If a Child is sent to visit a Relation or Friend, the grand Compliment is, to apply to the Confectioner or the Pastry-cook; and ’till the little Visitor be crammed with Biskets, or Cakes, or Tarts, or Sweetmeats, or all in their Turn, and that even to a Surfeit, the welcome is not thought compleat. Still there is some Excuse to palliate this Mistake; the Child is considered as a Visitor; and these Excesses are the mistaken Effects of Good-Nature and Respect; both which are apt grievously to err against Judgment. But my Principals here are the Parents; for from them alone must come the Habit of doing right, and by them alone must the Error be prevented or corrected. I have no Objection to a Child’s having a Tart or Bisket by Chance, but I am a profess’d Enemy to the daily Abuses committed with them. If we view the Loads of Wigs, Tarts, and Cakes, every Day made at the Pastry-cooks, we must be astonished at their Consumption. The Truth is, People give these Things to their Children ’till they have made them sick, and then give them because they are sick. If a Person happens to call on a Friend where there is a Child indisposed, it is ten to one but they find a Tart in it’s Hands; Ah! poor thing, says Mamma, it has eat nothing to-day, so I sent for a Tart for it. That the Hands, the Face, the Apparel and Bedding of Children, imprudently indulg’d with this kind of Food, be constantly daub’d and besmear’d, is the least bad Consequence attending such Indiscretion; it has several other Effects, particularly on their Health; by vitiating their Appetites, engendering Crudities, and alienating them from more wholesome Diet. But let us go lower into Common Life; and view the various Outlets from _London_. What Swarms, what Multitudes of Children are there not in the Fields on every fine Sunday! And what is their Entertainment? Why, generally speaking, they are stuffed with a coarse kind of Pastry-ware made coarse on purpose for Children, who of all the human Species ought not to touch it: then to compleat the Mischief, they are to wash it down with a foul, nauseous, heady kind of Ale, or other Malt Liquor. Yet when one opposes this Practice, as every one must with Hand and Heart, who has but a Head to guide them; Poor Things! cry the mistaken Parents, what! take Children into the Fields, and not give them a Bun! But how grievously does their dotard Fondness mislead them! Good Bread, with a very little Sweet Butter, wash’d down with Water, or clear well-brew’d Small Beer, would preserve their Health; while the only use of this Trash, is to impair or destroy it.