My system : 15 minutes' work a day for health's sake / by J.P. Muller ; specially revised by the author and translated by G.M. Fox-Davies and H.R. Murray.

  • Jørgen Peter Müller
Date:
[between 1900 and 1910]
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: My system : 15 minutes' work a day for health's sake / by J.P. Muller ; specially revised by the author and translated by G.M. Fox-Davies and H.R. Murray. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    INTRODUCTION TO REVISED ENGLISH EDITION. The book herewith submitted to the English-speaking public has met in every European country with unparalleled success, and it is not surpris- ing that in England, where Gymnastics and Physical Culture hold so high a place, a further edition should have become necessary. The oppor- tunity thus afforded has been taken advantage of to effect a revision of certain particulars. No material change has been made in the form of the exercises themselves, but the text and illustrations in their new form will be found to have been improved in many points, with a resultant gain in the direction of clearness. It may be of interest to English readers to know a little more than he himself tells ns about the person and achievements of the author—who in his own country, Denmark, and in several parts of the Continent, is a cele- brated and justly esteemed Amateur Athlete, Hygienist and Philosopher. J. P. Muller, who was born in 1866, entered the University in 1884, first studied theology, and then became lieutenant in the Royal Engineers. For ten years he was a private engineer, and for 4! years Inspector at the Vejlefjord Sanatorium for Consumptives in Jutland, but resigned this appointment in order to devote himself entirely to propagating the cause of Personal Hygiene and completing some important ethical works (not yet published in England). By means of physical exercises and gymnastics, he has developed himself from a delicate boy into one of the most successful all-round amateur sportsmen and athletes on the Continent. Carl Bloch, the Danish painter, once said to him : “ You are physi- cally the most perfect man I ever saw,” and Dr. Krajewski, of St. Peters- burg, the “Father’’ of Athletics, wrote, in a letter to. him: “ Really, so splendid a figure as yours, bearing so close a resemblance to the antique statues, is rarely to be met with, either among amateurs or professionals,’5 remarks which are sufficient testimony to the admirable physical develop- ment of the man. In this connection it may be noted that the author won in 1904 the first prize at the Athletic Union Physical Culture Competition as the best-developed man in Denmark ; and, after the leeture held in Glasgow on September igth, 1911, Mr. F. H. Newbery, Principal of the Glasgow School of Art, in proposing a vote of thanks to Lieut. Muller, spoke enthusiastically of the interest and value of the demonstration which had just been witnessed. He had, he said, been for thirty years dealing with living human models; he had seen Sandow and Hackenschmidt and
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