The Saint Paul globe., 1904-06-16
TOO MUCH EXERCISE
THE EXTREME OF PHYSICAL
CULTURE is BAD
Now and Then One Meets a Person
Who Never Exercises at All and Vet
Is WelI-WalI<ing Is Excellent for
Every One

People in these days have gotten into
the habit of thinking that physical ex-
ereiSe is the cure for every i'll. / was
reminded of this by reading the story
of a man, a learned judge eighty years
OF age, who never took any exercise
and not feeling well he consulted a
physician, who told him that he had no
business TO live without taking exer-
else. He further informed him that he
must at once give up his sedentary
habits and walk for an hour day. The
judge said that walking bored him and
that he feared he would walk himself
into his grave. The doctor insisted and
the man began to walk and in two
months he died.
The moral of this story is not that
exercise is unwise or injurious, but
that for men who have never exercised
to take a sudden squirt in their old age
is unwise. Modern men and women
have made of physical exercise a fetish,
and incidentally provided good liv-
ing for persons whose profession it is
TO show you how to exercise. every
muscle in your body at so much per-
Like all specialists, the physical cul-
turists claim that their Ology will heal
every i'll. Exercise will keep you young,
Will make your hair grow, take the
wrinkles out of your face. cure many
bodily complaints and do about every
thing except prevent your birthday
from bobbing up annually with great
precision. If you have pain in your
back, walk; if you have rheumatism, do
the exercises as taught by Prof. Flap
doodle seventeen times before going to
bed. If your hair is falling out have
your head massaged. All this is very
good if not carried to extremes. We
believe that nobody is healthy with
out exercise until we suddenly come
across some one, like the judge men
toned above, who never walks and yet
is well.
The Writer has in mind a woman who
is in the best of health and who never
walks at all, except across a room and
down stairs and back once a day Once
she was great invalid, and during the
time she was ill fell and injured her
hip. Since that time she has recovered
her health, but never recovered from
the effects of the fall and walks only
with assistance. For ten years she has
never been out except to drive and a
few years ago gave that up entirely
and never goes out of the house. She
is perfectly we'll, sleeps and eats we'll
and is the picture of health. But no
exercise of any kind does she ever take
pCOduSe she Is uildDI6 10. Inc writer
has another woman in mind who is
wonderfully well and who never walks.
She drives in her carriage and goes
about her own house, but exercise in
the proper sense of the term she never
takes. So it is not absolutely neces-
sary to take exercise to be well. There
are, of course, very few persons who,
in the course of a day, do not do some
walking, but there are hundreds, thou
n nI.aic OF oil
physical culture teachers tell us we
must.
Physical culture is all very we'll, but
like all good things, it is sometimes
carried TO extremes and then it does
real harm. These teachers will tell you
that walking is not exercise enough.
You must learn all sorts of ways of
waving your arms round and twisting
your neck and your body to bring into
play different muscles, and undoubted-
ly these things are beneficial to some
persons. But to telleus that we cannot