Yes, "reward" was the word I used. Now it seems absurd to you, perhaps, that it should be necessary to reward a man for eating a good dinner? Well, well, GOD has been more kind to him, then, than you would be. To every duty imposed by Him upon man, He has joined a pleasure as a reward for fulfilling it. How many things should I not have to say to you on this subject, if you were older? For the present, I will content myself with making a comparison.
When a mother thinks her child is not reasonable enough to do, of her own accord, something which it is nevertheless important she should do, as learning to read, for instance, or to work with her needle, &c., she comes to the rescue with rewards, and gives her a plaything when she has done well. And thus GOD, who had not confidence enough in man's reason to trust to it alone for supplying the wants of human nature, has placed a plaything in the shape of pleasure after every necessity; and in supplying the want, man finds the reward.
You will hardly believe that what I have here explained to you so quietly by a childish comparison, has been, and alas! still is, the subject of terrible disputes among grown-up people. If hereafter they reach your ears, remember what I have told you now, viz., that the pleasure lodged in the tongue and its surroundings, is a plaything, but a plaything given to us by GOD; and that we must use it accordingly.
If a little girl has had a plaything given to her by her mother, would she think to please her by breaking it or throwing it into a corner? No, certainly not: she would know that in so doing she would be going directly against her mother's intentions and wishes. Nevertheless she would amuse herself with it in play hours, with an easy conscience, and, if she is amiable, she will remember while she does so, that it comes to her from her mother, and will thank her at the bottom of her heart.
It is the same with man, of whose playthings we are speaking.
But, moreover, this little girl (it is taken for granted that she is a good little girl) will not make the plaything the business of her whole day, the object of all her thoughts; she will not forget everything for it, she will leave it unhesitatingly when her mamma calls her. Neither will she wish to be alone in her enjoyments, but will gladly see her little friends also enjoy similar playthings, because she thinks that what is good for her must be good for others too.
It is thus that man should do with his playthings; but, alas! this is what he does not by any means always do with them, and hence a great deal has been said against them. Little girls, in particular, are apt to fail on this point, and that is how the dreadful word gluttony came to be invented. For the same reason, also, people get punished from time to time; such punishments being the consequence of the misuse I speak of.
If people who call to see your mamma were, instead of going straight up stairs to her, to establish themselves at the lodge with the porter, and stay there chatting with him, do you think she would be much flattered by their visits? And yet this is exactly what people do who, when eating, attend only to the porter. He is so pleasant, this porter; he says such pretty things to you, that you go on talking to him just as if he were the master of the house, who, meanwhile, has quite gone out of your head.
You heap sugar-plums upon sugar-plums, cakes upon cakes, sweetmeats upon sweetmeats—everything that pleases the porter, but is of no use whatever to the master of the house. And then what happens? The master gets angry sometimes, and no wonder. Mr. Stomach grows weary of these visits, which are of no use to him. He rings all the bells, makes no end of a noise in the house, and forces that traitor of a porter who has engrossed all his company, to do penance. You are ill—your mouth is out of order—you have no appetite for anything. The mamma has taken away the plaything which has been misused, and when she gives it back, there must be great care taken not to do the same thing over again.
I have thought it only right, my dear child, in telling you the history of eating, to give to this little detail of its beginning, a place proportioned to your interest in it. You see by what I have said, that you are not altogether wrong in following your taste; but neither must it be forgotten that this part of the business is not in reality the most important; that a plaything is but a plaything, and that the porter is not the master of the house.