In listening attentively, only the brain and ears are needed; but
watch the individuals at an entertaining lecture, or in church with
a stirring preacher. They are listening with their spines, their
shoulders, the muscles of their faces. I do not refer to the look of
interest and attention, or to any of the various expressions which
are the natural and true reflection of the state of the mind, but to
the strained attention which draws the facial muscles, not at all in
sympathy with the speaker, but as a consequence of the tense nerves
and contracted muscles of the listener. "I do not understand why I
have this peculiar sort of asthma every Sunday afternoon," a lady
said to me. She was in the habit of hearing, Sunday morning, a
preacher, exceedingly interesting, but with a very rapid utterance,
and whose mind travelled so fast that the words embodying his
thoughts often tumbled over one another. She listened with all her
nerves, as well as with those needed, held her breath when he
stumbled, to assist him in finding his verbal legs, reflected every
action with twice the force the preacher himself gave,--and then
wondered why on Sunday afternoon, and at no other time, she had this
nervous catching of the breath. She saw as soon as her attention was
drawn to the general principles of Nature, how she had disobeyed
this one, and why she had trouble on Sunday afternoon. This case is
very amusing, even laughable, but it is a fair example of many
similar nervous attacks, greater or less; and how easy it is to see
that a whole series of these, day after day, doing their work
unconsciously to the victim, will sooner or later bring some form of
nervous prostration.

The same attitudes and the same effects often attend listening to
music. It is a common experience to be completely fagged after two