A parent ought on no account to allow a boy to touch spirits, however much diluted; they are, to the young, still more deadly in their effects than wine.
334. Have you any objection to a youth drinking tea?
Not at all, provided it be not green tea, that it be not made strong, and that it have plenty of milk in it. Green tea is apt to make people nervous, and boys and girls ought not even to know what it is to be nervous.
335. Do you object to supper for a youth?
Meat suppers are highly prejudicial. If he be hungry (and if he have been much in the open air, he is almost sure to be), a piece of bread and cheese, or of bread and butter, with a draught either of new milk or of table beer, will form the best supper he can have. He ought not to sup later than eight o'clock.
336. Do you approve of a boy having anything between meals?
I do not; let him have four meals a day, and he will require nothing in the intervals. It is a mistaken notion that "little and often is best," The stomach requires rest as much as, or perhaps more than (for it is frequently sadly over-worked) any other part of the body. I do not mean that he is to have "much and seldom:" moderation, in everything, is to be observed. Give him as much as a growing boy requires (and that is a great deal), but do not let him eat gluttonously, as many indulgent parents encourage their children to do. Intemperance in eating cannot be too strongly condemned.
337. Have you any objection to a boy having pocket money?
It is a bad practice to allow a boy much pocket money; if he be so allowed, he will be loading his stomach with sweets, fruit, and pastry, and thus his stomach will become cloyed and disordered, and the keen appetite, so characteristic of youth, will be blunted, and ill-health will ensue. "In a public education, boys early learn intemperance, and if the parents and friends would give them less money upon their usual visits, it would be much to their advantage, since it may justly be said that a great part of their disorders arise from surfeit, 'plus occidit gula quam gladius' (gluttony kills more than the sword)."—Goldsmith.
How true is the saying that "many people dig their graves with their teeth." You may depend upon it that more die from stuffing than from starvation! There would be little for doctors to do if there were not so much stuffing and imbibing of strong drinks going on in the world!