Intermarriage, or, How and why beauty, health and intellect result from certain unions, and deformity, disease and insanity from others / by Alexander Walker.

  • Walker, Alexander
Date:
1897
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Intermarriage, or, How and why beauty, health and intellect result from certain unions, and deformity, disease and insanity from others / by Alexander Walker. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    drinks. For the same reason should be avoided retention of urine and constipation, which attract the blood towards the parts whence it is desirable to withhold it. The habit of cleanliness, practised from the earliest youth, becomes a valuable corrective at puberty. An important subject of observation is clothing, and the necessity of habituating young people to cold, particularly with regard to the reproductive organs. “ Trousers,” it is observed, *' either very warm, or lined with woollen stuff, are highly improper, both on account of uncleanliness, and consequences which it is desirable to prevent. Young persons should not be permitted to lie on down beds ; nor, if long sedentary, to sit on soft chairs, to which rush, or wooden bottomed ones are greatly preferable. Neither should they be allowed to remain in bed longer than requisite, or to lie down needlessly on couches. While the languisliings of love spring up in soft repose, strong exercise extinguishes tender sentiments, and at the same time produces a revulsion to the other organs. The history of the goddess of hunting is a philosophical allegory, which expresses the great truth, that bodily exercise extinguishes all violent disposition to pleasures. “ Otia si tollas, periere cupi- dinis arcus,” is a sentiment that ought never to be forgotten. Care should even be taken to prevent young persons habitually leaning against anything, so as not to have all their muscles in action. In lads, activity, so necessary to an equal distribution of the nutritive juices, must be fostered by such means as are described by Donald Walker, in that most accurate and perfect work on the subject, entitled, Manly Exercises, in which are described, and illustrated by plates, walking, running, leaping, vaulting, balancing, skating, climbing, swimming, rowing, sailing, riding, driving, &c. To young women, exercise will be frequently necessary to prevent attachment to fanciful objects, as well as the tendency to dwell on those subjects which it is desirable to avoid. With