ctive and enterprizing
spirit. Poor food, short allowance, while they check the growth of the
child's body, check also the daring of the mind; and, therefore, the
starving or pinching system ought to be avoided by all means. Children
should eat _often_, and as much as they like at a time. They will, if at
full heap, never take, of _plain food_, more than it is good for them to
take. They may, indeed, be stuffed with _cakes_ and _sweet things_ till
they be ill, and, indeed, until they bring on dangerous disorders: but,
of _meat plainly_ and _well cooked_, and of _bread_, they will never
swallow the tenth part of an ounce more than it is necessary for them to
swallow. Ripe fruit, or cooked fruit, if no _sweetening_ take place,
will never hurt them; but, when they once get a taste for sugary stuff,
and to cram down loads of garden vegetables; when ices, creams, tarts,
raisins, almonds, all the endless pamperings come, the _doctor_ must
soon follow with his drugs. The blowing out of the bodies of children
with tea, coffee, soup, or warm liquids of any kind, is very bad: these
have an effect precisely like that which is produced by feeding young
rabbits, or pigs, or other young animals upon watery vegetables: it
makes them big-bellied and bare-boned at the same time; and it
effectually prevents the frame from becoming strong. Children in health
want no drink other than skim milk, or butter-milk, or whey; and, if
none of those be at hand, water will do very well, provided they have
plenty of _good meat_. Cheese and butter do very well for part of the
day. Puddings and pies; but always _without sugar_, which, say what
people will about the _wholesomeness_ of it, is not only of _no use_ in
the rearing of children, but injurious: it forces an appetite: like
strong drink, it makes daily encroachments on the taste: it wheedles
down that which the stomach does not want: it finally produces illness:
it is one of the curses of the country; for it, by taking off the bitter
of the tea and coffee, is the great cause of sending down into the
stomach those quantities of warm water by which the body is debilitated
and deformed and the mind enfeebled. I am addressing myself to persons
in the middle walk of life; but no parent can be _sure_ that his child
will not be compelled to labour hard for its daily bread: and then, how
vast is the difference between one who has been pampered with sweets and
one who has been reared on plain food and simp