he feels it burn, but he will tighten his muscles and hold on to a
cold in his head so persistently that he only gets rid of it at all
because nature is stronger than he is, and carries it off in spite
of him.

How common it is to see a woman entirely wrapped up, with a
handkerchief held to her nose,--the whole body as tense as it can
be,--wondering "Why does it take so long to get rid of this cold?"
To get free from a severe cold there should be open and clear
circulation throughout the whole body. The more the circulation is
impeded, the longer the cold will last. To begin with, the cold
itself impedes the circulation; and if, in addition, we offer
resistance to the very idea of having a cold, we tighten our nerves
and our bodies and thereby impede our circulation still further. It
is curious that the more we resist a cold the more we hold on to it,
but it is a very evident fact; and so is its logical corollary, that
the less we resist it the sooner it leaves us.

It would seem absurd to people who do not understand, to say:--

"I have caught cold, I must relax and let it go through me."

But the literal truth is that when we relax, we open the channels of
circulation in our bodies, and so allow the cold to be carried off.
In addition to the relaxing, long, quiet breaths help the
circulation still more, and so help the cold to go off sooner.

In the same way people resist pain and hold on to it; when they are
attacked with severe pain, they at once devote their entire
attention to the sensation of pain, instead of devoting it to the