Gymnastics for Youth: Or A Practical Guide to Healthful and Amusing Exercises for the Use of Schools. An Essay Toward the Necessary Improvement of Education, Chiefly as it Relates to the Body

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Contents

I
1
II
51
III
87
IV
101
V
135
VI
183
VII
195
VIII
225
XII
287
XIII
315
XIV
331
XV
339
XVI
361
XVII
367
XVIII
371
XIX
411

IX
237
X
247
XI
265
XXI
417
XXIII
407

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Page 13 - ... word MANHOOD ; and is frequently rendered extremely prejudicial to the health of .both mind and body, by concomitant circumstances. May it ever be used with caution by the young, as a symbol of mirth and gaiety. " FENCING is an exercise of an admirable utility in itself : it strengthens the body, and infuses courage ; but it is applicable only in later years, and has a connexion too dangerous with what is called the point of honor. Much the same may be said of RIDING : suitable as it is to the...
Page i - GYMNASTICS / FOR / YOUTH: / OR A / PRACTICAL GUIDE / TO / HEALTHFUL AND AMUSING EXERCISES / FOR THE USE OF SCHOOLS. / AN ESSAY TOWARD THE NECESSARY IMPROVEMENT / OF / EDUCATION, / CHIEFLY AS IT RELATES TO THE BODY...
Page viii - Health rather than knowledge was to be the basic objective of education, for "learning and refinement are to health and bodily perfection what luxuries are to necessaries. Is not then our education depraved, when it aims at a luxury, and neglects our greatest and most essential want?
Page 90 - And thus I have done with what concerns the Body and Health, which reduces itself to these few and easy observable Rules : Plenty of open Air, Exercise, and Sleep, plain Diet, no Wine or strong Drink, and very little or no Physick, not too warm and strait Clothing, especially the 2 5 Head and Feet kept cold, and the Feet often us'd to cold Water, and expos'd to wet.
Page 113 - ... mind, which ought to be our constant aim, cannot be accomplished without the aid of the body, is it not incumbent on us to promote the health and strength of the body, that it may be capable of serving the mind, and of assisting, instead of impeding, its operations ? Hence Plato, in Protagoras...
Page 60 - Throughout all nature, want of motion indicates weakness, corruption, inanimation and death. Trenck in his damp prison, leaped about like a lion, in his fetters of seventy pounds weight, in order to preserve his health : and an illustrious physician observes, " I know not which is most necessary to the support of the human frame, food or motion.
Page 69 - For this muscular movement is likewise requisite. But rest of body relaxes the muscles, diminishes the vital heat, checks perspiration, injures digestion, sickens the whole frame, and thus numberless diseases are introduced.
Page 353 - Nothing, in fact,' says the latter, 'can be easier than learning to swim. Little more is necessary, than the persuasion, that you can swim if you will. This I was taught by the celebrated Franklin, see his letters, when I was six and thirty years old. On this authority I made the trial and succeeded. He says, "All men can swim, as well as all beasts; nothing more is requisite, than to have the courage to put yourself into a proper position, and make the same motions with your hands and feet as you...
Page 181 - ... mental exertion till their bodies are to a certain degree fatigued, I do not say wholly exhausted. Till this fatigue is produced, their body has a preponderance over the mind ; and in this case it is a truly natural want which cannot easily be silenced. Each muscle requires exertion, and the whole machine strives to employ its powers. This is vulgarly called, to have no sit-still flesh. If the fatigue be once brought on, the call for bodily exertion is stilled, the mind is no longer disturbed...
Page 22 - ... danger. How fond mothers are like to receive this doctrine, is not hard to foresee. What can it be less than to murder their tender babes, to use them thus ? What! put their feet in cold water in frost and snow, when all one can do is little enough to keep them warm!

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