Sir, In your issue of February, 1935, under the title "The 'Aged' Child," your contributor, in commenting upon posture, prefaces his remarks on the consideration of the problem of the correction or prevention of faulty posture with the statement that, if a superstructure is to be satisfactory, the first essential is that the foundation should be perfect, and goes on further premising that the foundation of posture is the feet. On first sight this statement would appear to be reasonably acceptable, if it were not that the structure to be dealt with in a consideration of posture is the living creature man, peculiar in his upright habit of usage, and multifarious in the ways into which he directs his living and the use of himself.

The great work of Rudolph Magnus set down in his Körperstellung (1) has shown long ago that the primary control of the animal mechanism in use depends upon the relation of the neck and the head to the rest of the body mechanism in use, and that the tone of the muscles of the neck and head in use likewise conditions the tone of the whole body musculature.

The posture then that a child will adopt, while it may to an extent be influenced by the state of the feet, is an index of the use of the neck and head in relation to the whole mechanism, and the use of the neck and head in relation to the whole mechanism is to-day an arbitrary and ill-considered response.

That it is an ill-considered response has been shown by F. M. Alexander,(2) in his work on the constructive conscious control of the individual, to be due to debauched, faulty, unassociated sensory mechanisms conducting impressions which serve only to call forth instinctive reactions ill-adapted to the present needs of the individual, and, in fact, opposed to what untrammelled common sense would devise. The summation of these faulty response is recognised in its grosser form in the 'aged' child, but the full extent of all faulty responses are but barely measured where they occur in minor form but with universal incidence.

The practical work of F. M. Alexander in his re-education of the individual on a conscious basis has shown that flat feet and other mal-adaptations of different parts of the body can only be truly corrected, having regard to a co-ordinate use of the whole body (and therein he includes so-called mental and physical functions) by approaching the desired end through the indirect means of restoring conscious use of the primary control, a certain use of the neck and head in relation to the whole mechanism in use. By being taught to use the body as a mechanism controllable by permitting uses or checking uses through this primary control, just as a car is controlled by permitting the clutch to function or preventing it functioning, and by re-educating the sensory mechanism at the same time, Alexander gives his pupils a constructive control over their posture, and an ever-quickened sensory indicator whereby they may test their judgments, inhibit misdirection, and substitute directions in the use of themselves which experience dictates are provisionally superior.

It seems unfortunate that Magnus's and Alexander's work are still so little known, and that the heritage they have provided, most importantly for the child, is so slow to be delivered to it.

I am, yours, etc.,
Mungo Douglas, M.B.

Folds House, Bolton.
25th February, 1935.

1) Körperstellung, R. Magnus. Berlin: J. Springer.

2) Man's Supreme Inheritance, F. M. Alexander; Constructive Conscious Control of the Individual, F. M. Alexander; The Use of the Self, F. M Alexander. London: Methuen.