A Lecture on Physical Development, and its Relations to Mental and Spiritual Development | Page 7

effect the law of nature, which does not act, it is true, all in a moment; but which slowly and truly tends to this. The Hindoo ties up an arm, for years together, as a penance, thinking thereby he does Brahma service; the limb with fatal sureness withers away, and rots. The prisoner in solitary confinement has his mind and faculties bound, fettered and tied, and by a law as fixed as that which keeps the stars in their places, the said prisoner's mind grows weaker, feebler, less sane, day by day. School children are confined six long hours in a close school-room, sitting in one unvarying posture, their lungs breathing corrupted air, no single limb moving as it ought to move, not the faintest shadow of attention being paid to heart, lungs, digestive organs, legs or arms, all these being bound down, and tied as it were; and so, by the stern edict of heaven, which, when man was placed upon earth, decreed that the faculties unused should weaken and fail, we see around us thousands of unhealthy children whose brains are developed at the expense of their bodies; the ultimate consequence of which will be, deterioration of brain as well as body.
What is the remedy for all this? I have before stated that in large crowded cities, gymnastic training, systematically pursued as a study, is the only thing which seems possible to be done, and most assuredly will be beneficial wherever it is introduced. But there is a different method of physical education, which can be pursued either exclusively, or in association with gymnastics, which can be followed up either in the country, or in towns, where playgrounds can be obtained. This is the method which I have invariably pursued myself, namely, the systematic pursuit of health and strength by all manner of manly sports and games. I myself learnt to play and love these games at school and at college. I have given them now nearly four years' trial in my school, and every day convinces me more and more of their beneficial results.
I cannot tell how much physical weakness, how much moral evil we have batted, and bowled, and shinnied away from our door; but I do know that we have batted and bowled away indolence, and listlessness, and doing nothing, which I believe is the Devil's greatest engine; and I also know that the enthusiasm of the boys in these games never dies out, their enjoyment never flags, for these games supply the want of the boys' natures, and keep their thoughts from straying to forbidden ground.
Now these games are the very thing which that portion of mankind called the sporting world, have always loved and cherished. They have infused the love of these games into the very bones of Englishmen, and who knows how much good England owes to them! Let us then overlook for a while the religious world, the commercial world, the literary world, for they do not contain what we seek now, and let us look at this poor sister world, a world which seldom finds itself in such good company.
Each of these worlds has its work; the one we now have to do with, the sporting world, is a world probably as much decried, and with as much reason, as any. But see how pertinaciously this world will persist in coming up to the surface wherever a community of men may be. See how rigorously the Puritans tried to put down, or rather squeeze this heinous tendency out of Human Nature! But they did not succeed, though goodness knows, they tried hard enough. Yet it has come up again, and lo! it is now as vigorous as ever. Friends! I am finding fault with the Puritans in the very midst of their descendants. But what greater compliment could I pay these old Puritans than this? for their greatest glory is, that they left to their descendants the precious legacy of free thought! and so deeply imbedded is this in the very bones of the race, that they will gladly hear a stranger criticize and even condemn, a portion of the Puritan mind: knowing full well, that the fabric which they builded on the shores of this Continent is sufficient to bear witness to the real manhood that was in them. But what was the reason of their failure? Simply they were trying to drive out Nature with a pitchfork, and she of course will perpetually keep coming back. So we say of this world, the sporting world, so liable to abuse, and so unsparingly abused, what is true of all the worlds, and that is, that it would be well for mankind, if they were to bestow a little thought upon the demands of this, as well as of the