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Teaching Self-Denial and Self-Control
183
education as well as other literary and scientific knowledge. It is
important for them to understand the relation that their eating and
drinking, and general habits, have to health and life. As they under-
stand their own frames, they will know how to guard against debility
and disease. With a sound constitution, there is hope of accomplish-
ing almost anything. Benevolence, love, and piety, can be cultivated.
A want of physical vigor will be manifested in the weakened moral
powers. The apostle says, “Let not sin therefore reign in your mor-
tal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof.”—
The Health
Reformer, December, 1872
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It is Somebody’s Business
—You should study temperance in
all things. You must study it in what you eat and in what you drink.
And yet you say: “It is nobody’s business what I eat, or what I drink,
or what I place upon my table.” It is somebody’s business, unless
you take your children and shut them up, or go into the wilderness
where you will not be a burden upon others, and where your unruly,
vicious children will not corrupt the society in which they mingle.—
[184]
Testimonies for the Church 2:362
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Educate for Moral Independence
—Parents should educate
their children to have moral independence, not to follow impulse
and inclination, but to exercise their reasoning powers, and to act
from principle. Let mothers inquire, not for the latest fashion, but for
the path of duty and usefulness, and direct the steps of their children
therein. Simple habits, pure morals, and a noble independence in
the right course, will be of more value to the youth than the gifts
of genius, the endowments of learning, or the external polish which
the world can give them. Teach your children to walk in the ways of
righteousness, and they, in turn, will lead others into the same path.
Thus may you see at last that your life has not been in vain, for you
have been instrumental in bringing precious fruit to the garner of
God.—
The Review and Herald, November 6, 1883
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Parents to Study the Laws of Life
—Parents should make it
their first business to understand the laws of life and health, that
nothing shall be done by them in the preparation of food, or through
any other habits, which will develop wrong tendencies in their chil-
dren. How carefully should mothers study to prepare their tables
with the most simple, healthful food, that the digestive organs may
not be weakened, the nervous forces unbalanced, and the instruction