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Quotations about Exercise

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The truth is, that the craving for exercise is a part of healthy human nature. ~E. Warre, 1884





Reflect first upon that great law of our nature, that exercise is the chief source of improvement in all our faculties. ~Hugh Blair (1718–1800)





The desire of activity is designed by nature to promote our physical well-being. Physical activity is the law of physical health. ~Edward Brooks, 1882





Exercise should be regarded as tribute to the heart. ~Gene Tunney





Those who think they have not time for bodily exercise will sooner or later have to find time for illness. ~Edward Stanley





If it weren't for the fact that the TV set and the refrigerator are so far apart, some of us wouldn't get any exercise at all. ~Joey Adams





Why do strong arms fatigue themselves with frivolous dumbbells? To dig a vineyard is worthier exercise for men. ~Marcus Valerius Martialis





Lack of activity destroys the good condition of every human being, while movement and methodical physical exercise save it and preserve it. ~Plato





Physical fitness can neither be achieved by wishful thinking nor outright purchase. ~Joseph Pilates





I see exercise taking this perverted detour. The original intention of exercise was to heal and maintain health. Now I see it as having nothing to do with health. I see most exercises based on looking good. They actually make you less healthy. You overdevelop the obvious muscles. You take drugs to enhance that. You ignore the rest, and you become more out of balance. ~Bryan Kest





It is certain that, as in the body, when no labour or natural exercise is used, the spirits which want their due employment turn against the constitution and find work for themselves in a destructive way... ~Anthony Ashley Cooper, 1st earl of Shaftesbury





Fitness — if it came in a bottle, everybody would have a great body. ~Cher





There are really only two requirements when it comes to exercise. One is that you do it. The other is that you continue to do it. ~The New Glucose Revolution for Diabetes by Jennie Brand-Miller, Kaye Foster-Powell, Stephen Colagiuri, Alan W. Barclay





I consider my refusal to go to the gym today as resistance training. ~Author Unknown





[A]ll study, and no developed physique, is death.... If you are a student, be also a student of the body.... Up in the morning early! Habituate yourself to the brisk walk in the fresh air.... Guard your manly power, your health and strength, from all hurts and violations — this is the most sacred charge you will ever have in your keeping.

To you, clerk, literary man, sedentary person, man of fortune, idler, the same advice. Up! The world (perhaps you now look upon it with pallid and disgusted eyes) is full of zest and beauty for you, if you approach it in the right spirit! Out in the morning!... Early rising, early to bed, exercise, plain food, thorough and persevering continuance in gently-commenced training, the cultivation with resolute will of a cheerful temper, the society of friends and a certain number of hours spent every day in regular employment — these, we say, simple as they are, are enough to revolutionize life, and change it from a scene of gloom, feebleness, and irresolution, into life indeed, as becomes such a universe as this, full of all the essential means of happiness, full of well-intentioned and affectionate men and women, with the beneficent processes of nature always at work, the sun shining, the flowers blooming, the crops growing, the waters running, with all else that is wanted, only that man should be rightly toned to partake of the universal strength and joy. ~Mose Velsor (Walt Whitman), "Manly Health and Training," New York Atlas, 1858 September 12th





There is a necessity for a regulating discipline of exercise that, whilst evoking the human energies, will not suffer them to be wasted. ~Thomas de Quincey





The only exercise some people get is jumping to conclusions, running down their friends, side-stepping responsibility, and pushing their luck! ~Author Unknown





Movement is a medicine for creating change in a person's physical, emotional, and mental states. ~Carol Welch





A man's health can be judged by which he takes two at a time - pills or stairs. ~Joan Welsh





The word aerobics came about when the gym instructors got together and said, "If we're going to charge $10 an hour, we can't call it jumping up and down." ~Rita Rudner





I have to exercise in the morning before my brain figures out what I'm doing. ~Marsha Doble





A bear, however hard he tries, grows tubby without exercise. ~A.A. Milne





The only exercise I take is acting as pall-bearer to my friends who have indulged in strenuous exercise! ~Author unknown, quoted in "Play Safe in Taking Physical Exercise" by Royal S. Copeland, 1926 (Thanks, Garson O'Toole of quoteinvestigator.com!)





