The thoughts and decisions which have long swayed the mind, have also dominated the body until their paths over its surface have become well marked.

The number and variety of parts affected make it difficult to trace all the thought paths outward. While it is easy to catch sight of them in the facial expression and in the movement of the skeletal muscles we cannot follow their trail through the skin and the glands, the heart and other organs. We sometimes trace them by their effects. A fit of hysterical crying is accompanied by sobs which indicate the participation of the diaphragm in the chest movement; vomiting betrays the involvement of the stomach; gas in the colon tells of chemical changes going on within the intestine.

Many of the diffusion lines of joy and grief are quite distinct. Joy shortens the countenance, causes the eyes to brighten, the pulse to quicken; respiration grows deep and full, digestion is stimulated, and, if happiness be continuous, the nutrition of the entire body improves. Opposite manifestations are observed when grief holds thought in its leaden grasp. The countenance lengthens, the eyes become dull, the voice loses its accustomed quality and the step its elasticity. Secretion goes on sluggishly, and body nutrition lowers with rapidity.

Thoughts continually traveling over the same paths within brain and body, fatigue far more than diversity of thought, hence the need of frequent change of work and of environment to stimulate into action unused thought centers. When we can demonstrate with certainty the conduction lines of specific trains of thought, we shall be able to prescribe for ourselves and others mental work which shall serve as recreation to both mind and body. I sometimes fancy that musical sounds produce a psychic activity the diffusion lines of which can be traced, in the body of the ardent music lover; (he must, however, be unlearned in the art, otherwise his thought is so complex as to make him an unsatisfactory subject for study). As merchants used to set forth in a caravan together, far away in the East in olden time, laden with perfumes, and spices for one

emporium, bright silks and delicate fabrics for another, soft cashmeres and wools for still other marts, parted company when their path became no longer a common one, and each journeyed alone to his destination, so, a volume of melody starts from the stimulated psychic centers in the brain, upon its journey through the body. Do not slow and solemn tones vibrate most strongly within the chest, diffusing through its tissues? The heart under its influence seems to beat more slowly, the respirations deepen, the eyes grow large and become fixed; the whole body is stilled, and the soul turns toward God without conscious effort. But now the waves of sound change to a high clear tone, as the flute or cornet takes up the strain. No longer does the chest feel the spell, but through the arms and fingers the current swells, as for the moment they are the parts most closely connected with the active psychic centers. Then from the grand orchestra come a quick succession of changes; faster and faster the violin bows fly. No longer does the audience seem motionless and silent, even though no physical movement may be manifest. The feet now catch the current! it is difficult to keep them still. Children thus stirred would skip and dance, expressing by such movements the reverberation of the music in the lower extremeties. Who cannot understand why music with its ever changing measures and cadencies, has power to rest the over-worked body as well as mind. Does it not do so by subtly stealing through unused cell paths?

Why has the bicycle such power to relieve the tension of tired brains? Frances Willard tells us she found herself in a state of nervous exhaustion a few years ago from constant and long continued brain work. She went to England for rest. Surrounded by every helpful influence, she tried in vain to recover the lost brain force. Finally the son of Lady Henry Somerset, at whose beautiful home she was staying, persuaded her to learn to ride the bicycle, and before she had mastered it sufficiently to experience the good effect of its use as exercise, she felt her nervous strength returning. She told me she believed she was largely indebted to the bicycle for her restoration

to health. Can it be that brain work, especially word work (and speech making belongs peculiarly to word work) affects cerebral cells, the activity of which "reverberates" in the upper portion of the body, and that bicycle riding on the other hand stimulates cells whose diffusion lines are in the lower extremities? May it not be that the activity of the latter makes it possible for the former to rest?

