However, John Doe, who has already postponed far too long his search for a remedy, at last takes a course of “physical culture,” although his time is severely limited, and his exercises are confined to an hour or two morning and evening. At first he may say that he feels a wonderful benefit and probably advises every friend he meets in the city to follow his example. I am quite willing to grant that Doe may be benefited, I will even admit that if he continues his exercises it is possible he may not fall back into the same state of nervous prostration into which he fell originally, but the point I wish to make quite clear is that his cure did not in itself possess the elements of permanence. It was merely a tinkering or botching-up of the fabric of his body. For if we consider his case from a purely detached standpoint, we must see that Doe attempted to develop two systems or modes of life which could not in the nature of things work harmoniously together. On the one hand, for two, three, or four hours a day, he was occupied in mechanically developing his muscular system without any reference to the _manner_ in which he drove his machine, stimulating and accelerating the supply of blood which therefore required increased oxygenation or reinforced lung power; in brief, he was exercising those functions and energies which in a primitive state would have been called upon during the greater part of his waking life to supply him with food. On the other hand, for the remaining twelve hours or so during which he was engaged in his profession, in the eating of meals or in reading, in playing indoor games or in similar sedentary occupations, the newly developed powers were being neglected and a call was being made upon the old nervous energies and centres of control. John Doe’s physical body thus had two existences, excluding the natural condition of sleep, one fiercely active, muscular, dynamic, the other sedentary, nervous, static. These two existences are not correlated, they are antagonistic; they do not mutually support each other, they conflict. John Doe’s body becomes the scene of a civil war, and the heart, lungs, and other semi-automatic organs are in a state of perpetual re-adjustment to opposing conditions, as they are called upon to support one side or the other in the perpetual combat. Such a condition cannot tend in the long run to the improvement of mankind as a whole.