Physical Culture
[
Education, 210-213
(1903).]
The question of suitable recreation for their pupils is one that
teachers often find perplexing. Gymnastic exercises fill a useful place
in many schools, but without careful supervision they are often carried
to excess. In the gymnasium many youth, by their attempted feats of
strength, have done themselves lifelong injury.
Exercise in a gymnasium, however well conducted, cannot supply
the place of recreation in the open air, and for this our schools should
offer better opportunity. Vigorous exercise the pupils must have. Few
evils are more to be dreaded than indolence and aimlessness. Yet the
tendency of most athletic sports is a subject of anxious thought to those
who have at heart the well-being of the youth. Teachers are troubled
as they consider the influence of these sports both on the student’s
progress in school and on his success in afterlife. The games that
occupy so much of his time are diverting the mind from study. They
are not helping to prepare the youth for practical, earnest work in life.
Their influence does not tend toward refinement, generosity, or real
manliness.
Some of the most popular amusements, such as football and box-
ing, have become schools of brutality. They are developing the same
characteristics as did the games of ancient Rome. The love of domina-
tion, the pride in mere brute force, the reckless disregard of life, are
exerting upon the youth a power to demoralize that is appalling.
Other athletic games, though not so brutalizing, are scarcely less
objectionable, because of the excess to which they are carried. They
stimulate the love of pleasure and excitement, thus fostering a distaste
for useful labor, a disposition to shun practical duties and responsi-
[190]
bilities. They tend to destroy a relish for life’s sober realities and
its tranquil enjoyments. Thus the door is opened to dissipation and
lawlessness, with their terrible results.
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