Avicenna makes very judicious observations on this subject, but the greater part of them are taken from Galen. He insists, with becoming earnestness, on the propriety of attending to the regulation of the passions of the child, as being conducive to his health as well as to his morals. As soon as the boy is roused from sleep he is to be bathed; then he is to be allowed to play for an hour; afterwards, he is to have something to eat, and then is to be allowed more play. Afterwards he is to be bathed; then he is to take food; and, if possible, he is to be prevented from drinking water immediately after a meal, as it has a tendency to make unconcocted chyle be distributed over the body. When six years old, he is to be consigned to the care of a teacher, but he is not to be compelled to remain constantly in school. Avicenna goes on to state that, at the age he has then reached, he is to be more sparingly bathed, and that his exercise is to be multiplied before eating. Like most of the ancient authorities, he forbids wine to a child. Thus, he adds, is the regimen of the child to be regulated until he reach the age of fourteen. (I, i, 4.) Averrhoes gives very sensible directions on this subject. He forbids the use of wine and ales until manhood. (Collig. vi, 6.) SECT. XV.—ON THE PREPARATORY FRICTION. Before gymnastic exercises, the body ought to be rubbed moderately first with towels, and then with oil in the hollows of the naked hands, until it be properly warmed and softened, and its surface have contracted a florid blush, and become distended. * * * * * COMMENTARY. A more circumstantial account of the mode of preparing the body for gymnastic exercises is given by Oribasius. (Med. Collect. vi, 13.) It is taken, however, from Galen’s second book of ‘Hygiene.’ See a similar account in Aëtius (iii, 1), and Avicenna (i, 3, 2.) The object of it, according to Alexander Aphrodisiensis, was to soften the parts so that they might not be ruptured. (Prob. i, 119.) To rub the body with oil was a general practice of the ancients before strong exercises of every kind. Hence Horace characterizes an inactive person by his dread of oil, “Cur olivum Sanguine viperino cautius vitat?”—that is to say, as his commentator Acron explains it, “Cur vitat olivum, id est oleum, quo unctus tutius natet et luctetur?” The poet alludes to the practice in another place: “Ter uncti Transnanto Tiberim.” It appears from Martial that a composition of oil and wax, called _ceroma_, was sometimes used for this purpose: “Vara nec injecto ceromate brachia tendis.” (Epigr. vii, 32.)