324 THE NERVOUS SYSTEM 



best way, to think pure and unselfish thoughts, to cherish 

 the loftiest and noblest aspirations, is the most important 

 business of youth. Manhood prepared by such training is 

 ready for grand achievements. The spinal cord and the 

 lower brain centers have been drilled to prompt and accu- 

 rate reflex action, and much of the mechanical labor of 

 life is left to their unconscious ordering. Not only are 

 the ordinary movements of the body in walking, riding, 

 and the various athletic sports thus directed, but facility 

 and correctness of speech, both oral and written, have be- 

 come no longer matter for cerebral care. Rapid writing, 

 attended by accuracy in respect to the accepted forms and 

 rules of composition, has been acquired by thorough train- 

 ing, and the brain is left free to concentrate all its powers 

 upon the higher activities of thought and imagination. 

 That the products of those activities shall be worthy is 

 determined by the abundant store of memories of worthy 

 and beautiful objects, acts, purposes, and thoughts. No- 

 ble deeds will be inevitable because of the constantly 

 repeated, voluntary turning of nervous impulses into 

 channels for such results. Acts demanded by great and 

 sudden emergencies, when deliberation and reason are 

 impossible, will be unselfish, wise, and every way worthy, 

 because previous voluntary action has habituated all the 

 nerve centers so to respond to stimuli received when judg- 

 ment and reason have had time to consider. 



471 Heredity. Did each individual come into the 

 world with all his powers in their normal condition, and 

 grow up in the most favorable surroundings, such sym- 

 metrical and perfect manhood might be the expected and 

 ordinary result. Unhappily that is not the case. Many 

 eminent men of science believe that the impressions made 

 upon the soft substance of a man's brain in early life are 



