eport
on National Vitality:--

"But prevention is merely the first step in increasing the breadth of
life. Life is to be broadened not only negatively by diminishing those
disabilities which narrow it, but also positively by increasing the
cultivation of vitality. Here we leave the realm of medicine and enter
the realm of physical training.... Beyond athletic sports in turn comes
mental, moral, and spiritual culture, the highest product of health
cultivation. It is an encouraging sign of the times that the
ecclesiastical view of the Middle Ages, which associated saintliness
with sickness, has given way to modern 'muscular Christianity.'... This
is but one evidence of the tendency toward the 'religion of
healthymindedness' described by Professor James. Epictetus taught that
no one could be the highest type of philosopher unless in exuberant
health. Expressions of Emerson's and Walt Whitman's show how much their
spiritual exaltation was bound up with health ideals. 'Give me health
and a day,' said Emerson, 'and I will make the pomp of emperors
ridiculous.' It is only when these health ideals take a deep hold that a
nation can achieve its highest development. Any country which adopts
such ideals as an integral part of its practical life philosophy may be
expected to reach or even excel the development of the health-loving
Greeks."

CHAPTER II

_LOCATION OF A HOUSE--SOIL AND SURROUNDINGS_

In attempting to develop a system of rural hygiene, by means of which
the full value of the advantages of pure air and sunlight, of healthful
exercise and sound sleep, may be realized, the first step should be a
proper location of the house. For, while it is possible to have good
health in houses not advantageously located, and while the influence of
unsanitary surroundings is not as great as was formerly supposed, yet
there can be no question but that some influences, whether they be great
or small, must result directly from the situation of a dwelling. For
example, it has been noticed that a house whose cellar was damp was an
unhealthy house to live in, and early text-books on hygiene quote
statistics at length to prove this fact.

The early theories connecting ill-health with conditions in and around
the house have been handed down, and to-day some are accepted as true,
although by the modern science of bacteriology most of the early notions
have been upset. For example, it was considered dangerous to breathe
night air i