_Diatetics._
§ 57. By diatetics we mean the art of repairing the constant waste of
the system, and, in childhood, of also building it up to its full form
and size. Since in reality each organism has its own way of doing this,
the diatetical practice must vary somewhat with sex, age, temperament,
occupation, and circumstances. The science of Pedagogics has then, in
this department, only to enunciate general principles. If we go into
details, we fall into triviality. Nothing can be of more importance for
the whole life than the way in which the physical education is managed
in the very first stages of development. So generally is this fact
accepted, that almost every nation has its own distinct system, which
has been carefully elaborated. Many of these systems, no doubt, are
characterized by gross errors, and widely differ as to time, place, and
character, and yet they all have a justification for their peculiar
form.
§ 58. The best food for the infant in the first months of its life is
its mother's milk. The employment of another nurse, if a general custom,
as in France, is highly objectionable, since with the milk the child is
likely to imbibe to some extent his physical and ethical nature. The
milk of an animal can never supply the place to a child of that of its
own mother. In Walter Scott's story of _The Fair Maid of Perth_, Eachim
is represented as timorous by nature, having been nourished by a white
doe after the death of his mother.
§ 59. When the teeth make their appearance, it is a sign that the child
is ready for solid food; and yet, till the second teeth appear, light,
half-solid food and vegetables should constitute the principal part of
the diet.
§ 60. When the second teeth have come, then the organism demands both
vegetable and animal food. Too much meat is, doubtless, harmful. But it
is an error to suppose that man was intended to eat vegetables alone,
and that, as some have said, the adoption of animal food is a sign of
his degeneracy.
The Hindoos, who live principally on a vegetable diet, are not at all,
as has been asserted, a mild and gentle race. A glance into their
stories, especially their erotic poetry, proves them to be quite as
passionate as any other people.
§ 61. Man is an omnivorous being. Children have, therefore, a natural
desire to taste of every thing. With them, eating and drinking have
still a poetic side, and there is a pleasure in them which is not wholly
the mere pleasure of taste. Their proclivity to taste of every thing
should not, therefore, be harshly censured, unless it is associated with
disobedience, or pursued in a clandestine manner, or when it betrays
cunning and greediness.
§ 62. Children need much sleep, because they are growing and changing so
fast. In later years, waking and sleeping must be regulated, and yet not
too exactly.
§ 63. The clothing of children should follow the form of the body, and
should be large enough to give them free room for the unfettered
movement of every limb in play.
The Germans do more rationally for children in the matter of sleep and
of dress than in that of food, which they often make too rich, and
accompany with coffee, tea, etc. The clothing should be not only
suitable in shape and size, it must also be made of simple and
inexpensive material, so that the child may not be hampered in his play
by the constant anxiety that a spot or a rent may cause fault to be
found with him. If we foster in the child's mind too much thought about
his clothes, we tend to produce either a narrow-mindedness, which treats
affairs of the moment with too much respect and concerns itself with
little things, or an empty vanity. Vanity is often produced by dressing
children in a manner that attracts attention. (No one can fail to remark
the peculiar healthful gayety of German children, and to contrast it
with the different appearance of American children. It is undoubtedly
true that the climate has much to do with this result, but it is also
true that we may learn much from that nation in our way of treating
children. Already we import their children's story-books, to the
infinite delight of the little ones, and copies of their children's
pictures are appropriated constantly by our children's magazines and
picture-books. It is to be greatly desired that we should adopt the very
sensible custom which prevails in Germany, of giving to each child its
own little bed to sleep in, no matter how many may be required; and, in
general, we shall not go far astray if we follow the Germans in their
treatment of their happy children.)
§ 64. Cleanliness is a virtue to which children should be trained, not
only for the sake of their physical health, but also because it has a
decided moral influence. Cleanliness will not have things deprived of
their distinctive and individual character, and become again a part of
original chaos. It is only a form of order which remands all things,
dirt included, to their own places, and will not endure to have things
mixed and confused. All adaptation in dress comes from this same
principle. When every thing is in its proper place, all dressing will be
suitable to the occasion and to the wearer, and the era of good taste in
dress will have come. Dirt itself, as Lord Palmerston so wittily said,
is nothing but "matter out of place." Cleanliness would hold every
individual thing strictly to its differences from other things, and for
the reason that it makes pure air, cleanliness of his own body, of his
clothing, and of all his surroundings really necessary to man, it
develops in him the feeling for the proper limitations of all existent
things. (Emerson says: "Therefore is space and therefore is time, that
men may know that things are not huddled and lumped, but sundered and
divisible." He might have said, "Therefore is cleanliness.")