Meanwhile I do sincerely hope that others will take hold of these matters in all seriousness, and assist me in arriving at these practical physical forms, which I trust, in fact _know_ beyond the shadow of a doubt, will be fruitful of the most beneficent results in the teaching of the deaf, of singing and elocution, of pure vocal utterance in speaking; in curing stammering and other chronic faulty or deficient utterance; besides numerous other matters of equal importance not in immediate connection with vocal utterance. That these matters must be and are of the greatest importance to the medical student goes without saying. It is to be hoped that they may lead to a more rational treatment of our frail and often ailing bodies. I say "bodies" because this is the common phrase. Yet how false this is, every true physician is but too conscious of. Our ailments cannot be successfully treated from a mere physical standpoint. The question of life is not a mechanical one; it is spiritual beyond anything else, the spirit being the motive power giving life to the otherwise inert physical body. Yet the only endeavor of the physician has always been to cure the "machine," to set its mechanism right again when it is out of order, simply because he has not been able to get at the spiritual motive power which propels it. I have been trying to get at this motive power, and to some extent have been successful in so doing. Besides, the _body_ never suffers. Its ailments make the soul suffer; while the ailments of the soul have a comparatively less injurious effect upon the body. The body is the habitation of the soul. The soul dwells in its _every_ part. As long as this habitation is habitable the soul continues to dwell therein. When it becomes uninhabitable the soul departs, never to return. Hence a body, never so frail and ailing, will continue to live as long as a vital part is not affected, that is, a part the soul _requires_ for its habitation and cannot do without. Close such part to the indwelling of the soul, prevent material and spiritual factors from joining hands therein, and the spirit departs. Once departed it can never be made to return. Hence a body in the full vigor of health, after having been immersed in water sufficiently long to have any one vital avenue positively closed against the indwelling of the soul, cannot be resuscitated. As long as the soul clings to it, however, with never so feeble a grasp, it may come to life again, in the same manner that a flame nearly extinguished may be fanned to life again. For me to _fully_ describe my mode of proceeding in arriving at these matters would be equal to an attempt at crowding into a few paragraphs _all_ I have gone through within something like forty years, more or less, of observation. MAKING PARTS RIGID