THE IMPORTANCE OF PHYSICAL EDUCATION.
The influence of the physical frame upon the intellect, morals, and
happiness of a human being, is now universally admitted. The extent
of this influence will be thought greater in proportion to the
accuracy with which the subject is examined. Bodily pain forms a
large proportion of the amount of human misery. It is, therefore, of
the highest importance that a child should grow up sound and healthy
in body, with the utmost degree of muscular strength that education
can communicate.--LALOR.
The importance of the department of the great work of education which we
now approach has not hitherto been duly appreciated by parents and
teachers generally. I shall therefore devote more space to this subject
than is usual in works on education, but not more, I trust, than its
relative importance demands. Physical, intellectual, and moral education
are so intimately connected, that, in order duly to appreciate the
importance of either, we must not view it separate and alone merely, but
in connection with both of the others. And especially is this true of
physical education. However much value, then, we may attach to it on its
own account, considering man as a corporeal being, we shall have
occasion greatly to magnify its importance when we come to direct our
attention to his intellectual culture, and still more when we view it in
connection with his moral training. Then, and not till then, shall we be
enabled, in some degree, properly to appreciate the importance of
physical education.
It has been objected, says Dr. Combe,[1] that to teach any one how to
take care of his own health, is sure to do harm, by making him
constantly think of this and the other precaution, to the utter
sacrifice of every noble and generous feeling, and to the certain
production of peevishness and discontent. The result, however, he adds,
is exactly the reverse; and it would be a singular anomaly in the
constitution of the moral world were it otherwise. He who is instructed
in, and is familiar with grammar and orthography, writes and spells so
easily and accurately as scarcely to be conscious of attending to the
rules by which he is guided; while he, on the contrary, who is not
instructed in either, and knows not how to arrange his sentences, toils
at the task, and sighs at every line. The same principle holds in regard
to health. He who is acquainted with the general constitution of the
human body, and with the laws which regulate its action, sees at once
his true position when exposed to the causes of disease, decides what
ought to be done, and thereafter feels himself at liberty to devote his
undivided attention to the calls of higher duties. But it is far
otherwise with the person who is destitute of this information.
Uncertain of the nature and extent of the danger, he knows not to which
hand to turn, and either lives in the fear of mortal disease, or, in his
ignorance, resorts to irrational and hurtful precautions, to the certain
neglect of those which he ought to use. It is ignorance, therefore, and
not knowledge, which renders an individual full of fancies and
apprehensions, and robs him of his usefulness. It would be a stigma on
the Creator's wisdom if true knowledge weakened the understanding, and
led to injurious results. Those who have had the most extensive
opportunities of forming an opinion on this subject from extensive
experience, bear unequivocal testimony to the advantages which knowledge
confers in saving health and life, time and anxiety.
[1] Principles of Physiology applied to the Preservation of Health.
If, indeed, ignorance were itself a preventive of the danger, or could
provide a remedy when it approached, then it might well be said that
"ignorance is bliss;" but as it gives only the kind of security which
shutting the eyes affords against the dangers of a precipice, and
consequently leaves its victim doubly exposed, it is high time to
renounce its protection, and to seek those of a more powerful and
beneficent ally. Every medical man can testify that, natural character
and other circumstances being alike, those whose knowledge is the most
limited are the fullest of whims and fancies; the most credulous
respecting the efficacy of every senseless and preposterous remedy; the
most impatient of restraint, and the most discontented at suffering.
If any of my readers be still doubtful of the propriety or safety of
communicating physiological knowledge to the public at large, continues
the author from whom we last quoted, and think that ignorance is in all
circumstances to be preferred, I would beg leave to ask him whether it
was knowledge or ignorance which induced the poorer classes in every
country of Asia and Europe to attempt to protect themselves from cholera
by committing ravages on the medical attendants of the sick, under the
plea of their having poisoned the public fountains? And whether it was
ignorance or knowledge which prompted the more rational part of the
community to seek safety in increased attention to proper food, warmth,
cleanliness, and clothing? In both cases, the desire of safety and sense
of danger were the same, but the modes resorted to by each were as
different in kind as in result, the efficacy of the one having formed a
glaring contrast to the failure of the other.
