Machines have replaced muscles. The old printer walked from case to case and got exercise. Today he sits in an easy backed chair and uses a linotype.
Telephoning is quicker than traveling. No one "runs for a doctor."
Our houses have electric washers, electric irons and many other labor-saving devices.
Even the farmer has his telephone, his auto, his riding plow, his milking machine and his cream separator.
In the stores the cash boy has disappeared, the cash carrier takes the money to a girl who sits, a machine makes the change, another machine does her mathematics.
The modern idea of efficiency puts a premium on the sedentary feature of occupations and employees are frequently automatons that sit.
The business man sits at his desk, sits in a comfortable automobile as he goes home, sits at the dinner table and sits all evening at the theater, or at the card table. It is sit, sit, sit until he gets a big abdomen, a puffy skin and a bad liver.
He tries to counteract this with forced exercise in a gymnasium or a couple of hours golfing a week. Very likely his golfing is more interesting because of the side bets, than because of the exercise.
We are losing out on the natural, pleasurable, and practical exercises, mixed in the right proportions to promote physical poise and health. Things are too easy, luxury and comfort too teasing, for the ordinary mortal to resist, and the great mob sits or rides hundreds of times when they should stand or walk.
When my objective point is five or six blocks I walk and I think on the way. I probably get in two to four miles of walking every day, which my friends would save by riding in the street cars or autos.