WeRead Powered by ReaderPub
Man's supreme inheritance cover

Man's supreme inheritance

Chapter 40: CONCLUDING REMARKS
Open in WeRead

About This Book

A practitioner advances a theory that many physical and mental ailments arise from habitual misuse of the body and can be addressed through conscious guidance and re-education of posture, breathing, and coordination. He critiques contemporary physical-culture remedies as inadequate, outlines practical principles and exercises for teachers and clinicians, and supports his claims with clinical observations and philosophical reflection on human development. The work seeks to promote integrated, efficient bodily use to reduce strain, improve daily and artistic function, and foster broader physical and mental well-being.

CONCLUDING REMARKS

The foregoing will serve to draw attention to the far-reaching and beneficial effects of what, for the lack of a more satisfactory and comprehensive name, I refer to as respiratory re-education.

It is a method that makes for the maintenance and restoration of those physical conditions possessed by every normal child at birth, the presence of which ensures a proper standard of health, adequate resistance to disease, and a reserve power which, if a serious illness should occur, will serve to turn the tide at the critical moment towards recovery. The insurance of such a condition for a generation would mean the regeneration of the human race as constituted to-day; and I have no hesitation in stating that the results secured during the past twenty years, and particularly during the past thirteen years in London in co-operation with leading medical men, justify me in asserting that the practical application of the principles of this new method in education and re-education will be invaluable in overcoming the disadvantages and bad habits of our artificial civilised life, and that they will prove the great factor in successfully checking the physical degeneration of mankind.