Dr. Southwood Smith, the able author of a volume entitled "The
Philosophy of Health," says, The obvious and peculiar advantages of this
kind of knowledge are, that it would enable its possessor to take a more
rational care of his health; to perceive why certain circumstances are
beneficial or injurious; to understand, in some degree, the nature of
disease, and the operation as well of the agents which produce it as of
those which counteract it; to observe the first beginnings of deranged
function in his own person; to give to his physician a more intelligible
account of his train of morbid sensations, as they arise; and, above
all, to co-operate with him in removing the morbid state on which they
depend, instead of defeating, as is now, through ignorance, constantly
the case, the best concerted plans for the renovation of health. It
would likewise lay the foundation for the attainment of a more just,
accurate, and practical knowledge of our _intellectual_ and _moral
nature_. There is a _physiology_ of the _mind_ as well as of the _body_,
and both are so intimately united that neither can be well understood
without the study of the other. The physiology of man comprehends both.
Were even what is already known of this science and what might be easily
communicated made a part of general education, how many evils would be
avoided! how much light would be let in upon the understanding! and how
many aids would be afforded to the acquisition of a sound body and a
vigorous mind! prerequisites more important than are commonly supposed
to the attainment of wisdom and the practice of virtue.
Human physiology, says Dr. Combe, in his admirable treatise on that
subject, from which I have already quoted, is as important in its
practical consequences as it is attractive to rational curiosity. In its
widest sense, it comprehends an exposition of the functions of the
various organs of which the human frame is composed; of the mechanism by
which they are carried on; of their relations to each other, or the
means of improving their development and action; of the purposes to
which they ought severally to be directed, and of the manner in which
exercise ought to be conducted, so as to secure for the organ the best
health, and for the function the highest efficacy. A true system of
physiology comes thus to be the proper basis, not only of a sound
_physical_, but of a sound _moral_ and _intellectual_ education, and of
a rational hygiene; or, in other words, it is the basis of every thing
having for its object the physical and mental health and improvement of
man; for, so long as life lasts, the mental and moral powers with which
he is endowed manifest themselves through the medium of organization,
and no plan which he can devise for their cultivation, that is not in
harmony with the laws which regulate that organization, can possibly be
successful.
Let it not be said that knowledge of this description is superfluous to
the unprofessional reader; for society groans under the load of
suffering inflicted by causes susceptible of removal, but left in
operation in consequence of our unacquaintance with our own structure,
and of the relation of different parts of the system to each other and
to external objects. Every medical man must have felt and lamented the
ignorance so generally prevalent in regard to the simplest functions of
the animal system, and the consequent absence of the judicious
co-operation of friends in the care and cure of the sick. From ignorance
of the commonest facts in physiology, or from want of ability to
appreciate their importance, men of much good sense in every other
respect not only subject themselves unwittingly to the active causes of
disease, but give their sanction to laws and practices destructive
equally to life and to morality, and which, if they saw them in their
true light, they would shrink from countenancing in the slightest
degree.
Were the intelligent classes of society better acquainted with the
functions of the human body and the laws by which they are regulated,
continues this judicious writer, the sources of much suffering would be
dried up, and the happiness of the community at large would be
essentially promoted. Medical men would no longer be consulted so
exclusively for the cure of disease, but would be called upon to advise
regarding the best means of strengthening the constitution, from an
early period, against any accidental or hereditary susceptibility which
might be ascertained to exist. More attention would be paid to the
_preservation_ of health than is at present practicable, and the medical
man would then be able to advise with increased effect, because he would
be proportionally well understood, and his counsel, in so far, at least,
as it was based on accurate observation and a right application of
principles, would be perceived to be, not a mere human opinion, but, in
reality, an _exposition of the will and intentions of a beneficent
Creator_, and would therefore be felt as carrying with it an _authority_
to which, as the mere dictum of a fallible fellow-creature, it could
never be considered as entitled.
It is true that, as yet, medicine has been turned to little account in
the way of directly promoting the physical and mental welfare of man.
But the day is, perhaps, not far distant, when, in consequence of the
improvements both in professional and general education now in progress,
a degree of interest will be attached to this application of its
doctrines far surpassing what those who have not reflected on the
subject will be able to imagine as justly belonging to it, but by no
means exceeding that which it truly deserves.
Every person should be acquainted with the organization, structure, and
functions of his own body--the house in which he lives: he should know
the conditions of health, and the causes of the numerous diseases that
flesh is heir to, in order to avoid them, prolong his life, and multiply
his means of usefulness. If these things are not otherwise learned, they
should be taught--the elements of them at least--in our primary schools.
