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Exercise and Air
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time and money. Exercise, and a free and abundant use of the air
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and sunlight,—blessings which Heaven has freely bestowed upon
all,—would give life and strength to the emaciated invalid.
A large class of women are content to hover over the stove,
breathing impure air for one half or three fourths of the time, until
the brain is heated and half benumbed. They should go out and
exercise every day, even though some things indoors have to be
neglected. They need the cool air to quiet their distracted brains.
They need not go to their neighbors to gossip, but should make
it their object to do some good, working to the end of benefiting
others. Then they will be an example to others and receive real
benefit themselves.
Perfect health depends upon perfect circulation. Special attention
should be given to the extremities, that they may be as thoroughly
clothed as the chest and the region over the heart, where is the
greatest amount of heat. Parents who dress their children with the
extremities naked, or nearly so, are sacrificing the health and lives
of their children to fashion. If these parts are not so warm as the
body, the circulation is not equalized. When the extremities, which
are remote from the vital organs, are not properly clad, the blood
is driven to the head, causing headache or nosebleed; or there is a
sense of fullness about the chest, producing cough or palpitation
of the heart, on account of too much blood in that locality; or the
stomach has too much blood, causing indigestion.
In order to follow the fashions, mothers dress their children
with limbs nearly naked; and the blood is chilled back from its
natural course and thrown upon the internal organs, breaking up the
circulation and producing disease. The limbs were not formed by
our Creator to endure exposure, as was the face. The Lord provided
the face with an immense circulation, because it must be exposed.
He provided, also, large veins and nerves for the limbs and feet,
to contain a large amount of the current of human life, that the
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limbs might be uniformly as warm as the body. They should be so
thoroughly clothed as to induce the blood to the extremities. Satan
invented the fashions which leave the limbs exposed, chilling back
the life current from its original course. And parents bow at the
shrine of fashion and so clothe their children that the nerves and
veins become contracted and do not answer the purpose that God