tension. If such a man would begin his day an hour earlier, he could conduct all his affairs deliberately and even leisurely, and feel that he was always an hour ahead. To start in good time will often obviate the wear and tear of the average business life.

The fresh-air fiend has the best side of the argument. There are some persons who still insist that too much fresh air is dangerous, but we know of some of the wonders that have been wrought by this comparatively new treatment. One in very delicate health will be cautious not to overdo this, and will properly be advised by a physician. But for the rank and file of men, more life in the open air would mean to them more joy in their work and greater longevity.

It is said that the hopefulness of consumptives is due to accelerated breathing, and that living in the open air produces bodily exhilaration and arouses sanguine expectations even on the edge of the grave. Is it not strange that people who reject stale food, will breathe stale air with perfect complacency? Closed cars, closed offices, closed bedrooms, in these they live the greater part of the day, and wonder they are lacking in self-confidence.

It was Huxley who said that "The health of the mental and bodily functions, the spirit, temper, disposition, correctness of judgment, and brilliancy of imagination, depend directly upon pure air." The memory itself depends upon good physiological conditions, and when properly nourished receives better and more enduring impressions.

Oxygen is the universal scavenger. Professor Tyndall says _" _There is assuredly morality in the oxygen of the mountains, as there is immorality in the miasma of a marsh," and goes on to say that the purer the stream of blood the greater will be the glow of the heart. When we take air into our lungs the blood absorbs the oxygen and carries it to all parts of the body. After it has performed its life-giving office, it returns with its impure products of combustion as "cinders of the fire within us."

Physicians assert that the majority of men do not use three-fourths of their lungs in ordinary respiration. Children who play and run do so, but neither men nor women in their daily occupations exercise their lungs as they should.

Which do you prefer to look at, a silver stream of pure flowing water, or a muddy one? Which would you prefer to have flowing through the arteries of your body, a stream of red blood or a muddy one! If you would be self-confident, live out-of-doors as much as possible, breathe pure fresh air, and be a lover of nature, for, as Humboldt says: " Mere communion with nature, mere contact with the free air, exercise a soothing yet strengthening influence on the wearied spirit."

One of the most favorable times to practice deep breathing, coupled with positive mental suggestion, is immediately after retiring at night. Lie flat on the back, inhale deeply, slowly, and fully, expanding both the abdomen and chest; then slowly exhale while allowing all the parts to relax gently. The mind is peculiarly amenable to suggestion just before one goes to sleep. Positive suggestions made at this time sink deeply into the consciousness and become a permanent part of one's personality. The student will find it helpful in connection with this exercise to impress his mind with the thoughts he seeks to materialize in his life and character. He may formulate his own sentences, and mentally repeat them several times with great sincerity and positiveness. He may say: "I am growing daily in self-confidence. I have unlimited power within me. Tonight I shall rest calmly and cheerfully. I now relax every part of my body, and shall have deep refreshing sleep. All my power comes from God and I commend myself to His care. I shall to-night gather new power for the new day. I am an immortal soul, and know no limitation. My arms and legs grow heavy, my head is heavy, my eyelids are heavy, my entire body is heavy, heavy, heavy as lead, and my mind is relaxed, completely relaxed, and I grow sleepy, sleepy, sleepy."

At a banquet given in New York to Herbert Spencer, the eminent thinker was fearful that he would inadequately express himself on that occasion because of impaired health. "Any failure," said he, "in my response you must please ascribe, in part at least, to a greatly disordered nervous system." Here was fear- thought arising directly from physical weakness. "Without good health there can not be endurance, and therefore little confidence in one's abilities. Gladstone owed his wonderful staying powers to robust health, maintained by careful mastication of his food and exercise in chopping down trees. His splendid physical powers were the basis of his more wonderful eloquence.

The marvel of it all is that the human body endures so much abuse and neglect. Here are upward of two hundred bones, and more than twice as many muscles, and yet many men expect this wonderfully intricate and complex machine to run itself! Is it any wonder that a well and healthy man is so rarely seen?

A common source of ill-health comes from the worry habit. In its aggravated form this is said to cause cancer. Plow- ever that may be, we know that it does cause endless trouble and grief. The time and energy that are often spent in worry would be sufficient, if properly applied, to remove wholly the cause of worry. Timid men are much addicted to this debilitating habit. They worry not only about the past but about what is to come. This is particularly noticeable in the case of a diffident man who knows he must make a speech at some function or other. He spends his days and nights, not so much in diligent preparation as in worrying over the thought of embarrassment and failure. He spends sleepless nights in thinking how he will surely discredit himself in the eyes of all his friends, and when he stands before them to speak he has lost all natural control of his powers.

