=The liberty accorded to the child of to-day is purely physical. Civil rights of the child in the twentieth century=.--Hygiene has brought liberty into the physical life of the infant. Such material facts as the abolition of swaddling bands, open-air life, the prolongation of sleep till the infant wakes of its own accord, etc., are the most evident and tangible proof of this. But these are merely means for the attainment of liberty. A far more important measure of liberation has been the removal of the perils of disease and death which beset the child at the outset of life's journey. Not only did infants survive in very much greater numbers as soon as the obstacles of certain fundamental errors were swept away, but it was at once apparent that there was an improvement in their development. Was it really hygiene which helped them to increase in weight, stature, and beauty, and improved their material development? Hygiene did not accomplish quite all this. Who, as the Gospel says, can by taking thought add one cubit to his stature? Hygiene merely delivered the child from the obstacles that impeded its growth. External restraints checked material development and all the natural evolution of life; hygiene burst these bonds. And every one felt that a liberation had been effected; every one repeated in view of the accomplished fact: children should be free. The direct correspondence between "conditions of physical life fulfilled" and "liberty acquired" is now universally and intuitively recognized. Thus the infant is treated like a young plant. Children to-day enjoy the rights which from time immemorial have been accorded to the vegetables of a well-kept garden. Good food, oxygen, suitable temperature, the careful elimination of parasites that produce disease; yes, henceforth we may say that the son of a prince will be tended with as much care as the finest rose-tree of a villa. The old comparison of a child to a flower is the reality to which we now aspire; though even this is a privilege reserved for the more fortunate children. But let us beware of so grave an error. The babe is a man. That which suffices for a plant cannot be sufficient for him. Consider the depth of misery into which a paralyzed man has sunk when we say of him: "He merely vegetates; as a man, he is dead," and lament that there is nothing but his body left. The infant as a _man_--such is the figure we ought to keep in view. We must behold him amidst our tumultuous human society and see how with heroic vigor he aspires to life.