When Grammar Should Be Taught?

what he craves, much less what he cries for, I had said, or so much as speaks for: But that being apt to be misunderstood, and interpreted as if I meant a child should never speak to his parents for anything, which will perhaps be thought to lay too great a curb on the minds of children, to the prejudice of that love and affection which should be between them and their parents; I shall explain myself a little more particularly. It is fit that they should have liberty to declare their wants to their parents, and that with all tenderness they should be hearkened to, and supplied, at least whilst they are very little. But ’tis one thing to say, “I am hungry,” another to say, “I would have roast-meat.” Having declared their wants, their natural wants, the pain they feel from hunger, thirst, cold, or any other necessity of nature, ’tis the duty of their parents and those about them to relieve them: But children must leave it to the choice and ordering of their parents, what they think properest for them, and how much; and must not be permitted to choose for themselves, and say, I would have wine, or white-bread; the very naming of it should make them lose it.