Selecting the Farm 



6l 



Most men sell their lives at so much a day, from 

 two coppers in China to thousands of dollars in 

 Europe and America. The love of money — ^what- 

 ever that signifies — makes the bargain. It is idle 

 to expostulate. The habit is fixed with the race. 

 The greater the risk, sometimes the lower the pay. 

 Only a few people think they can afford to be 

 healthy, just as few can afford to live economically. 

 To these few a word is sufficient, for none are so 

 deaf as those who will not hear; none so pitiable as 

 those who hear and are prisoners of their deafness. 

 What is the objective? Health? Wealth? 

 Pleasure? Knowledge? Length of years? Fame? 

 Leisure? Service? Drifting? The Unknown? 

 Really this is the question, come to it as we may, 

 whether by way of the factory or the fruit-farm. 

 I suspect that the question has long been an- 

 swered: "Length of years, riches, honor." Now 

 riches and honor are relative, but length of years 

 is absolute. There is a cycle of life for every plant 

 and animal, according to its kind. Robins live 

 say fifteen years; turtles five hundred. It is the 

 way of turtles and robins. And how long shall a 

 man live ? "A day, and yet forever, ' ' answers one ; 

 * ' fourscore and no more, ' ' replies another. Schools 

 of thinking differ here also. But we are speaking 

 of this earth, not of some other universe. ''Oh!*' 

 replies the young doctor; "in that case, barring 

 accident, as long as his arteries keep elastic.** 

 There you are. "Know thy arteries,** Socrates 

 should have said. 



