The Four Epochs of Womans Life | Page 3

in his youth that his body is the ready servant of his will,
and does with ease and pleasure all the work that, as a mechanism, it is
capable of; whose intellect is a clear, cold, logic engine, to be turned to
any kind of work, to spin the gossamers as well as to forge the anchors
of the mind; whose mind is stored with the great and fundamental
truths of nature and the laws of her operations; one whose passions are
trained to come to heel by a vigorous will, the servant of a tender
conscience; one who has learned to love all beauty, whether of nature
or of art, to hate all vileness, and to respect others as himself."
The Correlation of Mind and Body.-- It is of the utmost importance that
the mutual reaction of mind and body upon each other should be
thoroughly understood. This reaction is so constant, so intricate, and so
complex that it is at times difficult to say which is cause and which
effect. Does the depressed state of the mind cause the indigestion, or is
a torpid liver the real seat of the melancholia?
The brain is the most delicately constructed organ in the entire body. In
the lower animals the brain is simply the great nerve-center which, with
its prolongation the spinal cord, presides over all the functions of life
which differentiate the animal from the vegetable. In the human being
the brain is much more highly developed and complicated; and is, in
addition, the seat of the mind, the intellect, and the affections. Like all
the other tissues of the body, the brain receives its nourishment from
the blood-vessels which pass through it, and its healthy maintenance is
in a direct ratio to the condition of its blood-supply.
A most interesting psychologic study is found in the case of cerebral
paralysis of young children, where there is mental defect amounting to
stupidity or imbecility, accompanied by extensive paralysis of the body,
so that the child is not able to sit up. With the gradual improvement of
the physical condition, so that the muscles become firm and the child
can sit, stand, and even walk, there is a corresponding mental
development; from being stupid and dull, the expression of the face

brightens and becomes intelligent; the child talks quite as well as other
children of its age, and sometimes becomes really intellectually
precocious. Here we see the development of the brain as a direct result
of the improved physical condition. In certain cases of insanity, on the
contrary, we find that the wasting away of the body results from the
disease of the brain, i. e., the disease of the brain has wrought the wreck
of the body.
From these pathologic studies, or studies of how the diseased state of
the brain and body may be overcome by physical development, on the
one hand, and, on the other hand, how the healthy body may be
wrecked by disease of the brain, we will turn to a consideration of the
effect of the development of the mind and intellect upon the physical
health.
On a girl's entering Vassar College an exact and detailed physical
examination is made by the resident physician, a health record is kept
during her stay there, and at the time of her graduation a final physical
examination is made. As a result of these statistics Dr. Thelberg says:
"These statistics, now covering a number of years, show that not only
can girls profitably take a college education, that is accomplished; but
will prove that grave physical imperfections can be corrected in the
period between eighteen and twenty-two years of age, coincidently
with the development of the mind along the lines of college work; the
college work, if not excessive in amount, being a real and most
important factor in the physical development."
But a still more striking proof can be cited of the beneficial result of
mental and intellectual occupation upon the bodily health. At Vassar a
great deal of attention is very properly paid to general hygiene and the
physical development, in addition to the natural advantages of outdoor
life in the country.
Take, for example, a woman's medical college located in the city: the
four years' course places the greatest strain on both mind and body;
practically no time is left for recreation, and very much too little time is
spent in sleep; the amount of exercise taken is the minimum. Yet in
spite of all these disadvantages under which the young women labor, a

great many of them who enter far below par in health, or, indeed, on the
fair road to become chronic invalids, graduate very greatly improved in
health.
The Emotional Nature.-- Formerly much more than now, owing to the
defective methods of her