Even more than this, however, can now be said. For such a criterion as is here suggested has significant implications for the human body,—that upon which life and mind ultimately depend. Experiments in psychology and psychiatry have revealed that traits of character are more than skin-deep and brain-deep; indeed, they are more than muscle-deep: they are as deep as the vital organs themselves. Even more than this is apparent, for these same sciences have demonstrated that not only is such a trait as anxiety just another name for a chronic muscular tension, but also that many diseases are, if not caused, at least abetted by what we think, how we act, and what feelings we cultivate. In more precise terms, the mechanisms of thought and action, being partly identical with the mechanisms of locomotion and metabolism, can produce either a hygienic or an unhygienic effect upon the whole structure of man’s organism. And in this fact, I think, we can find an acceptable basis, even if a new one, for the distinction between virtue and vice. This basis we propose is not altogether a novelty to keen students of human nature. We know that the normal, healthy and successfully adapted human individual is characterized by a relaxed and resilient condition, not only of his superficial or locomotor muscles, but also of the muscles of his alimentary tract. Both his voluntary and involuntary systems are constantly in a state of readiness to perform their necessary functions, and they also return to this condition after any series of actions has been performed. Such a man possesses aplomb, and is an example of the healthy Greek ideal of a sane mind in a sound body. In striking contrast to such a normal, resilient state, there are frequently found two other organic conditions which are readily delineated. The one is called muscular flabbiness, characterized by a powerless or a-tonic state of the muscles of either the voluntary (or teachable) and the involuntary (or unteachable) systems, or both. A man in this a-tonic plight is incapable of vigorous, coordinate action, and his muscles do not manifest a normal readiness to respond to successive stimulations. The other abnormal condition, at the opposite pole from this one, is the one involving chronic muscular tensions, a condition which may be compared to the state of a steel spring which is always kept under severe strain, and which is never released far enough to give the metal a chance to recover from the stresses it undergoes. Highstrung, over-anxious, jealous, irascible people illustrate this type of organism with exactness.