TRANQUILLITY OF MIND

Taranaki Daily News, 17 April 1935, Page 12

TRANQUILLITY OF MIND

IMPORTANCE OF RELAXATION. In an address given by Mrs. C. Benton at Okaiawa last week, she first appealed for continued support and co-operation for lhe Womens Division, a body of women who were not only behind the country women, working for their interests, but were striving to cope and help with all national problems affecting women. Mrs. Benton spoke on the value and the importance of some time being spent in solitude or Quiet and peace, which was really so necessary for mental well being, during these strenuous times of bustle and strain. The profit derived from such rests could not be over estimated. . ’ Many of the greatest-writers and pomposers of music owedxtheir lasting and immortal contributions to the world either to some physical affliction, or to the fact that they suffered. martyrdom by being imprisoned for their just convictions. . ' . , It was in Bedford gaol that J°'} n Bunyan wrote that great story, ‘“Pilgrim’s Progress,” the writing of which brought to him happiness and peace of mind. , ~ William Penn, the Quaker, while banished from, court, wrote “Some Fruits of Solitude,” in which he speaks of solitude as a "School few care to learn in though none instructs us better.” The author of “Don Quixote” was given time for thought and expression in words when he was cast, into prison. It was when .propped up in bed that Robert Louis Stevenson excelled himself. One found through study that misery was not physical. Misery was - always mental, and it was those who have learned to live triumphantly within their limitations, who became successful. They were destroyed or frustrated in life, not By what they suffered, but by what .they thought. David Grayson, the author of "Great Possessions” etc. told of his .lessons learnt of the value of solitude or quiet thought, when he became bedridden for some months in hospital. From a busy life, he turned his thoughts to his literary education when young and was amazed to find that he was able to remember whole poems that he had Jong entirely forgotten, including “The Lady of the Lake,” "The Prisoner of Chilton” and "Thouatopsis.” The hitherto long weary hours were transformed into triumphs and’joys which worked quicker cures than medicine or nursing and the mind became master over matter.

No matter how limited or miserable one’s environments or conditions might be, when the mind was allowed to go free one could find onself again in the past happy times, and among the most beautiful surroundings in thought. It was 1 to those reaching middle life, that the call for times of peace of mind and harmony became more apparent, and vital to good health, and what better occupation could be found than that of gardening, when not only was the magnetism of the earth imbibed but one could retire into one’s own soul and find that "tranquillity is nothing else than the good ordering of the mind.” It was here too, amidst the beauties of nature, that one seemed to learn the grandest, the most divine lessons of life, and to appreciate the truth and the beauty of that verse of Byron’s which began, “There is a pleasure in the pathless woods” and ended with “I love not man the less but nature more. - ’