accomplished. To walk with your muscles and not use superfluous
nervous force is the first thing to be learned, and after or at the
same time to direct your muscles as Nature meant they should be
directed,--indeed we might almost say to let Nature direct them
herself, without our interference. Hurry with your muscles and not
with your nerves. This tells especially in hurrying for a train,
where the nervous anxiety in the fear of losing it wakes all
possible unnecessary tension and often impedes the motion instead of
assisting it. The same law applies here that was mentioned before
with regard to the carriage,--only instead of being quiet and
letting the carriage take you, be quiet and let your walking machine
do its work. So in all hurrying, and the warning can hardly be given
too many times, we must use our nerves only as transmitters--calm,
well-balanced transmitters--that our muscles may be more efficient
and more able servants.

The same mistakes of unnecessary tension will be found in running,
and, indeed, in all bodily motion, where the machine is not trained
to do its work with only the nerves and muscles needed for the
purpose. We shall have opportunity to consider these motions in a
new light when we come to the directions for gaining a power of
natural motion; now we are dealing only with mistakes.






VIII.