April 14, 1868

Feeding of Infants

EGW

I am often told that in How to Live, I stated that infants should be nursed but three times a day. This is a mistake. But it is true that in the second number of that work, page 52, the following expression is found: “Babes should be nursed but three times a day.” These are neither my words, nor my sentiments. The article containing them was extracted from Cole's Philosophy of Health. The printer failing to give the proper credit, the following statement was given on the first page of No. 3: “The article in No. 2, headed, Particular directions to Parents and Guardians, should have been credited to this excellent work, The Philosophy of Health.”RH April 14, 1868, par. 1

My sentiments are these:RH April 14, 1868, par. 2

1. No general rules can be established in the care of all infants, in consequence of their almost endless varieties of condition at birth, and their different constitutional wants.RH April 14, 1868, par. 3

2. No mother would confine the period of infancy to a few days, or weeks, or even months after birth. In How to Live, No. 2, page 44, I did say, “Infancy extends to the age of six or seven years.”RH April 14, 1868, par. 4

3. The term properly called infancy, requires several changes as to the periods of taking food. Before birth it is receiving nourishment constantly. And the changes from this to the establishment of only two meals a day, which may, in most children, be done from the ages of one to three years, must be gradual.RH April 14, 1868, par. 5

4. No rules for all children can be given as to the progressive steps in these changes. Parents must view the wants of their children by the best light they have. When all act upon the best light they can obtain, it can hardly be expected that all mistakes will be avoided, but it is safest and best for the cause of reform, to err, if err we must, on the side of custom, rather than on the side of extreme change.RH April 14, 1868, par. 6

Greenville, Mich.,

April 8, 1868.

Ellen G. White.