A View of the Elementary Principles of Education, Founded on the Study of the Nature of Man (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1828 edition. Excerpt: ...heart. We must eat and drink, because we are excited to do so by hunger and thirst. But the laws of digestion and nutrition might be explained, the respective organs shown, and the necessity of submitting to the dictates of creation taught. The knowledge of the general rules of Hygeia is useful to every one. Let children know, that they must eat to live, but that they do not live to eat and to drink; let them feel the advantages of sobriety, and the consequences of indigestion; M let them see the vice of gluttony and drunkenness in nature, and be accustomed to temperance, and to the moderate use of every sort of food. It will be easy to render them attentive to the quantity and quality of aliments necessary to be taken, and to those which do not agree with their digestive organs. It is important that they should be able to resist the desire to eat of every dish that is placed on the table. It is a great fault of parents and teachers to preach sobriety, and themselves to give a contrary example. The example is more effectual than the precept. I think it also wrong to give dainties and liquors to children as rewards, for it is in this manner that they are taught to value them. They may enjoy the sense of taste, but they ought not to be governed by it. In speaking of hunger and thirst, food, beverage and nutrition, a great deal of knowledge may be given to children at table, with respect to the natural history of the three kingdoms, and with respect to chemistry and physiology. Parents might direct the conversation towards convenient subjects, and enter into farther explanations after dinner. Certainly this supposes the parents themselves to be well informed, which, however, 1 is too frequently not the case. The duty of instruction devolves...