This instruction would come, perhaps, most appropriately from the
members of the medical profession. But either society generally, or
physicians themselves, or both, have mistaken the true sphere of a
physician's usefulness, and what ought to constitute the grand object of
his profession, namely, the _prevention of disease_, and the _general
improvement of the health_, and not the CURING of diseases merely. The
physician, like the clergyman in his parish, should receive a salary;
and he should be occupied, chiefly, in teaching the laws of health to
his employers; in imparting to them instruction in relation to the means
of avoiding the diseases to which they are more particularly exposed,
and in laying before them such information as shall be needful, in order
to the highest improvement of their physical organization, and the
transmission to posterity of unimpaired constitutions. This he may do by
public lectures, at suitable seasons of the year; and by visiting from
house to house, and imparting such information as may be particularly
needed. The physician should not allow any of his employers blindly to
disregard the laws of health, or, knowing them, to violate them
unreproved. _He_ should be accounted the _best physician_, other things
being equal, whose employers have the _least sickness_, and uniformly
enjoy the _best health_. When the relation existing between the members
of the medical profession and the well-being of society generally comes
to be better understood, and physicians are employed in accordance with
the principles just stated, their greatest usefulness to the communities
they serve will be found to consist in teaching well men and women how
to retain and improve their health, and rear a healthy offspring, and
not in partially curing diseased persons who are constantly violating
the laws of health. These views will doubtless be new to many of my
readers, and seem to them very strange! But let me inquire of such what
they would think of the clergyman who should neglect to instruct his
parishioners in the ennobling doctrines of morality and religion, and
should suffer them to go on in sin unrebuked, until they become a burden
to themselves? who should wait until his counsels were solicited before
he sounds the note of alarm, and points the guilty sinner to "the Lamb
of God which taketh away the sin of the world?" and who should confine
his labors almost entirely to _condemned criminals_? Such conduct on the
part of clergymen would doubtless be regarded by these very persons as
passing strange! The course commonly pursued in the employment of
physicians is equally unphilosophical, and floods society with a legion
of evils--physical and intellectual, social and moral--three fourths of
which might be avoided, by the proper exercise of the medical
profession, in _one generation_; and ultimately, nineteen twentieths, if
not ninety-nine one hundredths of them. As I have already said, this
instruction would come, perhaps, most appropriately from the members of
the medical profession. But if these things are not taught elsewhere, I
repeat it, they should be taught--the elements of them at least--in our
primary schools.
I can not better enforce the importance of physical education than by
quoting from a lecture "on the education of the blind," by one of the
most distinguished practical educators[2] in this country. "That the
proportion of the blind to the whole population might be diminished by
wise social regulations, and by the dissemination of knowledge of the
organic laws of man, there is not a doubt; but whether the time has
come, or ever will come, is another question. At any rate, to so
enlightened a body[3] as I have the honor of addressing, suggestions of
methods by which the extent of blindness may be limited will neither be
misapplied, nor liable to offend a mawkish sensibility. That the
blindness of a large proportion of society is a social evil will not be
denied, nor will the right which society has to diminish that proportion
be questioned. But how? in a very simple way; by preventing the
transmission of an hereditary blindness to another generation; by
preventing the marriage of those who are congenitally blind, or who have
lost their sight by reason of hereditary weakness of the visual organs,
which disqualifies them to resist the slightest inflammation or injury
in childhood.
[2] Dr. Samuel G. Howe, director of the New England Institution for the
Education of the Blind, 1836.
[3] The American Institute of Instruction.
"I am aware that many people would condemn this proposition as cruel,
because it might add to the sadness of the sufferers; and that the whole
seven thousand five hundred blind in this country would rise up and
scout it, as barbarous and unnatural; for I have experienced the effects
of contradiction to the wills of individual blind persons in this
respect. But my rule is, the good of the community before that of the
individual; the good of the race before that of the community. To give
you an instance: the city of Boston, with a population of eighty
thousand, is represented in the Institution for the Blind by two blind
children only; and I know of but four in the whole population; while
Andover, with but five thousand, is fully and ably represented by
seven;[4] and it has three more growing up.
[4] This makes the ratio of representation in the institution from
Andover _fifty six times greater_ than from the city of Boston.
"Now how is this? Why, the blind of Andover are mostly from a common
stock; three of them are born of one mother, who has had four blind
children. Another of the pupils is cousin, in the first degree, to these
three; and two other pupils are cousins in a remote degree. Then, from
other places, there are two brothers, who have a third at home. There is
one blind girl, who has two blind sisters at home. Then there are two
pairs of sisters.
"In the immediate vicinity of Boston, I know of a family in which
blindness is hereditary; the last generation there were five. Of these
five one is married, and has four children, not one of whom can see well
enough to read; and if the others marry, they may increase the number to
twelve or twenty.
