MISCELLANEOyS PAPERS. 353 



PHYSICAL DEVELOPMENT AND SCHOOL LIFE. 



By Db. J. M. McWhaef, Ottawa. 

 Read before the Academy, at Topeka, December 30, 1904. 



PHYSICAL culture is necessary at the present day. The mer- 

 chant, the professional man, the clerk and the artisan feel it their 

 duty to atone for sins against their personality ; hence gymnasiums and 

 facilities for athletic sports of various kinds are placed at his com- 

 mand, giving him an opportunity to indulge in physical culture 

 according to his taste or fancy. We have a profusion of learned 

 dissertations upon the necessity of exercise to overcome the direful 

 effects of our enervated life. In perusing them we are led to believe 

 that in exercise alone is to be found the universal remedy for the 

 violation of nature's laws. I have no desire to underestimate the good 

 that may be accomplished by properly regulated exercise ; and yet, it 

 may not be out of place to halt and consider the natural physical de- 

 velopment in contradistinction to the artificial. It is an axiom that 

 the early years of life are preeminently the ones in which the body 

 may and should be developed in a natural way. But is it not the 

 period when a proper physical development is most easily interfered 

 with ? During early life nature is usually allowed to have her sway, 

 and is not hampered in her efforts to gradually bring about a nicely 

 adjusted coordination of the functions of the body. As this child of 

 nature advances in years the time of artificial education arrives, which 

 means that it must be subjected to conditions entirely at variance 

 with its former habits of life — one which may or may not exert a de- 

 leterious influence upon its physical development. 



In this connection the question of school life and its effects upon 

 physical development confront us. It is not an easy matter to deter- 

 mine to what extent premature or close mental application is or may 

 be responsible for defective bodily vigor. Investigations with this 

 object in view must of necessity be general in character ; hence cannot 

 take into account the individual. 



The school is composed of children in all stations of life, thus pre- 

 senting an average of a given community. By a study of this aver- 

 age we are enabled to arrive at a conclusion with reference to the 

 perfection or imperfection of a system of education, in so far as it 

 affects the health of the child. It is charged against our present 

 school system that it imposes too great a demand upon the young 

 organism in the critical period of its growth ; that it seeks to stimu- 

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