156 ANSWERS TO PRACTICAL QUESTIONS 



32. la a staid, formal promenade suitable exercise? 



No. There is an intimate relation between the brain and 

 the muscles. The mind should be pleasantly employed to ob- 

 tain the full effect of any exercise.* The sports of children are 

 often the very perfection of healthful gymnastic exercises. 



33. Is there any danger in changing the warm clothing 

 of our daily wear for the thin one of a party ? 



Very great. The body is not so well protected as usual 

 against a sudden change of temperature, as in going from a 

 heated room to the carriage, and a cold is often the conse- 

 quence. This may lay the foundation of fatal disease. 



34. Should we retain our overcoat, shawl, or furs, when 

 we come into a warm room ? 



No. The body will become over-heated, the pores be opened, 

 and the skin be rendered susceptible to the change of tempera- 

 ture when we return into the open air. 



with, the poverty of their diet ; but finding, on the other hand, that the 

 Romans, in the best period of the Republic, largely sustained themselves 

 on turnips, and that degeneracy came in as turnips went out, we are com- 

 pelled to reconsider our opinion. In brief, an exclusively vegetable food 

 may be best suited to those by whom it really is preferred. Children in 

 this respect exhibit the greatest difference ; some, with manifest advan- 

 tage, eat meat in large quantity others can hardly be prevailed on to taste 

 it, and yet retain perfect vigor. Similar differences, in all probability, exist 

 among adults; but a vegetarianism self-imposed against the promptings 

 of desire, would tend, as a vigorous writer says, to make us " not the chil- 

 dren, but the abortions of Paradise." HINTON. 



* The mental operations, like all others, are connected with changes in 

 the material of the body. In all our consciousness the chemical tenden- 

 cies of the substance of the brain come into play, and thus a chain of 

 action is set up which extends throughout the system. The influence of 

 these brain-changes is felt wherever a nerve travels, and modifies, invigor- 

 ates, or depraves the action of every part. Experience gives ample proof 

 of this fact to every one, as in the sudden loss of appetite a piece of bad 

 news will cause, or in the watering of the mouth excited by the thought 

 of food. And the history of disease abounds in evidence of a similar kind : 

 hair becoming gray in a single night from sorrow, milk poisoning an infant 

 from an attack of passion in the nurse, permanent discoloration of the 

 skin from terror, are among the instances on record. HINTON. 



