Mental Efficiency, and Other Hints to Men and Women — Arnold Bennett
You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org . If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this eBook. Title : Mental Efficiency, and Other Hints to Men and Women Author : Arnold Bennett Release date : November 6, 2007 [eBook #23347] Most recently updated: January 3, 2021 Language : English Other information and formats : www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/23347 Credits : Produced by Audrey Longhurst, Jeannie Howse and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries) *** START OF For a complete list, please see the end of this document . MENTAL EFFICIENCY BY ARNOLD BENNETT Novels THE OLD WIVES' TALE HELEN WITH THE HIGH HAND THE BOOK OF CARLOTTA BURIED ALIVE A GREAT MAN LEONORA WHOM GOD HATH JOINED A MAN FROM THE NORTH ANNA OF THE FIVE TOWNS THE GLIMPSE Pocket Philosophies HOW TO LIVE ON 24 HOURS A DAY THE HUMAN MACHINE LITERARY TASTE MENTAL EFFICIENCY Miscellaneous CUPID AND COMMONSENSE: A Play WHAT THE PUBLIC WANTS: A Play THE TRUTH ABOUT AN AUTHOR THE FEAST OF ST. FRIEND GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY NEW YORK MENTAL EFFICIENCY AND OTHER HINTS TO MEN AND WOMEN BY ARNOLD BENNETT Author of "How to Live on 24 Hours a Day" "The Old Wives' Tale," etc. GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY PUBLISHERS NEW YORK Copyright, 1911 By George H. Doran Company CONTENTS Page I. Mental Efficiency 7 The Appeal 7 The Replies 13 The Cure 19 Mental Calisthenics 24 II. Expressing One's Individuality 32 III. Breaking with the Past 39 IV. Settling Down in Life 45 V. Marriage 53 The Duty of It 53 The Adventure of It 59 The Two Ways of It 65 VI. Books 72 The Physical Side 72 The Philosophy of Book Buying 78 VII. Success 84 Candid Remarks 84 The Successful and the Unsuccessful 91 The Inwardness of Success 97 VIII. The Petty Artificialities 104 IX. The Secret of Content 112 I MENTAL EFFICIENCY ToC THE APPEAL If there is any virtue in advertisements—and a journalist should be the last person to say that there is not—the American nation is rapidly reaching a state of physical efficiency of which the world has probably not seen the like since Sparta. In all the American newspapers and all the American monthlies are innumerable illustrated announcements of "physical-culture specialists," who guarantee to make all the organs of the body perform their duties with the mighty precision of a 60 h.p. motor-car that never breaks down. I saw a book the other day written by one of these specialists, to show how perfect health could be attained by devoting a quarter of an hour a day to certain exercises. The advertisements multiply and increase in size. They cost a great deal of money. Therefore they must bring in a great deal of business. Therefore vast numbers of people must be worried about the non-efficiency of their bodies, and on the way to achieve efficiency. In our more modest British fashion, we have the same phenomenon in England. And it is growing. Our muscles are growing also. Surprise a man in his bedroom of a morning, and you will find him lying on his back on the floor, or standing on his head, or whirling clubs, in pursuit of physical efficiency. I remember that once I "went in" for physical efficiency myself. I, too, lay on the floor, my delicate epidermis separated from the carpet by only the thinnest of garments, and I contorted myself according to the fifteen diagrams of a large chart (believed to be the magna charta of physical efficiency) daily after shaving. In three weeks my collars would not meet round my prize-fighter's neck; my hosier reaped immense profits, and I came to the conclusion that I had carried physical efficiency quite far enough. A strange thing—was it not?—that I never had the idea of devoting a quarter of an hour a day after shaving to the pursuit of mental efficiency. The average body is a pretty complicated affair, sadly out of order, but happily susceptible to culture. The average mind is vastly more complicated, not less sadly out of order, but perhaps even more susceptible to culture. We compare our arms to the arms of the gentleman illustrated in the physical efficiency advertisement, and we murmur to ourselves the classic phrase: "This will never do." And we set about developing the muscles of our arms until we can show them off (through a frock coat) to women at afternoon tea. But it does not, perhaps, occur to us that the mind has its muscles, and a lot of apparatus besides, and that these invisible, yet paramount, mental organs are far less efficient than they ought to be; that some of them are atrophied, others starved, others out of shape, etc. A man of sedentary occupation goes for a very long walk on Easter Monday, and in the evening is so exhausted that he can scarcely eat. He wakes up to the inefficiency of his body, caused by his neglect of it, and he is so shocked that he determines on remedial measures. Either he will walk to the office, or he will play golf, or he will execute the post-shaving exercises. But let the same man after a prolonged sedentary course of newspapers, magazines, and novels, take his mind out for a stiff climb among the rocks of a scientific, philosophic, or artistic subject. What will he do? Will he stay out all day, and return in the evening too tired even to read his paper? Not he. It is ten to one that, finding himself puffing for breath after a quarter of an hour, he won't even persist till he gets his second wind, but will come back at once. Will he remark with genuine concern that his mind is sadly out of condition and that he really must do something to get it into order? Not he. It is a hundred to one that he will tranquilly accept the status quo , without shame and without very poignant regret. Do I make my meaning clear? I say, without a very poignant regret, be