“For love, nor honor, wealth, nor power,
Can give the heart a cheerful hour
When health is lost. Be timely wise;
With health all taste of pleasure flies.”
Moreover, the mind is affected by the condition of the body, and the morals by the state of the mind. As, therefore, cooking determines to a large degree the condition of the body, it must also affect to a considerable extent our moral and spiritual welfare. It is not too much to say, therefore, that there is religion in good cooking.
It has been truly said that “the cook fills an important place in the household. She is preparing food to be taken into the stomach, to form brain, bone, and muscle. The health of all the members of the family depends largely upon her skill and intelligence.” As the lives of those on a steamship are in the hands of the helmsman, so the lives and the health of the members of the family are, to a great degree, in the hands of the one who prepares their meals.
Thousands are dying annually as the result of poor cooking. Food poorly prepared is not nutritious, and can not, therefore, make good blood.
Some may say they have no natural ability to cook; but any one having ordinary intelligence, with a little effort, care, and proper directions, can learn to cook well. And surely the health of the family ought to be of sufficient importance to inspire every mother with ambition to learn how to cook.
Mothers should also teach their daughters the mysteries of good cooking. They should show them that this is an essential part of their education,—more essential than the study of music, fancy work, the dead languages, or the sciences. The knowledge of these latter without the knowledge of how to care for the body and provide it with suitable nourishment, is of little worth. Meredith hit upon a great truth when he said:—
“We may live without music, poetry, and art;