tary, might yet, by ufe and conftant appplication, be brought to be ha- Coftivenefs.. bitual, if by an unintermitted cuftom they were at certain feafons endeavoured to be conftantly produced.

3. I HAD obferved fome men, who, by taking after fupper a pipe of tobacco, never failed of a ftool; and began to doubt with myself, whether it were not more cuftom, than the tobacco, that gave them the benefit of nature; or at least, if the tobacco did it, it was rather by exciting a vigorous motion in the guts, than by any purging quality; for then it would have had other effects.

HAVING thus once got the opinion, that it was poffible to make it habitual; the next thing was to confider, what way and means were the likelieft to obtain it.

4. THEN I gueffed, that if a man, after his first eating in the morning, would prefently folicit nature, and try whether he could strain himself fo as to obtain a stool, he might in time, by a conftant application, bring it to be habitual.

§ 25. THE reasons that made me chufe this time, were:

I. BECAUSE the ftomach being then empty, if it received any thing; grateful to it, (for I would never, but in cafe of neceffity, have any one eat, but what he likes, and when he has an appetite) it was apt to embrace it close by a strong conftriction of its fibres; which conftriction,. L fuppofed, might probably be continued on in the guts,, and fo increase their peristaltick motion; as we fee in the Ileus, that an inverted motion,, being begun any-where below, continues itself all the whole length, and makes even the ftomach obey that irregular motion.

2. BECAUSE when men eat, they ufually relax their thoughts; and the pirits, then free from other employments, are more vigorously diftributed into the lower belly, which thereby contribute to the fame effect.

3. BECAUSE, whenever men have leifure to eat, they have leisure enough alfo to make fo much court to madam Cloacina, as would be neceflary to our prefent purpofe; but elfe, in the variety of human affairs and accidents, it was impoffible to affix it to any hour certain; whereby the custom would be interrupted: whereas men in health feldom failing to eat once a day, though the hour be changed, the custom might still be preferved..

$26. UPON thefe grounds, the experiment began to be tried, and I. have known none, who have been fteady in the profecution of it, and taken care to go conftantly to the neceffary-house, after their first eating,. whenever that happened, whether they found themselves called on or no, and there endeavoured to put nature upon her duty; but in a few months. they obtained their defired fuccefs, and brought themfelves to fo regular an habit, that they feldom ever failed of a ftool, after their first eating, unless it were by their own neglect. For, whether they have any motion or no, if they go to the place, and do their part, they are fure to have nature very obedient.

27. I WOULD therefore advife, that this courfe fhould be taken with a child.

Coftivene child every day, prefently after he has eaten his breakfast. Let him be fet upon the tool, as if difburdening were as much in his power, as filling his belly; and let not him or his maid know any thing to the contrary, but that it is fo: and if he be forced to endeavour, by being hindered from his play, or eating again till he has been effectually at stool, or at least done his utmoft, I doubt not but in a little while it will become natural to him. For there is reafon to fufpect that children being usually in-. tent on their play, and very heedlefs of any thing else, often let pass those motions of nature, when fhe calls them but gently; and fo they, neglecting the seasonable offers, do by degrees bring themfelves into an habitual coftiveness. That by this method coftiveness may be prevented, I do more than guess: having known, by the conftant practice of it for fome time, a child brought to have a stool regularly after his breakfast, every morning.

Phyfick.

$28. How far any grown people will think fit to make trial of it, must be left to them; though I cannot but fay, that confidering the many evils that come from that defect, of a requifite eafing of nature, I scarce know any thing more conducing to the preservation of health than this is. Once in four and twenty hours, I think is enough; and no-body, I guess, will think it too much. And by this means it is to be obtained without phyfick, which commonly proves very ineffectual, in the cure of a fettled and habitual coftiveness.

