Some Thoughts Concerning Education (1902)

himself in cold Water. But, perhaps, Italy will be thought 35 much warmer than England, and the Chillness of their Waters not to come near ours in Winter. If the Rivers of Italy are warmer, those of Germany and Poland are much colder, than any in this our Country, and yet in these, the yews, both Men and Women, bathe all over, at all Seasons 40 of the Year, without any Prejudice to their Health. And Swimming. Open air. [§§ 7 — 9 every one is not apt to believe it is Miracle, or any peculiar Virtue of St Winifreds Well, that makes the cold Waters of that famous Spring do no Harm to the tender Bodies that bathe in it. Every one is now full of the 5 Miracles done by cold Baths on decay'd and weak Constitutions, for the Recovery of Health and Strength ; and therefore they cannot be impracticable or intolerable for the improving and hardening the Bodies of those who are in better Circumstances. 10 If these Examples of grown Men be not thought yet to reach the Case of Children, but that they may be judg*d still to be too tender, and unable to bear such Usage, let them examine what the Germans of old, and the Irish now, do to them, and they will find, that Infants too, as tender as 15 they are thought, may, without any Danger, endure Bathing, not only of their Feet, but of their whole Bodies, in cold Water. And there are, at this Day, Ladies in the Highlands of Scotland who use this Discipline to their Children in the midst of Winter, and find that cold Water does them 20 no Harm, even when there is Ice in it. § 8. I shall not need here to mention Swimmings when . . he is of an Age able to learn, and has any one to teach him. Tis that saves many a Man s Life; and the Romans thought it so necessary, that they