I really don't think I need buns of steel. I'd be happy with buns of cinnamon. ~Ellen DeGeneres





Commit to be fit. ~Author Unknown





It is exercise alone that supports the spirits, and keeps the mind in vigor. ~Marcus Tullius Cicero





While I was out running this morning I heard someone clapping, but it was just my thighs cheering me on. ~Internet meme





The need for exercise is one of the numerous sensations which lead living beings to perform actions necessary for the preservation of life or of health. ~Fernand Lagrange, 1889





Things seem to work out better all around when I'm working out. ~Terri Guillemets





The only valid excuse for not exercising is paralysis. ~Moira Nordholt, feelgoodguru.com





Moderate exercise is indispensable; exercise till the mind feels delight in reposing from the fatigue. ~Socrates





Let exercise alternate with rest. ~Pythagoras





Of exercises, games, gymnastics, &c., the reader must understand well that we inculcate the regular and appropriate practising of them not as a frivolous pastime, or a matter of ceremony and politeness, to be done in a genteel club way, but as a real live thing, a part of a robust and perfect man.... There is no sham or make-believe about this business of entering on the development, purification, strengthening and gracefulness of the body; but it is something to be carried out with an earnest, conscientious, persevering soul.... Habit will soon make all easy; and let us inform you, reader, there is no small pleasure in the victory one attains, by a little sternness of will, over all deleterious gratifications of appetite. It is as great as a general gaining an important battle. ~Mose Velsor (Walt Whitman), "Manly Health and Training," New York Atlas, 1858 September 26th [Thanks, Zachary Turpin! —tεᖇᖇ¡·g]





My idea of exercise is a good brisk sit. ~Phyllis Diller





It wasn't until my late twenties that I learned that by working out I had given myself a great gift. I learned that nothing good comes without work and a certain amount of pain. When I finish a set that leaves me shaking, I know more about myself. When something gets bad, I know it can't be as bad as that workout. ~Henry Rollins





The benefit of daily exercise will not only be accompanied by daily health, but for preventing the intrusion of those maladies which abridge life, or cut off from it all that constitutes the value of life. ~D. Unwins, quoted in Edward Parson Day's Collacon, 1884





There is no doubt that physical activity is the basis of efficient functioning of the human mechanism, both physical and mental. ~Uttar Pradesh, 1885





A man may take as much exercise in walking a mile up and down stairs, as in ten on level ground. ~Benjamin Franklin





Aerobics: a series of strenuous exercises which help convert fats, sugars, and starches into aches, pains, and cramps. ~Author unknown





He who has a weak constitution becomes stronger by manual exercise than a robust man without it. ~Xenophon





Labour or Exercise ferments the Humours, casts them into their proper Channels, throws off Redundancies, and helps Nature in those secret Distributions, without which the Body cannot subsist in its Vigour, nor the Soul act with Chearfulness. ~Joseph Addison, The Spectator, 1711 July 12th, No. 115





Every leap and spring aids in renewing the body, and therefore in giving greater hilarity to the spirit, and superior vigor to the intellect. Every motion helps to construct a fortification against disease, and to render the body more impregnable against its attacks. Those prodigious leaps over the vaulting horse, how they kick hereditary gout out of the toes. Those swift somersaults, with their quick and deep breathings, are ejecting bronchitis, asthma, and phthisis from the throat and lungs. On yonder pendent rope consumption is hung up like a malefactor, as he is. Legions of blue devils are impaled on those parallel bars. Dyspepsia lost hold of its victim when he mounted the flying horse, and has never since been able to regain her accursed throne, and live by gnawing the vitals. There goes a flock of nervous distempers, headache and ticdoloreux and St. Anthony's fire; there they fly out the window, seeking some stall-fed alderman, or fat millionaire, or aristocratic old lady. Rheumatism and cramps and spasms sit coiled up and chattering in the corners of the room like Satanic imps, as they are, the strong muscles of the athletes having shaken them off as the lion shakes the dew drops from his mane. The balancing-pole shakes lumbago out of the back. Pleurisy and apoplexy and fever and paralysis and death hover round; they look into the windows of this hall, but finding brains and lungs and hearts all defiant of their power, they go away in quest of some lazy cit, some guszling drone, some bloated epicure at his late supper, to fasten their fangs upon him. ~Horace Mann (1796–1859) [Wording slightly altered. 'Blue devils' refers to depression. Dr. Drugger, in 1865, called Mann's remarks idealistic, saying it's "muscular poetry—rather more poetry than truth." Drugger has been described as cherishing a "philosophico-crotchety contempt for gymnastics." —tεᖇᖇ¡·g]





The most important effect of muscular exercise is produced on the lungs... ~Dr. Day, Chambers's Encyclopædia, 1880 [Fits well with Sears' P.A.C.E. —tεᖇᖇ¡·g]





Exercise is essential to the health of the whole body; it increases the circulation and the power of breathing, and stimulates every part of the body to a good healthy growth. ~Winfred E. Baldwin, 1896





Any workout which does not involve a certain minimum of danger or responsibility does not improve the body — it just wears it out. ~Norman Mailer





The chest so exercis'd improves its strength;

And quick vibrations thro' the bowels drive

The restless blood, which in unactive days

Would loiter else thro' unelastic tubes.

Deem it not trifling while I recommend

What posture suits: To stand and sit by turns,

As nature prompts, is best. But o'er your leaves

To lean for ever, cramps the vital parts,

And robs the fine machinery of its play.

~John Armstrong (1709–1779), The Art of Preserving Health, 1744 [Armstrong, a physician, was known as "The Poet of Health." —tεᖇᖇ¡·g] #exercise #standingdesk





Good music can make the difference between a mediocre workout and a slam-damn-fantastic workout! ~Terri Guillemets





Exercise is a dirty word. Every time I hear it, I wash my mouth out with chocolate. ~Author Unknown





I eat and drink what I like, and as much as I like. I smoke the strongest cigars all day; and the only exercise I take is to walk up to bed. That is quite enough for a man who has worked his brain all day—and I mean to live to a hundred. ~Joseph Chamberlain (1836–1914)





An hour of basketball feels like 15 minutes. An hour on a treadmill feels like a weekend in traffic school. ~David Walters





Exercise relieves stress. Nothing relieves exercise. ~Animal Crossing: Wild World (Nintendo video game) written by Takayuki Ikkaku, Arisa Hosaka, and Toshihiro Kawabata





I consider exercise vulgar. It makes people smell. ~Alec Yuill Thornton





Many people lose sight of the ultimate purpose of exercise, which is to improve overall health and fitness. They become lost in the mindless patterns of the gym and habitually grind out set after set in strainful workouts. While it's important to build strength and increase muscle tone, that is simply not enough.... A human body is meant for all kinds of movements, with overall performance measured in more than just pounds lifted or miles traveled.

What does it mean to be really fit? For me, I wanted to be more than just strong. I wanted to be agile, flexible, coordinated, and to have good balance—qualities of movement I associate with my youth when I was dancing and playing sports.

~Jonathan Urla, Yogilates: Integrating Yoga and Pilates for Complete Fitness, Strength, and Flexibility, "Introduction," 2002





Better to hunt in fields, for health unbought,

Than fee the doctor for a nauseous draught,

The wise, for cure, on exercise depend;

God never made his work for man to mend.

~John Dryden





People say that losing weight is no walk in the park. When I hear that I think, yeah, that's the problem. ~Chris Adams





If the poor overweight jogger only knew how far he had to run to work off the calories in a crust of bread he might find it better in terms of pound per mile to go to a massage parlor. ~Christiaan Barnard





I believe that the Good Lord gave us a finite number of heartbeats and I'm damned if I'm going to use up mine running up and down a street. ~Neil Armstrong on jogging, in an interview with Walter Cronkite





If your dog is fat, you're not getting enough exercise. ~Author Unknown





You can cheat on your boyfriend or girlfriend but not on your workout. ~Author Unknown





I am pushing sixty — that is enough exercise for me. ~Author unknown, sometimes attributed to Mark Twain





Exercise is the yuppie version of bulimia. ~Barbara Ehrenreich





Whenever I feel like exercise, I lie down until the feeling passes. ~Robert M. Hutchins





He that in his studies wholly applies himself to labor and exercise, and neglects meditation, loses his time; and he that only applies himself to meditation, and neglects labor and exercise, only wanders and loses himself. ~Confucius



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