130
Counsels on Health
temperance should be carried out in all the details of home life. Self-
denial should be taught to children and enforced upon them, so far as
is consistent, from babyhood. Teach the little ones that they should eat
to live, not live to eat; that appetite must be held in abeyance to the
will; and that the will must be governed by calm, intelligent reason.
If parents have transmitted to their children tendencies which will
make more difficult the work of educating them to be strictly tem-
perate, and of cultivating pure and virtuous habits, what a solemn
responsibility rests upon the parents to counteract that influence by
every means in their power! How diligently and earnestly should they
[114]
strive to do their duty by their unfortunate offspring! To parents is
committed the sacred trust of guarding the physical and moral con-
stitution of their children. Those who indulge a child’s appetite and
do not teach him to control his passions may afterward see, in the
tobacco-loving, liquor-drinking slave, whose senses are benumbed,
and whose lips utter falsehood and profanity, the terrible mistake they
have made.
It is impossible for those who give the reins to appetite to attain to
Christian perfection. The moral sensibilities of your children cannot
be easily aroused unless you are careful in the selection of their food.
Many a mother sets a table that is a snare to her family. Flesh meats,
butter, cheese, rich pastry, spiced foods, and condiments are freely
partaken of by both old and young. These things do their work in
deranging the stomach, exciting the nerves, and enfeebling the intellect.
The blood-making organs cannot convert such things into good blood.
The grease cooked in the food renders it difficult of digestion. The
effect of cheese is deleterious. Fine-flour bread does not impart to the
system the nourishment that is to be found in unbolted wheat bread.
Its common use will not keep the system in the best condition. Spices
at first irritate the tender coating of the stomach, but finally destroy the
natural sensitiveness of this delicate membrane. The blood becomes
fevered, the animal propensities are aroused, while the moral and
intellectual powers are weakened and become servants to the baser
passions.
The mother should study to set a simple yet nutritious diet before
her family. God has furnished man with abundant means for the
gratification of an unperverted appetite. He has spread before him the
products of the earth—a bountiful variety of food that is palatable to
[115]