Physical life

“ It is sound physiology, as well as good morals and manners, to cease from the usual routine of six days of mental or physical work, and rest both the mind and the body on the seventh. Those who have succeeded best in what they have undertaken, and who have enjoyed sound health during a long and useful life, have studiously lived up to the mandates of this great physiological law. ”

“ At one extreme some say that all is mind, at the other, that life is entirely physical, that the mind is but a refined part of the body. Most of us recognize both body and mind, and realize that life has a physical basis. ”

“ It has called attention to mental and bodily unities, has served as a guide to explain the physical and psychical characteristics of individuals, and has been instrumental in applying physiological and hygienic principles to the habits of life, thus rendering a service for which the world is greatly indebted. ”

“ Where the motive organs, the muscles and bones, predominate, the physical powers will be most prominent. Where the vital organs, indicated by a heavy-set body and a full chest, predominate, the manifestations of life will be most prominent. Where the nervous system predominates, the mental powers will be most prominent.
Motive temperament.—The motive temperament is indicated by bones broad and large; muscles slim, firm and tough; the individual is tall, angular, brow prominent, cheek-bones high, shoulders broad, chest full, eyes and hair usually dark. ”

“ All of the vital functions are active; the large chest-room, the vigorous heart, the firm muscles, insure a bodily activity that keeps the operations of organic life in unconscious and easy motion. Digestion, assimilation, excretion, and elimination, work in harmony and with vigor.
Mentally, this type is the reflection of its physical traits. The rich blood, by its active circulation through the brain, causes vivid and active mental action. The general cast of the mind is never gloomy. ”

“ The living being, as they maintained, is composed of soul and body. The intellect has its seat in the heart, the liver serving as the central organ for the blood, which they considered to be the true life principle. ”

“ Those things which now most engage the attention of men, as politics and the daily routine, are, it is true, vital functions of human society, but should be unconsciously performed, like the corresponding functions of the physical body. They are infra-human, a kind of vegetation. I sometimes awake to a half-consciousness of them going on about me, as a man may become conscious of some of the processes of digestion in a morbid state, and so have the dyspepsia, as it is called. ”

“ Health means harmony, concord, rhythm between every part, and the power of the one individual intelligence to use it all, to act or refrain from action, and to hold and maintain through all, repose, equilibrium, and self-mastery.
The physical body we know to be a thing of sense and time. We know its beginning, its gestation, its entrance and exit on this material plane. Its secrets are all involved in the subtle relations it bears to the soul that inhabits, unifies, and utilizes it. ”

“ For, although, in the point of view of knowledge or intellect, the five senses are the really important approaches to the mind, yet, in the view of feeling or pleasure and pain, the omission of the varied organic susceptibility leaves a wide gap in the handling of the subject. Some of our very strongest pleasures and pains grow out of the region of organic life—the digestion, circulation, respiration, muscular and nervous integrity or derangement.
In exerting influence over human beings this department of sensibility is a first resource. ”

“ If any one doubts the importance of an acquaintance with the fundamental principles of physiology as a means to complete living, let him look around and see how many men and women he can find in middle life, or later, who are thoroughly well. ”

“ Will the theory of physical disease account for the instantaneous plunging of a man or woman into the deepest anguish who, scarce ten seconds before, were in the enjoyment of perfect health of spirit, soul and body? ”

“ With the ideas of unimpaired and unimpeded function as pleasurable, and of the new as demanding readjustment, we arrive at the consideration of health and disease. The free performance of any particular function is the first condition of the health of the organ of which it is the function, the regular performance of all physical functions according to the mutual adjustment [Pg 372] of the organs of the body the condition of the health of the organism as a whole. And thus again we come round to the conception of pleasure as connected with the action that accords with the health of the organism. ”

“ But further, the bodily life of man, it is evident, would be imperfect, because useless, was not the above union of the heart and lungs attended with operation, by acting on the body, and thereby supplying it with power to fulfil the various ends and purposes of bodily and natural life. ”

“ Take, then, the human body. This complex and beautiful system of correlated and nicely-adjusted parts may be studied in a state of maturity and equilibrium, in which all the organs and functions by action and reaction co-operate to produce perfect stability, health, and physical happiness. This study is physiology. ”

“ I have preferred to cultivate physiology in a more philosophic way, recognizing the eternal man who inhabits the body, as well as the transient physical form, and discovering a new class of facts which render our chemical and anatomical physiology far more philosophic and intelligible. What a blind groping in the dark rigidly materialistic physiology appears to one who has gained that full knowledge of our complex constitution which constitutes our anthropology! ”

“ I have found the following a very helpful exercise to take just before going to bed and on rising in the morning: Say to yourself, "Every cell in my body thrills with life; every part of my body is strong and healthy." I have known a number of people to greatly improve their health in this way. You become what you picture yourself to be. If your mind thinks of sickness in connection with self you will be sick. If you imagine yourself in strong, vigorous health, the image will be realized. You will be healthy. ”

“ Life then, or those functions which we call living, are the effects of certain exciting powers, acting on the excitability, or property distinguishing living from dead matter. When those effects, namely, the functions, flow easily, pleasantly, and completely, from the action of the exciting powers, they indicate that state which we call Health. ”

“ If we ask how we must live to secure the best health and longest life, the answer must be drawn from physiological knowledge; but if we ask how long the best mode of living will preserve life, the reply is, Physiology cannot teach you that. ”