§ 29. THIS is all I have to trouble you with, concerning this management, in the ordinary courfe of his health. Perhaps it will be expected from me, that I thould give fame directions of phyfick, to prevent diseases: for which, I have only this one, very facredly to be observed: Never to give children any phyfick for prevention. The observation of what I have already advised, will, I fuppofe, do that better than the ladies diet-drinks, or apothecary's medicines. Have a great care of tampering that way, left, inftead of preventing, you draw on difeafes. Nor even upon every little indifpofition is phyfick to be given, or the phyfician to be called to children; especially if he be a bufy man, that will presently fill their windows with gally-pots, and their ftomachs with drugs. It is fafer to leave them wholly to nature, than to put them into the hands of one forward to tamper, or that thinks children are to be cured in ordinary diftempers, by any thing but diet, or by a method very little distant from it; it seeming suitable both to my reason and experience, that the tender conftitutions of children fhould have as little done to them as is poffible, and as the abfolute neceffity of the cafe requires. A little cold-ftilled red poppy-water, which is the true furfeit-water, with ease and abftinence from flesh, often puts an end to several diffempers in the beginning, which, by too forward applications, might have been made lufty difeafes. When fuch a gentle treatment will not stop the growing mifchief, nor hinder it from turning into a formed difeafe, it will be time to seek the advice of fome fober and difcreet phyfician. In this part, I hope, I fhall find an eafy belief; and no-body can have a pretence to doubt the advice of one, who has spent

time in the study of phyfick, when he counfels you not to be too forward Phyfick. in making ufe of phyfick and phyficians.

$30. AND thus I have done with what concerns the body and health, which reduces itself to these few and eafily obfervable rules.

Plenty of

open air, exercife, and fleep; plain diet, no wine or ftrong drink, and very little or no phyfick; not too warm and ftreight cloathing; efpecially the head and feet kept cold, and the feet often used to cold water and exposed to wet.

$31. DUE care being had to keep the body in ftrength and vigour, so Mind. that it may be able to obey and execute the orders of the mind; the next and principal bufinefs is, to fet the mind right, that on all occafions it may be difpofed to confent to nothing, but what may be fuitable to the dignity and excellency of a rational creature.

§ 32. IF what I have faid in the beginning of this difcourfe be true, as I do not doubt but it is, viz. that the difference to be found in the manners and abilities of men, is owing more to their education than to any thing elfe; we have reafon to conclude, that great care is to be had of the forming children's minds, and giving them that feafoning early, which fhall influence their lives always after. For when they do well or ill, the praife or blame will be laid there: and when any thing is done aukwardly, the common faying will pass upon them, that it is fuitable to their breeding.

§ 33. As the strength of the body lies chiefly in being able to endure hardships, fo alfo does that of the mind. And the great principle and. foundation of all virtue and worth is placed in this, that a man is able to deny himfelf his own defires, crofs his own inclinations, and purely follow what reafon directs as beft, tho' the appetite lean the other way.

Pa

§ 34. THE great mistake I have obferved in people's breeding their chil- Early. dren has been, that this has not been taken care enough of in its due feafon; that the mind has not been made obedient to difcipline, and pliant to reafon, when at first it was moft tender, moft eafy to be bowed. rents being wifely ordained by nature to love their children, are very apt, if reafon watch not that natural affection very warily; are apt, I fay, to let it run into fondness. They love their little ones, and it is their duty: but they often with them cherish their faults too. They must not be eroffed, forfooth; they must be permitted to have their wills in all things; and they being in their infancies not capable of great vices, their parents think they may fafely enough indulge their little irregularities, and make themselves fport with that pretty perverfenefs, which they think well enough becomes that innocent age. But to a fond parent, that would not have his child corrected for a perverfe trick, but excufed it, faying it was a small matter; Solon very well replied, Aye, but cuftom is a great one.

$35. THE fondling must be taught to ftrike, and call names; muft have what he cries for, and do what he pleases. Thus parents, by humouring and cockering them. when little, corrupt the principles of nature

in

Early. in their children, and wonder afterwards to taste the bitter waters, when they themselves have poifoned the fountain. For when their children are grown up, and thefe ill habits with them when they are now too big to be dandled, and their parents can no longer make use of them as playthings; then they complain, that the brats are untoward and perverfe; then they are offended to fee them wilful, and are troubled with those ill humours, which they themselves infufed and fomented in them; and then, perhaps too late, would be glad to get out those weeds which their own hands have planted, and which now have taken too deep root to be easily extirpated. For he that has been used to have his will in every thing, as long as he was in coats, why should we think it strange that he should defire it, and contend for it ftill, when he is in breeches? Indeed, as he grows more towards a man, age fhews his faults the more, fo that there be few parents then fo blind, as not to see them; few so infenfible as not to feel the ill effects of their own indulgence. He had the will of his maid before he could fpeak or go; he had the mastery of his parents ever fince he could prattle; and why, now he is grown up, is ftronger and wifer than he was then, why now of a fudden muft he be restrained and curbed? why muft he at feven, fourteen, or twenty years old, lofe the privilege which the parent's indulgence, till then, fo largely allowed him? Try it in a dog, or an horfe, or any other creature, and fee whether the ill and refty tricks they have learned when young, are easily to be mended when they are knit: and yet none of thofe creatures are half fo wilful and proud, or half so desirous to be mafters of themselves and others, as

man.

