Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III THE PRINCIPLE OF GYMNASTIC TOTALITY The principle of suitable selection is of prime importance to the gymnast. An immense number of possible movements, either because of their direct injuriousness or because of the lack of direct usefulness, must be weeded out. But there still remains an immense material in which order must be brought if we shall ever hope to gain control of it. We must undertake to bring together those exercises which resemble each other in all main features, separating them from others with which they have little in common. No science is possible without classification of the material with which it deals. No science of gymnastics can ever grow up if we do not endeavor to classify the exercises. It being well understood that the exercises themselves are not the end, but the effects they produce, it immediately becomes evident that the only satisfactory basis for such a classification is to be sought in these effects. A classification based on mere external form, or upon the apparatus used, or on any other incidental similarity or dissimilarity can havebut small value to him who wishes to study his subject. To him the effects are the important matter, and by such a classification forms are brought together which vary greatly in their effects. So, though we may loosely speak of free exercises and apparatus work, of head movements, and leg movements, of wand exercises and dumb bell exercises, of parallel bar exercises, of exercises on the horse, we must remember that this is not a classification into natural families. A perfectly proper classification on the other hand is one sometimes used, by which exercises are divided into exercises for strength, for coordination, for speed, for endurance, for attention, etc. It has the great advantage also of ... --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.