368 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



But while our science and our art are now steadily growing 

 in precision and usefulness, our practical accomplishments are 

 greatly limited, because general enlightenment regarding the 

 things of the body has not kept pace with the acquisitions of 

 science. 



Our new outlooks in preventive medicine have made it plain, 

 as I have said, that a very wide curtailment of suffering and a 

 large saving of human life are possible if only the people can have 

 an elementary knowledge of the human body and of such simple 

 principles of hygiene and sanitation that under the increasingly 

 complex conditions of modern life they may be able to guard 

 against common forms of infection and against unwholesome 

 modes of life, which not only invite infection, but many other 

 forms of ill. 



It seems to me that here the schools and the colleges have 

 high responsibilities, and of these I wish briefly to speak. 



The conviction has for some time been current that the chil- 

 dren should be taught something about the structure and work- 

 ing of the human frame, and in this way already much has been 

 achieved. Of the importance of this sort of knowledge no spe- 

 cial demonstration is needed to-day. But in many of the public 

 schools in this land the instruction in physiology and hygiene 

 has been of late largely subordinated, if not actually falsified, to 

 the interests of what some are pleased to call temperance ; mean- 

 ing thereby the avoidance of alcohol and tobacco, lest horrible 

 and frequently impossible things should happen to the liver or 

 the brain. 



But I think that the distortion of truth is not liable to lead at 

 last, no matter how worthy the motive, to the ends for which the 

 anti-alcoholic and anti-nicotinal physiologies and hygienes of our 

 schools have been devised. It seems to me certain that a great 

 deal of the future physical and mental well-being of our people 

 depends upon the acquirement early in life of absolutely accurate, 

 though it be rudimentary, knowledge of this complex and sensi- 

 tive bodily mechanism ; and that the self-control and self-respect 

 which such knowledge fosters will in the long run do more than 

 vague fear of bodily ill to promote a temperance much more com- 

 prehensive and beneficent than that which centers itself in the 

 avoidance of alcohol and tobacco, bad as the misuse of these may 

 be. It is to be hoped that mistaken zeal in this direction may 

 not long prevail to the physical and moral detriment of the 

 children. 



Many of our institutions for higher education now recognize 

 the value of a knowledge of the body, and of the physical condi- 

 tions under which man can best secure the highest usefulness and 

 enjoyment. But I do not think that as yet this subject has re- 



