Rareripes fall early. John Fiske's name was coupled, as we have seen, with those of Newton and Humboldt. Newton died at eighty-six, Humboldt at ninety. These men developed slowly: the hothouse methods were not for them. Fiske at twenty knew more than any of them did at forty. Fiske at twenty-five was a better man mentally and physically than he was at thirty-five. At forty he was refused life-insurance because his measurement east and west was out of proportion to his measurement north and south.
He used often to sit at his desk for fifteen hours a day, writing and studying. The sedentary habit grew upon him; the vital organs got clogged with adipose tissue. The doctor told him that "his diaphragm was too close to his lungs"--a cheerful proposition, well worthy of a small, mouse-colored medicus who dare not run the risk of displeasing a big patient by telling him the truth, that is, that deep breathing and active exercise in the open air can never be replaced through the use of something poured out of a bottle.
People who eat too much, drink too much, smoke too much, and do not exercise enough, have to pay for their privileges, even though they are able to work differential calculus with one hand and recite Xenophon's "Anabasis" backward. They all have the liver and lungs too close to the diaphragm, because that damnable invention of Sir Isaac Newton's slumbers not nor sleeps, and all the vital organs droop and drop when we neglect deep breathing. Inertia is a vice. The gods cultivate levitation, which is a different thing from levity, meaning skyey gravitation, uplift, aspiration expressed in bodily attitude. When levitation lets go, gravity doubles its grip.
The Yogi of the East know vastly more about this theme than we do, and have made of deep breathing an art. Carry the crown of your head high, hold your chin in, and fill the top of your lungs by cultivating levitation. We are gods in the biscuit!
After four years at Harvard and the regulation two years at the Harvard Law School, John Fiske opened an office in Boston and gave his shingle to the breeze. No clients came, and this was well--for the clients. Also, for John. The law is a business proposition: its essence is the adjustment of differences between men, the lubrication of exchange, getting things on! Learned men very seldom make good lawyers. Law is a very practical matter, and as for "Law Latin," it can be learned in a week and then should be mostly forgotten. The lawyer who asks his client about the "causa sine qua non," or harangues the jury concerning the "ipse dixit" of "de facto" and "de jure," will probably be mulcted for costs on general principles.