§ 36. WE are generally wife enough to begin with them, when they are very young and difcipline betimes thofe other creatures we would make useful and good for fomewhat. They are only our own offspring, that we neglect in this point; and having made them ill children, we foolishly expect they should be good men. For if the child muft have grapes, or fugar-plums, when he has a mind to them, rather than make the poor baby cry, or be out of humour; why, when he is grown up, muft he not be fatisfied too, if his defires carry him to wine or women? They are objects as fuitable to the longing of twenty-one or more years, as what he cried for, when little, was to the inclinations of a child. The having defires accommodated to the apprehenfions and relish of those sever ral ages, is not the fault; but the not having them subject to the rules and restraints of reafon : the difference lies not in the having or not having appetites, but in the power to govern, and deny ourselves in them. He that is not used to fubmit his will to the reafon of others, when he is young, will scarce hearken or submit to his own reason, when he is of an age to 'make use of it. And what kind of a man fuch a one is like to prove, is eafy to foresee.

§ 37. THESE are overfights ufually committed by those who feem to take the greatest care of their children's education. But, if we look into the common management of children, we shall have reafon to wonder,

in the great diffoluteness of manners, which the world complains of, that Early. there are any footsteps at all left to virtue. I defire to know what vice can be named, which parents, and thofe about children, do not feafon them with, and drop into them the feeds of, as often as they are capable to receive them? I do not mean by the examples they give, and the patterns they set before them, which is encouragement enough; but that which I would take notice of here, is the downright teaching them vice, and actual putting them out of the way of virtue. Before they can go, they principle them with violence, revenge, and cruelty. Give me a "blow that I may beat him," is a leffon, which most children every day hear and it is thought nothing, because their hands have not strength enough to do any mifchief. But I afk, does not this corrupt their minds? is not this the way of force and violence, that they are fet in? and if they have been taught when little, to strike and hurt others by proxy, and encouraged to rejoice in the harm they have brought upon them, and fee them fuffer; are they not prepared to do it, when they are ftrong enough. to be felt themselves, and can strike to fome purpose?

THE Coverings of our bodies, which are for modefty, warmth, and defence, are, by the folly or vice of parents, recommended to their children for other uses. They are made matter of vanity and emulation. A child is fet a longing after a new fuit, for the finery of it and when the little girl is tricked up in her new gown and commode, how can her mother do lefs than teach her to admire herself, by calling her, "her little queen," and " her princefs?" Thus the little ones are taught to be proud of their cloaths, before they can put them on. And why should they not continue to value themselves for this out-fide fashionableness of the taylor or tire-woman's making, when their parents have fo early inftructed them to do fo?

LYING and equivocations, and excufes little different from lying, are put into the mouths of young people, and commended in apprentices and children, whilft they are for their mafter's or parent's advantage. And can it be thought that he, that finds the ftraining of truth difpenfed with, and encouraged, whilft it is for his godly mafter's turn, will not make use of that privilege for himself, when it may be for his own profit?

THOSE of the meaner fort are hindered by the ftreightness of their fortunes, from encouraging intemperance in their children, by the temptation of their diet, or invitations to eat or drink more than enough but their own ill examples, whenever plenty comes in their way, fhew that it is not the dislike of drunkenness and gluttony that keeps them from excefs, but want of materials. But if we look into the houses of thofe who are a little warmer in their fortunes, their eating and drinking are made fo much the great, business and happiness of life, that children are thought neglected, if they have not their fhare of it. Sauces, and ragoufts, and foods difguifed by all the arts of cookery, muft tempt their palates, when their bellies are full and then, for fear the ftomach fhould be overcharged, VOL. IV. D a pre

: