[7] See pages [337] and [339].
CHAPTER IX
PHYSICAL TRAINING THE KEY TO HEALTH AND BEAUTY
The Ancient Greeks the Most Perfect Type of Beauty; the Cause of the Inferior Physique of American Women; the Physical Training of the Japanese Women; Improved Physique as the Result of Physical Training; Increasing Stature and Improved Physique of American Men; Report of the Royal Commission of Great Britain on Physical Training; Physical Training Among the Ancients; the Influence of Physical Training on the Health and Life of the Individual; the Effect of Exercise on Brain Development and Character; the Physiology and Pathology of Exercise; the Relative Proportions of a Perfect Female Form; Table of Standard Weights for Women; the Muscular System; the Benefits of Exercise; Passive Exercise; Massage; the Balance and Carriage of the Body; Common Defects in the Carriage of the Body; the Heart’s Need of Exercise; the Gymnasium in the Campaign against Disease; Gymnastic versus Athletic Training; Exercise after Eating; Effect of Brain Fatigue on Body Fatigue, and vice versa; Marks for Physical Efficiency; Advantages Derived from Athletic Sports; Ethical Value of Sports for Women; Forms of Athletic Games Best Suited to Women.
Physical training is the key to all beauty of form and face as well as grace of motion. Beauty without health is inconceivable.
The Greeks were the devotees of the beautiful, and they were the most perfect embodiments of health and beauty the world has ever seen. Their splendid physique was due to their outdoor life, physical training, which began in childhood and youth, and was systematically carried on throughout life, their public baths, and their athletics, sports and national games. Beauty is the inevitable corollary of health.
And the Greek artists bequeathed to all future generations a legacy of untold value, using the men and women of the golden age of Greece as the prototypes for the most beautiful statues which the world has ever seen, proving that through the perfect development of the muscular system alone can an ideal type of beauty be attained, and these statues also show that the women of that day were the physical compeers of the men.
The greatest attention to the physical development of her citizens was given in Sparta. Girls and young women were subjected to a similar, though less severe, training than men and boys. It included running, leaping, wrestling, and throwing the lance; these formed the favorite contests in the national games. Xenophon says: “The Spartans are the healthiest of all the Greeks, and among them are found the finest men and the handsomest women in Greece.” The women of the Teutonic tribes frequently accompanied their husbands to war, and exhibited instances of the most daring bravery.
History, as well as these magnificent legacies in marble and on canvas, teaches us that no greater fallacy could be imagined than that “we are women, and therefore weak.” On the contrary, “We are weak, because it never entered into our thoughts that we might be strong,” and it has been repeatedly proved that physical deterioration can be overcome by exercise, and that the same means greatly increases the mental capacity.
In savage races women are the equal, if not the superior, of the men, and woman’s smallness of stature, physical inferiority, and lessened powers of endurance must be attributed to the customs of civilized society carried on for hundreds of years.
The Cause of the Inferior Physique of American Women.—The majority of American girls and women of the present day have undeveloped muscles, a bad carriage, an impaired digestion, and are without skill in outdoor games, and unable to ride, row, or swim.