7. [part]
[...] But I want to counsel you, dear children, not to look down on foods with which others are content. If from your youth on you become accustomed to enjoy with thanks every food that is nourishing, even if it doesn’t taste as good to you as others, you will find in the future that that is good advice. Children usually like to eat sweets and baked goods and people like to give these to them and are accustomed to call this something good. But according to experience it is not so healthy for the children as regular foods and children do well when they take very little of sweet things and baked goods. In addition it is very good for children when they eat and drink in moderation and in an orderly fashion. Often they don’t know themselves when they have had enough. Then one is accustomed to say to them, “You’ve probably had enough now. You must stop when it tastes the best,” and then an obedient child follows. Not to do anything all day but to eat one thing after another is most unhealthy. To eat in the morning, at noon and in the evening, that is correct. When children are small and growing it is well to give them something between breakfast and dinner [3] and also between dinner and supper, a little bread or perhaps some butter and bread. If that’s what they get they will be hungry then at mealtime and, with God’s blessing, the meal will do them good. We ask for [God’s blessing] in a table prayer before eating and return thanks to the Lord after eating.
The impression that the foods, which God had designated for the nourishment and preservation of our body, are His gifts [this impression] makes the children not waste the little piece of bread they are given nor treat it inappropriately, indeed that they sit properly at table while eating, do not play with the food nor greedily gulp foods down, which is unhealthy and damaging. The Creator has given us teeth so that we can thoroughly chew meats and that sort of means of nourishment in our mouths before they come to digestion in the stomach. It is also part of the care of the body that children learn to eat properly and smartly follow the admonitions given to them to that end.
3. Dinner, the main meal of the day, was always at noon
Something
of Bodily Care for Children
Translated by Pastor Roy Ledbetter
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