INTRODUCTION. 23 



received by the children of 1870. This is good. The increase 

 in education through schools, publications and the increasing com- 

 plexity of civilization is now so rapid that it needs little or no 

 stimulus. What we need is more and better physical development 

 and an increase in the average age at which reproduction takes 

 place. One year added to the average age of reproduction is, as 

 far as the succeeding generations are concerned, nearly equal to 

 one year added to school education, and in some respects it is much 

 more important. Each year added to the average age of repro- 

 duction will, in a few generations, add two years to the average 

 length of useful life, but the race cannot support these added years 

 if the physical development is sacrificed to the mental. Healthy 

 development is a gradual process, hot house development is un- 

 healthy. We have gymnasiums, athletic clubs and physical culture 

 publications. These are good, but we should add to them sys- 

 tematic and scientific physical training for our children. We should 

 add to the curricula of our schools a regular course of physical 

 instruction under competent instructors. These should aim at, not 

 the production of athletes, but the production of sound and healthy 

 bodies. If this be done regularly and systematically, then the 

 average age of reproduction may be advanced from generation to 

 generation and man may yet live as many hundreds of years as he 

 now lives scores of years. 