“ Even in its present state these capacities are so interlaced that one cannot act strongly without inducing some action in the others; just as in the physical frame the brain, the heart, and the lungs can no one of them act unless all act in some degree; while in perfect health all act in the fulness of perfect harmony, no one organ rendering itself prominent by being more full of vitality and activity than another. ”

“ Through proper living and thinking the body and mind are built up, not only enough to meet ordinary demands upon them, but extraordinary ones. In other words, it is within our power to have a large margin, balance or reserve of physical and mental force. ”

“ According as the body is constituted and composed, as it is influenced by heredity, race, and [pg 285] selection, by nutrition, mode of life, climate, and other circumstances, there are developed in a hundred different ways what we call the natural disposition or character, inclinations, virtues or vices, passions or temperaments. Even the names given to the different temperaments emphasise this dependence of what is innermost in us, the deepest tendencies of our being, on the bodily organisation and the nature of its physiological constitution. ”

“ Physiology teaches the nature of man, the laws that govern his being, the functions of the vital organs, and the conditions upon which alone health and life depend. Phrenology treats of the laws of mind, the different portions of the brain, the temperaments, the organs, how to develop some and repress others to produce a well balanced and healthy condition. ”

“ Internally it reproduces the mould of all the organs which constitute the framework of the human body. We see it, in short, move, speak, take nourishment; perform, in a word, all the great functions of animal life. ”

“ We may therefore say that life is dependent upon voluntary as well as involuntary motion for its existence, and above all it may be affirmed, that a healthy and sound body is never seen, unless there has been proper daily exercise. For, as every function that we have named must be maintained in order that there may be a state of perfect health, so also the whole congeries of organs must be exercised together, in order that there may be nothing superfluous, and nothing wanting, in the entire fabric. ”

“ Every person should be acquainted with the organization, structure, and functions of his own body—the house in which he lives: he should know the conditions of health, and the causes of the numerous diseases that flesh is heir to, in order to avoid them, prolong his life, and multiply his means of usefulness. ”

“ It must not be forgotten that we mold not {51} alone what we call character, but that we manifestly produce effects upon our tissues that are lasting. Indeed it is these that count the most, for health at least. It is the physical basis of will and intellect that is grooved by what we call habit. ”

“ Assuming that the highest possible health of the body is represented by 100, and the lowest possible by the figure 1, and assuming, what no physiologist or metaphysician will question, that the head and heart keep step with the body, we shall not hesitate long in determining the state of the mind and soul of the fashionable, languid, nervous lady whom we meet in America at every turn, and who ranges from 10 to 50 on our scale. ”

“ The human body is a wonderfully complex piece of mechanism, and if left to itself or rather to natural guidance, its manifold functions are performed with unfailing regularity; and regularity in function means health— irregularity, disease. ”

“ If brains, nerves, stomach, etc., are intelligent, talk to us, tell us how they are conditioned and report how they feel, then Spirit and matter co-mingle, sickness and health, good and evil, Life and death, are mixed ”

“ New secrets of physiology may be revealed, deeply affecting human nature in its innermost recesses. The standard of health may be raised and the lives of men prolonged by sanitary and medical knowledge. ”

“ The innumerable changes, corporeal and mental, we reduce, by generalizing, to a few classes; and we speak, in reference to the mind, of its faculties or functions of perception, memory, reason, as we speak, in reference to the body, of its functions of respiration, circulation, nutrition. ”

“ Interpretation.—When straight and not dissected by obscure little lines, denotes a healthy body; if extending only to the hollow of the hand, or short, it denotes a short life, or full of disease; the longer this line, the longer may the life be; if cut at end poverty in old age. ”

“ When these subjects have been discussed as fully as our time will allow, I shall examine, at considerable length, the manner in which the powers that support life, which have been improperly called by physiologists, the nonnaturals, act upon the body. ”

“ I use my physical energy to serve every ounce of me, brain, nerves and organs. A man in health is a man in happiness, whether he be dining at Voisin’s, or on ripe figs on the hot rocks of les Baux. And I am a man in health ”

“ Individual Variations.—Another extremely 28important difference is that hunger, thirst, sleep, and other bodily instincts are implanted in every human being, and individual natural differences in regard to these instincts are so insignificant as to be negligible. (We wish to emphasize the word “natural” in its true sense, as in actual life many people develop so many different habits as to the quality and quantity of food and drink and in their ignorance call them their “nature.”) ”

“ In the healthy-minded, on the contrary, there are no fears or shames to discover; and the sensations that pour in from the organism only help to swell the general vital sense of security and readiness for anything that may turn up.
Consider, for example, the effects of a well-toned motor-apparatus, nervous and muscular, on our general personal self-consciousness, the sense of elasticity and efficiency that results. ”

“ The return to the great primitive elements of health—water, air, and simple food, with a regular system of exercise—has brought to many a jaded, weary, worn-down human being the elastic spirits, the simple, eager appetite, the sound sleep, of a little child. ”

“ We cannot but hope that, with a better knowledge of our physical structure, a clearer vision of the dangers to which we are exposed, more study of the laws of physiology, heredity, and of our environment, and above all, less reckless disregard of these in a mad pursuit of pleasure, wealth, and position, man's period of mature, healthy, and best activity may be lengthened, perhaps, even a score of years. ”

“ In certain nervous conditions, natural or provoked, this Force can possess the human organism and bring about, temporarily, either a change in one’s personality or an alteration in one’s sensations and in the intellectual and moral faculties. ”

“ The mind surely but unconsciously pervades every physical tissue with its vital influence, and is present in every function; throbbing in the heart, breathing in the lungs, and weaving 538its own quality into nutrition, assimilation, sensation, and motion. ”