THE PHYSICAL ELEMENT IN EDUCATION. 473 



our women also to be in this respect real helpmeets to men, we 

 shall not have on this continent a race which is to remain. What 

 Dr. Clark says, in the Building of a Brain, may well be quoted 

 here : " On this continent races have been born and lived and dis- 

 appeared. Mounds at the west, vestiges in Florida, and traces 

 elsewhere proclaim at least two extinct races. The causes of 

 their disappearance are undiscovered. We only know they are 

 gone. The Indian, whom our ancestors confronted, was losing 

 his hold on the continent when the Mayflower anchored in Plym- 

 outh Bay, and is now also rapidly disappearing. It remains to 

 be seen if the Anglo-Saxon race, which has ventured upon a con- 

 tinent that has proved the tomb of antecedent races, can be more 

 fortunate than they in maintaining a permanent grasp upon this 

 western world." 



How shall we develop this power ? Regarding the new-born 

 child as a bundle of latent forces, how shall we draw out these 

 forces so that they shall be active, and yet be directed and con- 

 trolled by an enlightened will ? Only general suggestions can be 

 offered. The order of development is important. The earliest 

 attention should necessarily be given to the physical powers. 

 Nutrition is of the first importance. Next comes motion, the exer- 

 cise of muscles, and through these a certain development of mind 

 and will. And these phenomena of motion on the part of children 

 are so common, and, when we wish them to be quiet, so exasperat- 

 ing to us, that we miss their great importance in development. 

 How can children grow without continual motion ? Consider 

 how large a part of our physical economy is dependent on motion. 

 We pour food into the stomach, but the stomach is a muscular 

 organ and does a great part of its work through muscular motion. 

 It is to a certain extent dependent for its tone on the vigor of the 

 muscular system. After the food is converted into chyle and sent 

 drop by drop into the blood and is then passed through the oxy- 

 genizing process in the lungs, what is it that pumps it along the 

 arteries but another muscular organ, the heart ? And how much 

 help this flow of nutritious blood to the very extremities of the 

 system, into every nook and cranny of every organ of the body, 

 derives from the action of the voluntary muscular system, we can 

 hardly estimate. But we know the life current is quickened by 

 exercise and slackened by the cessation of exercise. There is an- 

 other way in which we know the influence of the voluntary mus- 

 cular system. When more exercise is taken, more food is required 

 to repair the waste, and there is better circulation of the blood. 



Again, consider the senses, those avenues of knowledge to the 

 knowing mind. Take the eye. It is not only a combination of 

 lenses with a retina behind them sensitive to impressions. The 

 lenses are furnished with adjusting muscles. And the ball itself 



