precepts must be made very familiar, copiously illustrated, well wrought
together by habit and attentive thought, and above all clear cut, that the pain of
violating them may be sharp and poignant. Vague and too general precepts
beyond the horizon of the child's real experience do not haunt him if they are
outraged. Now the child must obey these, and will, if he has learned to obey well
the command of others.
One of the best sureties that he will do so is muscle-culture, for if the latter are
weaker than the nerves and brain, the gap between knowing and doing appears
and the will stagnates. Gutsmuths, the father of gymnastics in Germany before
Jahn, used to warn men not to fancy that the few tiny muscles that moved the
pen or tongue had power to elevate men. They might titillate the soul with words
and ideas; but rigorous, symmetrical muscle-culture alone, he and his Turner
societies believed, could regenerate the Fatherland, for it was one thing to paint
the conflict of life, and quite another to bear arms in it. They said, "The weaker
the body the more it commands; the stronger it is the more it obeys."