To cure the worry habit it is of little practical use to say "Don't worry." A man so afflicted should ask himself pertinent questions, such as, what am I worrying about? How can I remedy the matter? When he knows what should be done, let him proceed to do it. Perhaps it looks impossible. Let him at least try. Upon close analysis we very often find that the matter we have been worrying about is not worth it. Why, for instance, should a man rack body and soul over a few dollars? If a man owes you money and will not pay it, is it not better to cancel the debt than to cancel your health and peace of mind? Your worrying man exerts a bad influence. It was a rule of one of the Roth's child's, a great financier, not to have anything to do with an unlucky man or an unlucky plan. Why? Because the man who has been unlucky gets to think himself unlucky and is commonly a man who worries. Through contact with him, you readily get into your system the microbe of discontent and presently two worrying men spring up where only one was before. No one cares to meet the long-faced man, the man with the hard-luck story. The reason is evident. We know that a man who takes time to grumble and complain is taking that time from actual hard work. To worry is to acknowledge that things and events are too large for you, and that you are in some way inferior. The man who is intent upon building a high degree of self-confidence will avoid worry, real or imaginary, and if he has a grievance he will lose it in his work.

In these bustling times it is well to be on one's guard against the habit of nervousness. Many men are living at too intense a pace. The expenditure of nerve force is out of proportion to the supply, and actual results do not warrant the high price of worn out, nervous, physical collapse, and premature death. At the end of a year, a man of poise will achieve many times more than a nervous, erratic person, who possibly spends half his time in rectifying hasty mistakes. Every man, then, should cultivate poise. Like a piece of finely adjusted machinery, his thoughts and acts should be carried on without strain or friction. But let it be remembered that poise begins in the mind and should be developed there that it may express itself in the outward life of a man. As Horatio W. Dresser says: "Let us seek first that calmness which spares us the petty frictions of life, then gradually attain adjustment. Since it is the little interior friction, the mental worry and the nervous tension which wear us out, we should pause and let down the tension, take off the strain. Inner poise we must have if we would be outwardly at peace; and poise is a balance of opposites, a nice adjustment; such that we move along with the stream of life, instead of against it."

A man should not work at his maximum. There should be something in reserve for the extra "spurt" that may be demanded by some emergency. Self-confidence depends in no little degree upon reserve power. To use up one's vitality as quickly as it is generated, is to live close to the danger-line. Then one day something snaps, and we see a man moving about uncertainly, like a steamer that has been crippled and disabled in mid-ocean and sends out signals for help.

Every man should have a playtime for at least a small part of each day, and a reasonably long vacation every summer. Good health is impossible when the machinery works incessantly during many years. There must be rest and relaxation, a change of air and scene, a new line of thought, a larger and better outlook. Said a successful publisher, "I would keep better hours if I were a boy again. I would go to bed earlier. Sleep is our great replenisher. If we sit up late, we decay, and sooner or later we contract a disease called insomnia. Late hours are shadows from the grave."

A prominent clergyman declares that many business men go to see him, broken down in the prime of life just when they should be in the best condition for real work. He attributes their trouble not to laziness but to strenuousness. They have been using one set of their powers too much, and other powers perhaps not at all. To this want of balance and harmony, he ascribes their premature downfall.

Health is too precious to be thus frittered away. Young men particularly should take warning from the object-lessons they have on all sides. Too many men are breaking down at thirty-five and forty, and "three-score-and-ten" is more and more becoming the exception.

When a nervous, diffident man asks: "Will the use of alcohol or tobacco impair my chances of becoming self-confident?" we invariably answer, "Yes, most emphatically." We have already said that a high degree of good health is essential to a high degree of self-confidence. Anything, then, that affects the one affects the other. Alcohol is an irritant. If indulged in it will tell against the bodily tissues sooner or later. A self-confident man should be a good speaker, but the use of tobacco directly affects the delicate lining of the throat, and a habitual smoker finds in time that his voice loses its clearness and brilliancy. Irritation of throat leads to more serious troubles, susceptibility to "sore throat" increases, and in time the speaker begins to lose his nerve. Exceptions to this, it is true, may be found, but in a general way both the drinking and the smoking habit are detrimental to the building of self-reliance.