No other people had comprehended sport’s hidden and manifest value so perfectly. When life has succeeded by dint of daily effort in conquering the enemies around it—natural forces, wild beasts, hunger, thirst, sickness—sometimes it is lucky enough to have abundant strength left over. This strength it seeks to squander in sport. Civilization begins at the moment sport begins. As long as life struggles for preservation—to protect itself from its enemies, maintain itself upon the surface of the earth—civilization cannot be born. It is born the moment that life satisfies its primary needs and
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