Emerson College - Emersonian Yearbook (Boston, MA)

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. physical education lay dormant. The modern gymna- sium has revived it. The enthusiasm for bodily training thus created, will be of inestimable value, for, as a public, we are lethargic upon this all-impor- tant subject. In setting forth and describing in some detail, exer- cises, many of Which are original with me, and all of Which are practised according to principles that have not heretofore entered prominently into the theory and practice of other instructors in physical education, I Write in no spirit of criticism of systems or methods. I recognize no antagonism. A great bank- of darkness envelops the world. Every true teacher is a torch- bearer, advancing into that darkness. We cannot add to the general illumination of the World by extinguish- ing the torches of others. No great artist ever spent his time in criticism of other artists. Michael Angelo Was once asked to criti- cise some of Raffaelas frescoing. I-Ie said nothing, but he took a crayon and drew a figure --the best he could, and then replied: HI criticise by example. Michael Angelo emphasized a gospel principle. Criticise your neighbor by example, by living better, if you can. As much of truth as is in your Work will be immortal 5 the rest you do not Wish should live. Mendelssohn once Said: 44 I do not Want to hear so much criticism of music.

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in regard to public schools, and the time allowed for physical exercises therein, are sufficient to show us that, as a nation, we have little conception of what physical education requires. It is astonishing, in view of the past, and in view of the future, that inen do not see that, in a republican government, we must depend upon the strength and the power of the inen and the women who carry it forward,-- that nothing is attained without the rounding of the whole nian. I scarcely need refer to the Greeks, and yet, so far as education is concerned, they have been the despair of all suc- ceeding ages. YV e have had in no other age schools to be compared in results with the Greek schools. Nowhere else has there been such personal education. Wliat did they lay as the basis '? Physical culture. ln that is the secret of their success. Greece has given us representative inen in every department. VVe point to Greece for the greatest orator, for the greatest creative poet, for the greatest sculptor, for the first nian in what we consider the highest mental philosophy. Plato intellectually stands at the head of all the philosophers of the world. We inust reineinber, then, that that which made the Greeks what they were about four or five hundred years before Christ, was the natural evolution from physical culture. For nearly two thousand years the subject of 0 A o ,

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i I Want the critic to compose some music. But I may say a Word in a fraternal spirit to the effect that I believe there is something good in nearly every system of physical culture. I never felt like discouraging any. All teachers and students of physical culture, if they but understood these spiritual fraternities, would consider themselves brothers and sisters, and not be ready to say, L4 My system is all right, and yours is all Wrongf' V Let us say in the new light, H Come, let us reason together. Let us openly contribute all we may, for when We are advocating any system of culture, be it mental or physical, it is the Welfare of the race that is involved. In presenting exercises which, in the principles involved, and in the arrangement and in the methods of practice constitute a unique system of bodily educa- tion, I' shall speak, first, of results. ffrllhe true test of the merit of a method is its results? Now, ten years of experience, ten years of watching effects has shown that the results of practising this method of physical culture are simply Wonderful, more marvel- lous than I should like even to state. I can only allude in passing to the great cures that have been Wrought in those Who have followed it faithfully, -- to the many who have been restored from dyspepsia, from - 4