Lesson 10 (Exercise)

           Here in India, however, we have chosen quite a different path! Our men do arduous mental work, but give little or no exercise to the body. Their bodies are enfeebled by excessive mental strain, and they fall a prey to serious diseases; and just when the world expects to benefit by their work, they bid it eternal farewell! Our work should be neither exclusively physical nor exclusively mental, nor such as ministers merely to the pleasure of the moment. The ideal kind of exercise is that which gives vigour to the body as well as to the mind; only such exercise can keep a man truly healthy, and such a man is the farmer.

         But what shall he do who is no farmer? The exercise which games like the cricket give is too inadequate, and something else has to be devised. The best thing for ordinary men would be to keep a small garden near the house, and work in it for a few hours every hours every day. Some may ask, "What can we do if the house we live in be not own?" This is a foolish question to ask, for, whoever may be the owner of the house, he cannot object to his ground being improved by digging and cultivation. And we shall have the satisfaction of feeling that we have helped to keep somebody else's ground neat and clean. Those who do not find time for such exercise or who may not like it, may resort to walking, which is the next best exercise. Truly has this been described as the Queen of all exercises. The main reason why our Sadhus and Fakirs are strong as a class is that they go abut from one end of the country to the other only on foot. Thoreau, the great American writer, has said many remark-able things on walking as an exercise. He says that the writings of those who keep indoors and never go into the open air, will be as weak as their bodies. Referring to his own experience, he says that all his best works were written when he was walking the most. He was such and inveterate walker that four or five hours a day was quite an ordinary thing with him! Our passion for exercise should become so strong that we cannot bring ourselves to dispense with it an any account. We hardly realise how weak and futile is our mental work when unaccompanied by hard physical exercise. Walking gives movement to every portion of the body, and ensures vigorous circulation of the blood; for, when we walk fast, fresh air is inhaled into the lungs. Then there is the inestimable joy that natural objects give us, the joy that comes from a contemplation of the beauties of nature. It is, of course, useless to walk along lanes and streets, or to take the same path every day. We should go out into the fields and forests where we can have a taste of Nature. Walking a mile or two is no walking at all; at least ten or twelve miles are necessary for exercise. Those who cannot walk so much every day can at least do so on Sundays. Once a man who was suffering from indigestion went to the doctor to take medicine . He was advised to walk a little every day, but he pleaded that he was to weak to walk at all. Then the doctor took him into his carriage for a drive. On the way he deliberately dropped his whip, and the sick man, out of courtesy, goth down to take it. The doctor, however, drove on without waiting for him, and the poor man had to trudge behind the carriage. When the doctor was satisfied that he had walked long enough, he took him into the carriage again, and explained that it was device adopted to make him walk. As the man had begun to feel hungry by this time, he realised the value of the doctor's advice, and forgot the affair of the whip. He then went home and had a hearty meal. Let those who are suffering from from indigestion and kindred diseases try for themselves, and they will at once realise the value of walking as an exercise.