Counsels on Health - Ellen G. White

Physical exercise and labor combined have a
happy influence upon the mind, strengthen the
muscles, improve the circulation, and give the
invalid the satisfaction of knowing his own power
of endurance; whereas, if he is restricted from
healthful exercise and physical labor, his attention
is turned to himself. He is in constant danger of
thinking himself worse than he really is, and of
having established within him a diseased
imagination which causes him to continually fear
that he is overtaxing his powers of endurance. As a
general thing, if he should engage in some welldirected
labor, using his strength and not abusing
it, he would find that physical exercise would
prove a more powerful and effective agent in his
recovery than even the water treatment he is
receiving.
The inactivity of the mental and physical
powers, as far as useful labor is concerned, is that
which keeps many invalids in a condition of
feebleness which they feel powerless to rise above.
It also gives them a greater opportunity to indulge
an impure imagination—an indulgence which has
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