EXHILARATING HEALTH (An excerpt from an early edition which tells us a lot about Macfadden's point of view) Health is the most desirable possession of mankind. It is the most precious, yet, to some, the most elusive of all possessions. Without its presence all other gifts are but as the feeble flickering of tapers compared with the power and glory of the midday sun, which it represents. The possession of health makes life a perpetual joy. Nothing daunts the man and woman possessed of health - nothing overawes, nothing discourages, nothing overpowers. It is the constant source of untold pleasures - pleasures incalculable, and yet seldom appreciated until they are gone. Health means vim, vigor, snap and energy. Health means clarity and strength of mind; purity and beauty of soul. The healthy person is unconscious of discomfort; he rises superior to it - is absolutely the monarch of all he surveys. He dominates life instead of allowing it to dominate him. He is unconscious of the parts of his body or the functions they perform. He is a unit - a being - a man, whole, complete, vigorous, perfect, happy - because healthy. To such a man work is a joy; obstacles but opportunities for endeavor; difficulties but a means of enlarged triumph. He knows no weariness, no languor, no lassitude, no exhaustion, except the healthy weariness and exhaustion, easily recuperated, that comes from pleasurably exerted strength and vigor. He is a radiating center of life - physical, mental, spiritual. To grasp his hand is a pleasure, to gaze into his eyes a joy, to hear his voice is to feel a thrill, and to peer into his mind is to be stimulated to higher achievement. Health plus, all things else being equal, is what makes the champion, the expert, the "Captain," in any and every line. It supplies the courage, the daring, the boldness, the aggressiveness of life. It is what makes initiative possible, bulldog "pertinacity effective, and achievement assured.

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A two-page advertisement in Physical Culture Magazine for one of the very early editions

  
An advertisement from the 1920's and another from the 1930's


The encyclopedias were copiously illustrated and had many excellent full-page color charts.


Of course, he was never shy about showing off his own impressive physique


A two-page spread from the brochure, "A simple Guide To Health"

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