If thought-life is so closely connected with the body in general as many facts lead us to believe, it must be a helpful or hindering force in the mental, moral and physical development of the individual. Which it shall be depends largely upon his heredity and his environment. Heredity provides the foundation, environment the building materials of every life. Parents who would transmit to their children a cerebral structure, capable of a pure and energetic thought-life, must live noble lives themselves. An impure fountain cannot give forth pure water, neither can men whose lives have been spent in vice, and women whose minds have habitually been filled with frivolous and foolish thoughts hope to endow their offspring with a physical structure capable of elevating the standard of our race. Among the building materials which should be provided for the right development of every child, four are perhaps most important: 1. Training of the senses; 2. The acquirement of right "motor habits;" 3. The presentation to the mind of right suggestions; and 4. The establishment of a personal relation between the soul and God early in life. The value of right training of the senses can scarcely be overestimated. The cerebral mass, hidden away in darkness in the skull, is helpless and useless until messages from without penetrate, through the medium of the senses, into its dusky retreat. Throughout life it remains thus dependent, and the more expert the senses become in their work of picking up and transmitting information to it, the better able will those cerebral cells be to reach right conclusions regarding the world outside.

Habit is the repetition, in a more or less involuntary manner, of an act originally performed with some degree of volition.

A child learns to walk or talk with great effort, but every time the nerve and muscle combination is made which results in either, the action becomes less difficult, until finally it occurs without conscious volition. Right motor habits may be acquired early in life, even before the child realizes their value. Prof. James speaks of them as "precious conservative agents," and recommends that we make habitual as many useful actions as we can and "guard against the growing into ways that are likely to be disadvantageous to us, as we would guard against the plague."

Suggestion has been defined as "the introduction within us of a practical belief which is spontaneously realized." Without referring to the extreme possibilities of suggestion, i. e., hypnotism and mesmerism, we cannot deny that every human being who associates with others is influenced more or less profoundly by them. Can one even read a book without receiving suggestions which modify his thought-life? It is only needful to admit this to acknowledge the importance to the developing child of right suggestions. The mature man or woman acquires the power of auto-suggestion which materially neutralizes the influence of the suggestions of others, thus limiting their power over him. The child has not yet developed this controlling force and is therefore at the mercy, so to speak, of forces which tend to build up a healthy thought-life, or which make it impossible.

The influence of the early establishment of a holy personal relation between the soul and God cannot be over-estimated. Such a relation is like the "balance wheel" which steadies a great mechanism. It gives to the mind the largest conception possible to it-a conception the magnitude of which can never dwindle however highly developed the mind may become. The Rev. Charles Cuthbert Hall, President of Union College, New York City, said in a recent sermon, "Great belief in God comes from great thoughts about God, and great thoughts come only from the contemplation of great things. Outside of God himself nature is the most boundless object for contemplation, herefore study nature if you would develop the mind on its

God-ward side." What the thought-life at maturity and in after years shall be, depends largely upon the occupation, and especially upon the companionship which the individual chooses for himself; if these are such as to strengthen and develop that which is evil in him, he will develop motor habits harmful to himself and others. On the contrary if he chooses well, and lives healthfully, his ideals will remain high, his thought-life pure, and to him will come the power to make the world better for his having lived.

THE PROBLEM OF OCCUPATIONS.

ABSTRACT OF KATE HOLLADAY CLAGHORN'S PAPER, READ BEFORE THE ASSOCIATION OF COLLEGIATE ALUMNE AT

ANN ARBOR, OCTOBER 30, 1897.

Following Dr. Mosher, Kate Holladay Claghorn, Ph. D. (Yale), read a paper entitled "The Problem of Occupations." Taking the records of a certain woman's college as a basis for study, she showed that the college woman who sets out to earn her living turns most naturally to school teaching as a profession, entering that employment in such numbers as to bring about results unfortunate for herself, for the schools, for the college that sends her out, and for the community at large. The disadvantages that arise to the teacher herself are obvious. She must accept a low rate of pay for her work; she must be content with an inferior position; she must lengthen her period of preparation at much expenditure of time and money, not always with advantage to the work she means to do, in order to stand any chance of place and salary at all. She has, besides, no assurance of being able to continue in the profession, once she has embarked upon it, and so cannot find there the stimulus to thought and effort afforded by what is known from the beginning to be a life pursuit. The schools suffer from this crowding of the teacher's profession, by their inability to select the best from the great mass of applicants who come to them; and the colleges from which those applicants are sent out, are the less