LIFE AND HEALTH 



CHAPTER I .\ i ::"vl?J 

 INTRODUCTION 



1. Physiology in Schools. As a branch of study in our 

 schools, physiology aims to make clear certain laws of 

 health. Through a proper knowledge of these laws, and 

 their practical application, we may hope to spend happier 

 and more useful, because healthier, lives. 



Hence, of all our school studies, no other should appeal 

 to us with such peculiar force as does physiology, for it is 

 the study of ourselves. 



2. Questions which suggest themselves to the Thoughtful. 

 Physiology appeals to us even from the first in a deeply 

 personal way. Every thoughtful young person who takes 

 up this study will now begin, even if he has never done so 

 before, to ask himself a hundred questions about " the house 

 in which we live." 



Why is breathing so essential to our life, and why can- 

 not we stop breathing when we try ? Where within us, 

 and how, burns the mysterious fire whose subtle heat 

 warms us from the first breath of infancy till the last hour 

 of life ? 



How is it that we can lift these curtains of our eyes 

 and behold all the wonders of the world around us, then 

 drop them, and though at noonday, be instantly in 



