CHAPTER XXVI 



THE EMOTIONS 



Questions. 1. Are all people naturally (instinctively) afraid of the 

 same things ? 2. What good does it do living things to feel fear ? 3. Does 

 fear ever interfere with adjustment ? 4. How does anger help life ? 

 5. Do all people naturally feel anger at the same things ? 6. Can we 

 learn to overcome fears ? 7. Can we learn to control anger ? 8. Can we 

 make use of our fears and angers ? 



206. Our double muscular system. In the simplest animals 

 every stimulus may result in a contraction or a movement. The 

 whole protoplasm takes part in receiving the impression and in 

 producing the reaction. In our bodies movements are brought 

 about by the action of muscles (see Fig. io8), of which there 

 are two kinds, (i) Those with which we are most familiar (in 

 the flesh of animals that we use as food) are attached to the 

 bones of the skeleton and to the skin. The fibers of these mus- 

 cles show characteristic cross stripes (see Fig. 119). They are 

 sometimes called voluntary muscles, because we can cause them 

 to contract at will. (2) Those muscles that are present in the 

 inner organs— the stomach, the walls of the intestines, the blood 

 vessels— are not striped (see 3, Fig. 31). They are called invol- 

 untary muscles, because we cannot contract them at will.^ 



The striped, or skeletal, muscles hold the body in position : 

 they make possible locomotion, grasping, getting and chewing 

 food, directing our sense organs, and making sounds with our 

 voice. The smooth muscles relate the parts of the body to one 

 another. Through their activity food is moved, blood is trans- 

 ported and delivered, and so on. The voluntary system usually 

 works under more or less direct control of the central nervous 



1 The muscles of the heart are striped, resembling those of the skeleton ; but 

 they are not voluntar>% resembling those of the viscera. 



2;i 



