To physician, wife, husband, children, employer, employee, pastor, and friend alike the hypochondriac is a pest, a nuisance, a chill and almost a curse, and, poor creature, these facts do not take away or lessen our sympathy for him, for, though most of his ills are imaginary, he suffers more than do those who come in contact with him.
Then there is the neurasthenic--the mentally collapsed whose collapse invariably comes from too great tension or worry.

I know several housewives who became neurasthenic by too great anxiety to keep their houses spotless.

Not a speck of dust must be anywhere.

The slightest appearance of inattention or carelessness in this matter was a great source of worry, and they worried lest the maid fail to do her duty.
I know another housewife who is so dainty and refined that, though her husband's income is strained almost to the breaking point, she must have everything in the house so dainty and fragile that no ordinary servant can be trusted to care for the furniture, wash the dishes, polish the floors, etc., and the result is she is almost a confirmed neurasthenic because, in the first place, she worries over her dainty things, and, secondly, exhausts herself in caring for these unnecessarily fragile household equipments.
Every neurasthenic is a confirmed worrier.

He ever sits on the "stool of repentance," clothing himself in sackcloth and ashes for what he has done or not done.