MUSCLES 



285 



manent invalid. Exercise is useful and necessary, but ath- 

 letics are frequently harmful in their effect on the body. 



Exercise for the Student. The person who usually needs 

 the most emphatic advice as to exercise is the one who is 

 ambitious to become a scholar. He much prefers to remain 

 at his books, though he above all others should be the one 

 to take regular recreation. He who studies all the time is in 

 the end outstripped, even at his studies, by the one who plays 

 as well as studies. No one can become a scholar who neglects 

 to develop his body while cultivating his brain. He will be 

 likely to find in a few years that he must give up study al- 

 together because his body has been allowed to become weak 

 while carrying out the dictates of his brain. Colleges have 

 been forced to make gymnasium practice a part of the stu- 

 dent's regular work in order to 

 counteract his tendency to shut 

 himself up with his books. 



Kind of Exercise. Exercise is 

 always most beneficial if it is 

 pleasant; exercise merely for the 

 sake of using muscles is sure to 

 become irksome. Hence, games 

 of base- ball or tennis, rowing or 

 bicycling in the country are 

 preferable to gymnastics or hard 

 work at a required occupation. 

 The mind needs its recreation, 

 as well as the body its exercise. 

 Out-of-door games are best. 

 Bicycling is an excellent ex- 

 ercise, although attempts to take long rides are mischievous, 

 and the habit of stooping over the handle bars and "scorch- 

 ing" is extremely bad. Horse-back riding and walking are 

 also good, but walking for exercise should be varied by some 

 running or rapid walking up hill, so as to make one somewhal 



FIG. 142. DIAGRAM 



Showing the effect upon the poise 

 of the body produced by improper 

 standing posture. The dotted line 

 represents the backbone. 



