Children are generally too much wrapped up, particularly in infancy.
They should be accustomed to cold rather than heat; great cold
never does them any harm, if they are exposed to it soon enough;
but their skin is still too soft and tender and leaves too free
a course for perspiration, so that they are inevitably exhausted
by excessive heat. It has been observed that infant mortality is
greatest in August. Moreover, it seems certain from a comparison
of northern and southern races that we become stronger by bearing
extreme cold rather than excessive heat. But as the child's body
grows bigger and his muscles get stronger, train him gradually to
bear the rays of the sun. Little by little you will harden him till
he can face the burning heat of the tropics without danger.
Locke, in the midst of the manly and sensible advice he gives us,
falls into inconsistencies one would hardly expect in such a careful
thinker. The same man who would have children take an ice-cold bath
summer and winter, will not let them drink cold water when they
are hot, or lie on damp grass. But he would never have their shoes
water-tight; and why should they let in more water when the child
is hot than when he is cold, and may we not draw the same inference
with regard to the feet and body that he draws with regard to the
hands and feet and the body and face? If he would have a man all
face, why blame me if I would have him all feet?
To prevent children drinking when they are hot, he says they should
be trained to eat a piece of bread first. It is a strange thing to
make a child eat because he is thirsty; I would as soon give him a
drink when he is hungry. You will never convince me that our first
instincts are so ill-regulated that we cannot satisfy them without
endangering our lives. Were that so, the man would have perished
over and over again before he had learned how to keep himself alive.