t
revolutionizing the field of health conservation.

[Sidenote: Medical Practise]

The practise of medicine, which for ages has been known as the "healing
art," is undergoing a gradual but radical revolution. This is due to the
growing realization that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of
cure. As teachers and writers on hygiene, as trainers for college
athletes, as advisers for the welfare departments of large industrial
plants, and in many other directions, physicians are finding fields for
practising preventive medicine. Even the family physician is in some
cases being asked by his patients to keep them well instead of curing
them after they have fallen sick.

Furthermore, the preventive methods of modern medicine are being applied
by the people themselves, as witness the great vogue to-day of sleeping
out of doors; the popularity, not always deserved, of health foods and
drinks; the demand for uncontaminated water supplies, certified milk,
inspected meat and pure foods generally; the world-wide movement against
alcohol, and the legislation to correct wrong conditions of labor and to
safeguard the laborer.

Labor itself to-day is being held in honor, and idleness in dishonor.
Ideals are being shifted from those of "leisure" to those of "service."
Work was once considered simply a curse of the poor. The real gentleman
was supposed to be one who was able to live without it. The king, who
set the styles, was envied because he "did not have to work," but had
innumerable people to do work for him. His ability to work, his
efficiency, his endurance, were the last things to which he gave
consideration. To-day kings, emperors, presidents are trying to find out
how they can keep in the fittest condition and accomplish the greatest
possible amount of work. Even among society women, some kind of work is
now "the thing."

[Sidenote: High Ideals]

One of the most satisfying tasks for any man or woman to-day is to take
part in this movement toward truer ideals of perfect manhood and
womanhood. Our American ideals, though improving, are far inferior to
those, for instance, of Sweden; and these, in turn, are not yet worthy
to be compared with those of ancient Greece, still preserved for our
admiration in imperishable marble. With our superior scientific
knowledge, our health ideals ought, as a matter of fact, to excel those
of any other age. They should not stop with the mere negation of
disease, degeneracy, delinquenc