MIND IN RELATION TO BODY

Evening Star, Issue 22327, 1 May 1936, Page 11

MIND IN RELATION TO BODY

KWIIW GREEK SHUT The present-dav attitude to the culture of mind and body in proper relation to each other is discussed by Dr Arthur Macls ally, in his first annual report as chief medical officer of the Board of Education (Britain). This covers 1934. .... ~ Dr MacNalty recalls that in the golden age of Greek culture every young cituen would spend some hours of the day in playing a ball game, running, leaping, or throwing the discus; then he would bathe^ and go home to dinner. This physical training was continued into middle age, for it was a social stigma to be unwieldy or short of breath. Sun-bathing, too, had its devotees. Than, coming to this country and to the present day. Dr MacNulty writes; “In this land of fog and mist and, let us add, this land of bright spring days and radiant summers, the old Greek spirit has been renaptured and the harmony between training of the mind and training of the body has been re-established. “It is implicit in the aims and objects of State education. It is seen in the improved level of general education and knowldege, in the "laying holds and sports grounds of the. schools of to-day, in the walking parties and cyclists that throng tho roads and lanes of the countryside, in the great increase in swimming baths—both open-air and closed—of recent years, in the love of amateur sport and in tho increasing interest taken in the work of educational and health authorities. Yet, while much has been achieved, there is still much to bo done.” , .... Commenting on tho fact that if physical exercise is carried too far, two systems may be overworked instead of one. Dr MacNalty states:— “At older ages, anxious, nervous men frequently abuse muscular exercise in employing it as a means of resting tho brain. By Wavs such as these an attempt is made to correct one mistake by committing another. “On tho other hand, the boy and girl who arc overpressed in physical exercise or sports may suffer from exhaustion, which reacts unfavourably upon their mental capacities and causes them to fall behind in class work.”