But I will not dwell here. The common notion on this subject, if not ridiculous, is certainly strange. I will only add, that, come into vogue as it might have done, there is no opinion more unfounded than the very general one among adults, that children should be uniformly grave; and that just in proportion as they laugh and appear frolicsome, just in the same proportion are they out of the way, and deserving of reprehension.
It is strange that it should be so, but I have seen many parents who were miserable because their children were sportive and joyful. Oh, when will the days of monkish sadness and austerity be over; and the public sentiment in the christian world get right on this subject!
General remarks. Hints to fathers.--SEC. 1. Proper hours for repose. Dark rooms. Noise.--SEC. 2. Place for sleeping. Sleeping alone--reasons.--SEC. 3. Purity of the air in sleeping rooms.--SEC. 4. The bed. Objections to feathers. Other materials.--SEC. 5. The covering of beds. Covering the head.--SEC. 6. Night Dresses. Robes.--SEC. 7. Posture of the body in sleep.--SEC. 8. State of the mind.--SEC. 9. Quality of sleep.--SEC. 10. Quantity of sleep.
Not a few persons consider all rules relative to sleep as utterly futile. They regard it as so much of a natural or animal process, that if we are let alone we shall seldom err, at any age, respecting it. Rules on the subject, above all, they regard as wholly misplaced.
Those who entertain such views, would do well, in order to be consistent, to go a little farther; and as breathing and eating and drinking--nay, even _thinking_--are natural processes, deny the utility of all rules respecting _them_ also. Perhaps they would do well, moreover, to deny that rules of any sort are valuable. But would not this have the effect to bar the door perpetually against all human improvement? Would it not be equivalent to saying, to a half-civilized, because only half-christianized community--Go on with your barbarous customs, and your uncleanly and unthinking habits, forever?
But I have not so learned human nature. I regard man as susceptible of endless progression. And I know of no way in which more rapid progress can be made, than by enlightening young mothers on subjects which pertain to our physical nature, and the means of physical improvement. Not for the _sake_ of that perishable part of man, the frame, but because it is nearly in vain to attempt to improve the mind and heart, without due attention to the frame-work, to which mind and heart, for the present, are appended, and most intimately related.