Emerson College - Emersonian Yearbook (Boston, MA)

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the chest, he does not exercise what i-s below the lungs. Deep, full breathing, exercises the muscles around the waist and exercises the abdomen. The contents of the abdomen are thus moved, and their energy is quickened. I am aware, in saying this, that certain works on physi- ology, declare that men and women ought to breathe differentlyg that, while men should take a full and deep respiration, women should not, that woman is not constituted so that she should, especially after the years of puberty. Yet, if we look at the muscles of respiration, we find that they are precisely alike in men and women, and the stomach and the liver need the same motions in both sexes in order to promote the activity of these organs. Now, the third method by which these vital organs are developed is by preserving a due balance between the energy that supplies and the energg that wastes. There are certain muscles of the body that quicken the supply of blood, -that develop the power of life. It is blood that we want, -it is blood for which every part of the organism is crying out. Nourishment, nourishment, nourishment! Where is the nourishment? In the blood. What manufactures the blood? The vital organs. Look well to them. From them radiates all power. The vital organs are the manufacturers of life. Now, a certain number of muscles are used perpetually 13

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seem to 'be so related to the vital organs that one can judge of the condition of a vital organ by the muscles over it. For example, one can judge of the condition of the stomach by the condition of the muscles over it. A physiologist would not neerl to ask a man how his food agreed with him if he could examine the muscles over the stomach. A person with chronic dyspepsia cannot bear a touch upon the muscles over the stomach. lf he happens to meet a hlunflering June bug he collapses. lVhy is this so '? My opinion is that the nerve centres which rule the vital organs are affected, through reflex action, by those nerve centres which govern the muscles sur- rounding the vital organs. Sonic muscles are con- trolled by the same nerves that control the organ under them. Those muscles that holfl the organs in place, create such activity in the pin-uinogastric nerve that it carries life and animation to the stomach and liver. I know not how else to account for this observable fact. I saw it lirst recorded by Dr. Jackson, thirty years ago, as a record of his long experience with dyspeptie patients and those who had what they called H liver complaint. p Moreover, the muscles that hold the stomach in place, constitute a portion of the muscles of respiiationg therefore, if a person breathes only in the upper part of 12

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in quickening tl1e activity of the vitztl O1'g2LI1S. 'llhcre are other sets of muscles that are used cc111ti11uz1lly in wasting the supply that comes lf1'c'1111 these vital organs. Now, this latter class of muscles 111:1y he developed until they will 0Xll2l1llStf the l1l1111d Ztlltl lcill the 1lQ1'SOllQ as in tl1e case of the XV41INll'l'illll, Dr. lVi11sl1i11, who developed such llll,lSljl1l21.l' 1111wc1' that he efmld lift two thousand seven llll1'llll'l1'tl 11o1111ds, llllli dit-fl of pros- tration. He lost the llilllllllftb l1Ul'VL't'4'll llll' two func- tions. A 11111.11 is truly Sll'C1llg', i11 111'11po1'ii1111 11s hc is SJCIOIIQ' in the vital ls't'lllI't'S. llc-rc is the fz1c't111'y 111a11ufuctu1'i11S' lllOOtl, 1111d that 11111-tr11'5' is li1'l't 1111 to its 1lO1'l112l1l tOl1G by exe1'c:isi11g the llll,lSt'lt'S :11'o1111d its oiguns. l1111s11111cg:h as tl1e1'1f is llllfiillltfl' set of muscles coiistantly using 1111 Zlllll l'Xll1lllSlllilg' the blood, we must 111'esc1've due l1z1l:111111' l11fl11'ee11 the two sets. lVe 'l71'1l-Sf sI'1w'11,g1f71v1z ffm f'f'Hfl'1'N 11'!11'If' 11-1' .f 1'1wf the swfaces. If the tltillllilvlltsl of the 11111s1-les that waste, exceeds tl1e vital supply, no 11111tte1' how stroiig the muscles are, the health is going down. Stfl'Qllg'ill of muscle is 11ot l'1Q211ll3l1. XVe must. then. lime 21 syste111 of physical culture that 211l11lS directly at the vital 0l'Q'21-llSZ first, and second,z1nd all the way tl1l'UllQl1. It is the testimony of physiciauis thz1,t over ninety per cent of diseases are caused by ClG1'Zl111gC1l1Gl1l? of the StOlllltC1l1 and liver. Hence the i111po1't11,11cc of St1'G1lg'iLl19llll1g 14