t they
may have companionship in their plays. For girls this exercise is less
necessary. Dancing may take its place, and systematic exercise should be
used only where there is a tendency to some weakness or deformity. They
are not to become Amazons. On the other hand, boys need the feeling of
comradeship. It is true they find this in some measure in school, but
they are not there perfectly on an equality, because the standing is
determined to some extent by his intellectual ability. The academic
youth cannot hope to win any great preeminence in the gymnastic hall,
and running, climbing, leaping, and lifting do not interest him very
much as he grows older. He takes a far more lively interest in exercises
which have a military character. In Germany the gymnastic art is very
closely united with the art of war.

(The German idea of a woman's whole duty--to knit, to sew, and to obey
implicitly--is perhaps accountable for what Rosenkranz here says of
exercise as regards girls. We, however, who know that the most frequent
direct cause of debility and suffering in our young women is simply and
solely a want of muscular strength, may be pardoned for dissenting from
his opinion, and for suggesting that dancing is not a sufficient
equivalent for the more violent games of their brothers. We do not fear
to render them Amazons by giving them more genuine and systematic
exercise, both physically and intellectually.)

Sec. 67. The main idea of gymnastics, and indeed of all exercise, is to
give the mind control over its natural impulses, to make it master of
the body which it inhabits, and of itself. Strength and dexterity must
combine to give us a sense of mastership. Strength by itself produces
the athlete, dexterity by itself the acrobat. Pedagogics must avoid both
these extremes. Neither must it base its teaching of gymnastics on the
idea of utility--as, _e.g._, that man might save his life by swimming,
should he fall into the water, and hence swimming should be taught, etc.

The main thought must be always to enable the soul to take full and
perfect possession of the organism, so as not to have the body form a
limit or fetter to its action in its dealings with the external world.
We are to give it a perfect instrument in the body, in so far as our
care may do so. Then we are to teach it to use that instrument, and
exercise it in that use till it is complete master thereof.

(What is said about the impropriety of making athletes