7. Hitherto I have spoken generally; now I proceed to give instructions as to the above-mentioned virtues specifically, how they may be exercised in children easily, prudently, and decorously.
8. Temperance and frugality claim the first place for themselves, inasmuch as they constitute the foundation of health and life, and are the mothers of all other virtues. Children will become accustomed to these, provided you indulge them in only so much food, drink, and sleep as nature demands. For other animals, following only the leading of nature, are more temperate than we; therefore children ought to eat, drink, and sleep only at the time when nature disposes them so to do, namely, when they appear to suffer from hunger or thirst, or to be oppressed for sleep. Before this is discovered, to feed them, to give them drink, to put them to sleep, to cram them even beyond their will, to cover them up or to compel them to sleep, is madness. It is sufficient for them that such things be supplied them according to nature. Care must be taken that their appetites be not provoked by pastry or any innutritious delicacies; for these are the oiled vehicles which carry in more than is necessary, and the stomach is enticed to eat more than enough. Such things are really enticements to luxurious living. For although it may not be improper to occasionally give children something savory, yet to malke their food of sweetmeats is as destructive to health (as shown in the fifth chapter) as it is to sound morals.
9. Immediately, in the first year, the foundations of cleanliness and neatness may be laid, by nursing the infant in as cleanly and neat a way as possible, which the nurse will know how to do, provided she is not destitute of sense. In the second, third, and following years, it is proper to teach children to take their food decorously, not to soil their fingers with fat, and not, by scattering their food, to stain them-
