Few things are more hurtful to children than unripe fruits. They weaken the powers of digestion, and sour and relax the stomach, by which means it becomes a proper nest for insects. Children indeed shew a great inclination for fruit, and I am apt to believe, that if good ripe fruit were allowed them in proper quantity, it would have no bad effects. We never find a natural inclination wrong, if properly regulated. Fruits are generally of a cooling nature, and correct the heat and acrimony of the humours. This is what most children require; only care should be taken lest they exceed. Indeed the best way to prevent children from going to excess in the use of fruit, or eating that which is bad, is to allow them a proper quantity of what is good[12]. Roots which contain a crude viscid juice should be sparingly given to children. They fill the body with gross humours, and tend to produce eruptive diseases. This caution is peculiarly necessary for the poor; glad to obtain at a small price what will fill the bellies of their children, they stuff them two or three times a day with greasy potatoes, or other crude vegetables. Children had better eat a smaller quantity of food which yields a wholesome nourishment, than be crammed with what their digestive powers are unable properly to assimilate. Butter ought likewise to be sparingly given to children. It both relaxes the stomach, and produces gross humours. Indeed, most things that are fat or oily, have this effect. Butter, when salted, becomes still more hurtful. Instead of butter, so liberally given to children in most parts of Britain, we would recommend honey. Honey is not only wholesome, but cooling, cleansing, and tends to sweeten the humours. Children who eat honey are seldom troubled with worms: they are also less subject to cutaneous diseases, as itch, scabbed head, &c. Many people err in thinking that the diet of children ought to be altogether moist. When children live entirely upon slops, it relaxes their solids, renders them weak, and disposes them to the rickets, the scrophula, and other glandular disorders. Relaxation is one of the most general causes of the diseases of children. Every thing therefore which tends to unbrace their solids, ought to be carefully avoided. We would not be understood by these observations as confining children to any particular kind of food. Their diet may be frequently varied, provided always that sufficient regard be had to simplicity. _Of the Exercise of Children._ Of all the causes which conspire to render the life of man short and miserable, none has greater influence than the want of proper EXERCISE: healthy parents, wholesome food, and proper clothing, will avail little, where exercise is neglected. Sufficient exercise will make up for several defects in nursing; but nothing can supply the want of it. It is absolutely necessary to the health, the growth, and the strength of children.