wear oneself out

Besides, it’s folly to wear oneself out any sooner than one need.

To wear oneself out slowly in a strife obscure and without issue; to perish without having aroused either sympathy or opposition, to disappear into oblivion before disappearing in the tomb … ah! all the furies, all the bloody reprisals, the dungeons, the gibbets, the massacres, all the martyrdoms by which human wickedness strove to stifle the voice of the just, are less horrible than this extermination by apathy.

Perhaps he was only referring to his later experience; but still it was enough to break down any constitution, to wear oneself out for ever by the same train of thought, and the same routine of business.