President Eliot, of Harvard College, who has enjoyed exceptional opportunities for observing the effects of exercise upon young men, says: “A singular notion prevails, especially in the country, that it is the feeble, sickly children who should be sent to school and college, since they are apparently unfit for hard work. The fact that, in the history of literature, a few cases can be pointed out in which genius was lodged in a weak or diseased body, is sometimes adduced in support of the strange proposition that physical vigor is not necessary for professional men. But all experience contradicts these notions. To attain success and length of service in any of the learned professions, a vigorous body is well-nigh essential. A busy lawyer, editor, minister, physician, or teacher has need of greater physical endurance than a farmer, trader, manufacturer, or mechanic. All professional biography teaches that to win lasting distinction in sedentary, in-door occupations, which task the brain and the nervous system, extraordinary toughness of body must accompany extraordinary mental powers.” =Heredity.=--In the matter of bodily health and vigor, the sins of the parents are visited upon the children. What narrow-mindedness the father displays, therefore, in devoting himself so assiduously to business as to neglect his health, and to entail upon his sons and daughters such a low standard of vitality as to impair their usefulness in life, and to deprive them of the power to enjoy, as they should, the inheritance he hopes to leave them. =Exercise for the Stout, the Thin, and the Old.=--It may seem somewhat paradoxical that the same means that are employed to increase flesh and weight should also be recommended to reduce obesity. There is a difference, however, between superfluous fat and solid, healthy, active muscle. =The Stout.=--It is a well known fact that persons of moderate weight, in preparing for some unusual or extraordinary test of strength, reduce their flesh and toughen their muscles by a course of severe training. It is not an uncommon thing for college crews to reduce their weights, by a month’s training, twelve pounds per man. A prize fighter will often come down thirty or forty pounds in preparing for a contest. An instance is cited of a student, who, after carefully weighing himself, sat down to a fifty-five pound rowing-weight, pulled forty-five full strokes a minute for twenty minutes, then, with the same clothing as before, weighed himself, and found he had lost one pound.