HOW TO LIVE LONG.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIII, Issue 1005, 15 June 1911, Page 4

HOW TO LIVE LONG.

MR EDISON PLANS TO LIVE 150 YEARS. Mr Thomas Alva Edison, the famous inventor, who disbelieves in the immortality of the soul, declares in an interview his conviction that the human body is a machine, which, if properly treated, is capable of sustaining life in comfort and enjoyment for 150 years. He stated that he himself expects to live to that age. The inventor’s confession of his expectations of a long life was elicited by a controversy started by Mr J. C. Stubbs, of Chicago, a friend and business associate of the late Mr E. H. Harriman, who announces that he will retire on his sixty-fifth birthday. Mr Stubbs declares : “I am going to retire because I want to live, ' and adds, “all business men ought to retire at sixty-five for their own sakes as well as for the sake of the institutions they serve.” According to Mr Stubbs the reason Mr Harriman died at a comparatively early age was that he “worked all day and thought out problems at night.” Mr Edison received an interviewer at his Orange laboratory in New Jersey, at the conclusion of a week during which he had worked seventeen hours a day, including one stretch of forty-eight hours. “I can think,” he observed, “twice as much and work twice as long as Mr Harriman did and Mr Stubbs does. This is due to the fact that my system of living is based : (1) On proper eating ; (2) proper sleeping ; and three, on proper clothing. “ Why did Mr Harriman think in bed ? Because he ate too much. Mr Stubbs and others of his ilk eat as much, though not as wholesomely, as a hod-carrier, without taking any exercise. They choke their engines with too much coal. I eat just as much as I want, and that is very little, perhaps half a handful of solids at each meal. The result is that I am asleep thirty seconds after my head hits the pillow. Mr Harriman spent four out of eight hours in bed thinking and dreaming. lam in bed for six hours, and all of it is good solid sleep. I never dreamed in my life, “ I am now sixty-four, and can work and think better than ever I did. This talk of retirement is bosh. I have, worked since I was twelve, and hope to continue working until lam 150. My Paradise is here on earth.

“ My physical condition is perfect. This is also due in part to the fact that I clothe myself sensibly.” Mr Edison here kicked off a shoe two sizes too large, and exclaimed with a chuckle, “So with trousers and shirts. Every vein and artery is thus given a chance to do its work, for none of them is ever pinched. Bacteria starve in my system. They have abandoned the job of trying to fasten Bright’s disease, diabetes, and other sicknesses on me. What vices have I ? Well, chewing tobacco. My wife used to object to this, but since she learned that the Chief Justice has the same habit she is resigned and thinks it respectable.”