A practical treatise on the management and diseases of children / by Richard T. