Preface:There has long been needed in this country a sensible and clear presentation of advice to everyone concerned about over-all fitness—advice not limited to the would-be athlete, the gourmand, or the man or woman in need of recreation, nor indeed to either youngster or oldster, but directed rather to the great mass of our population aged thirty to sixty years. (Although I myself believe that “middle age,” for which this book has been primarily written, really extends from the early twenties to the early seventies.)Also there is a decided advantage in having a book on fitness written by a physician who himself practices what he preaches and knows whereof he speaks.There has been a tremendous amount of both scientific and pseudo-scientific writing on the subject of fitness, but with limitation to the details of diet alone, often fads of the moment, or to particular calisthenic exercises to develop strength in certain muscles or bodily grace—all very well in themselves but constituting only one small aspect of the total picture. It is refreshing to have, as here, a more complete account for the benefit of the intellect and the spirit as well as the body.The author states that the book is not intended to say why fitness may be desirable but rather how to become fit and to stay so. However, he frequently gives himself away by extolling the great benefits of keeping fit through avoiding obesity and excesses of tobacco and alcohol, and maintaining a regular program of pleasant and reasonably vigorous exercise. We doctors can now state from our experience with people, both sick and well, and from a growing series of scientific researches that ”keeping fit” does pay richly in dividends of health and longevity. Many laymen have inde-pendently discovered for themselves—though not as yet ade-quately advised by the medical profession, absorbed as it is in the diagnosis and treatment of disease—that keeping fit has kept them not only healthier in body but also keener in mind and more vigorous and at the same time more tranquil in spirit.As a cardiologist I have concluded from my practice of more than forty years and from current scientific investigations that keeping fit also delays in all probability the onset of crippling rusting of the arteries themselves, which we call atherosclerosis, the great epidemic of today.I can heartily recommend this book.PAUL DUDLEY WHITE, M.D.