"Now apply this state of things to the whole country, and have you any
difficulty in conceiving how it happens that there are seven thousand
five hundred blind in the United States? And can you doubt whether or
not this great proportion of blind to the whole community might not be
considerably diminished, if men and women understood the organic laws of
their nature? understood that, very often, blindness is the punishment
following an infringement of the natural laws of God; and if they could
be made to act upon the holy Christian principles, that we should deny
ourselves any individual gratification, any selfish desire, that may
result in evil to the whole community?
"I would that every individual whom I have the honor to address would
assist in the education of the blind, so far as to give them just and
Christian views of this subject. I would that all should work for
society; not for society to-day alone, but for the society of future
ages; not in any one narrow, partial way, but upon a broad scale, and in
every way in which they can be useful. If a person congenitally blind,
or strongly predisposed to become so, or one who marries a person so
born or so disposed, has blind offspring in consequence of it, I ask, is
he not as responsible, in a moral point of view, for the infirmity of
his children as though he had put out their eyes with his own hands?
"You may suppose, perhaps, that the infirmity of blindness would
incapacitate sufferers from winning the affections of seeing persons;
and that, with respect to two blind persons, the sense of incapacity to
support a family would prevent them from uniting themselves. In the
first place, I answer, that seeing people do no better than the blind.
Even a blind man may perceive that many marriages are mere matters of
course, resulting from juxtaposition of parties; and rarely matters
where the purer affections and higher moral sentiments are consulted.
And, in the second place, that incapacity of supporting a family will
not weigh a feather in the balance with desire, unless the intellectual
and moral nature is enlightened and cultivated. Do we not see, every
day, cases of misery entailed upon whole families, because one of the
parties had overlooked or disregarded _moral infirmity_, which ought to
have been a greater objection than any _physical defect_--than even
blindness or deafness?
"But no process of reasoning is required, for there stand the facts. The
blind not only seek for partners in life, but are sometimes sought by
seeing persons; and numerous instances have occurred within my
knowledge. It is true, that despair of success in any other quarter, or
an equally unworthy motive, may induce some to seek for partners among
the blind, or the blind to unite with the blind; but still, there is the
evil.
"My observation induces me to think that the blind, far more than seeing
persons, are fond of social relations, and desirous of family
endearments. A moment's thought would induce one to conclude that this
would naturally be the case; a moment's observation convinces one that
it is so. Now I have found among them some of the most pious,
intelligent, and disinterested beings I ever knew; but hardly more than
one who was prepared to forego the enjoyments of domestic relations. And
how can we expect them to be so, more than seeing people? The fact is,
but very few persons in the community give any attention to the laws of
their organic nature, and the tendency to hereditary transmission of
infirmities. Very few consider that they owe more to society than to
their individual selves; that if we are to love our neighbor _as
ourself_, we must, of course, love _all_ our neighbors, collectively,
more than the single unit which each one calls I.
"I would that considerations of this kind had more weight with the
community generally. I would that the subject were more attended to, and
that the violation of the laws of our organic nature were less frequent
in our country. There is one great and crying evil in our system of
education; it is, that but part of man's nature is educated, and that
our colleges and schools doom young men for years to an uninterrupted
and severe exercise of the intellectual faculties, to the comparative
neglect of their moral, and still more of their physical nature. Nay,
not only do they _neglect_ their physical nature--they ABUSE it; they
sin against themselves and against God; and though they sin in
ignorance, they do not escape the penalties of His violated laws. Hence
you see them pale, and wan, and feeble; hence you find them
acknowledging, when too late, the effects of severe application. But do
they acknowledge it humbly and repentingly, as with a consciousness of
sin? No, they often do it with a secret exultation, with a lurking
feeling that you will say or think, 'Poor fellow, his mind is too much
for his body!' Nonsense! his mind is too weak; his knowledge too
limited; he is an imperfect man; he knows not his own nature. But if he
has no conscientiousness, no scruple about impairing his own health and
sowing the seeds of disease, he has less about entailing them upon
others. And a consumptive young man or woman--the son or daughter of
consumptive parents--hesitates not to spread the evil in society, and
entail puny faces, weakness, pain, and early death upon several
individuals, and punish their children for their own sins.
"Is this picture too high-colored? Alas! no. And if I showed you
satisfactorily that sin against the organic laws caused so great a
proportion of blindness, how much more readily will you grant that the
same sin gives to so many of our population the narrow chest, the hectic
flush, the hollow cough, which makes the _victim doomed_, by his
_parent_, to consumption and early death! Do you not see, every Sabbath,
at church, the young man or woman, upon whose fair and delicate
structure the peculiar impress of the EARLY DOOMED is stamped? and as a
slight but hollow cough comes upon your ear, does it not recall the
death-knell which rang in the same sad note before to the father or
mother? Who of you has not followed some young friend to his long
resting-place, and found that the grass had not grown rank upon the
grave of his brother? that the row of white marbles, beneath which slept
his parents and sisters, were yet glistering in freshness, and that the
letters which told their names and their early death seemed clear as if
cut but yesterday?
"They tell us that physical education is attended to in this country;
and yet, where is the teacher, where is the clergyman even, who dares to
step forth in these cases, and say to those who are _doomed_, you must
not and shall not marry? and where are the young men and women who would
listen to them if they did? It is not that they are wanting in
conscientiousness; they may be conscientious and disinterested; but they
do not know that they are doing wrong, because they are not acquainted
with the organic laws of their nature. All that is done in schools or
colleges toward physical education is the mere strengthening of the
muscular system by muscular exercise; but this is not half enough. These
remarks may be deemed irrelevant to my subject, but they can not be lost
to an audience whose highest interest is the education of man; and if I
am mistaken in supposing that little attention has been paid to the
subject, its importance will guaranty its repetition."
Before dismissing this subject, I will introduce two additional
quotations from American authors, whose opinions are received by the
medical profession in this country not only, but throughout Europe. In
both instances, I copy from works published in Great Britain, into which
the opinions of these American writers have been quoted. In regard to
hereditary transmission, Dr. Caldwell observes: "Every constitutional
quality, whether good or bad, may descend, by inheritance, from parent
to child. And a long-continued habit of drunkenness becomes as
essentially constitutional as a predisposition to gout or pulmonary
consumption. This increases, in a manifold degree, the responsibility of
parents in relation to temperance. By habits of intemperance, they not
only degrade and ruin _themselves_, but transmit the elements of like
degradation and ruin to their posterity. This is no visionary
conjecture, the fruit of a favorite and long-cherished theory. It is a
settled belief resulting from observation--an inference derived from
innumerable facts. In hundreds and thousands of instances, parents,
having had children born to them while their habits were temperate, have
become afterward intemperate, and had other children subsequently born.
In such cases, it is a matter of notoriety that the younger children
have become addicted to the practice of intoxication much more
frequently than the older, in the proportion of five to one. Let me not
be told that this is owing to the younger children being neglected, and
having corrupt and seducing examples constantly before them. The same
neglects and profligate examples have been extended to all, yet all have
not been equally injured by them. The children of the earlier births
have escaped, while those of the subsequent ones have suffered. The
reason is plain. The latter children had a deeper animal taint than the
former."--_Transylvania Journal._
Physiologists in general coincide in the belief that a vigorous and
healthy physical and mental constitution in the parents communicates
existence in the most perfect state to their offspring, while impaired
constitutions, from whatever cause, are transmitted to posterity. In
this sense, all who are competent to judge are agreed that the Giver of
life is a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the
children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate him or
violate his laws. Strictly speaking, it is not _disease_ which is
transmitted, but organs of such imperfect structure that they are unable
to perform their functions properly, and so weak as to be easily put
into a morbid state or abnormal condition by causes which unimpaired
organs are able to resist.
My last quotation on this point is from a lecture delivered by Dr.
Warren before the American Institute of Instruction, copied into the
"Schoolmaster," a work published in London under the superintendence of
the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge:
"Let me conclude by entreating your attention to a revision of the
existing plans of education in what relates to the preservation of
health. Too much of the time of the better educated part of young
persons is, in my humble opinion, devoted to literary pursuits and
sedentary occupations, and too little to the acquisition of the
corporeal powers indispensable to make the former practically useful. If
the present system does not undergo some change, I much apprehend we
shall see a degenerate and sinking race, such as came to exist among the
higher classes in France before the Revolution, and such as now deforms
a large part of the noblest families in Spain;[5] but if the spirit of
improvement, so happily awakened, continues--as I trust it will--to
animate those concerned in the formation of the young members of
society, we shall soon be able, I doubt not, to exhibit an active,
beautiful, and wise generation, of which the age may be proud."
[5] I am informed by a lady who passed a long time at the Spanish court,
in a distinguished situation, that the grandees have deteriorated by
their habits of living, and the restriction of intermarriages to their
own rank, to a race of dwarfs; and, though fine persons are sometimes
seen among them, they, when assembled at court, appear to be a group of
manikins.