“And what is physical culture?” is naturally the question which arises to the lips of those to whom the subject is still unfamiliar. Let me begin by saying what it _is not_. To begin with, to suppose, as many people do suppose, that athletics and physical culture are the same thing is quite a mistaken notion. Then is physical culture opposed to athletics? Certainly not. Cricket and football and rowing and swimming, and, indeed, all forms of manly sport and exercise, are admirable things in their way, but they are not physical culture. A part of it, if you like; but physical culture is something far wider in its scope, infinitely loftier in its ideals. What was the ideal of the Greeks? They were ardent athletes, but their pastimes were only regarded as a means to an end. The Greeks regarded the culture of the body as a sacred duty; their aim was to bring it to the highest possible state of power and beauty, and we know how they succeeded. Surely what they succeeded in doing cannot be impossible for us. Does the reader now begin to get a clearer idea of what is meant by physical culture? As I have previously said, it is to the body what culture, in the accepted sense of the word, is to the mind. To constantly and persistently cultivate the whole of the body so that at last it shall be capable of anything that sound organs and perfectly developed muscles can accomplish--that is physical culture. The production, in short, of an absolutely perfect body--that is physical culture. To undo the evil for which civilization, and all the drawbacks it has brought in its train, have been responsible in making man regard his body lightly--that is the aim of physical culture. I think I am justified in saying that while it embraces every variety of athletics it goes very much further.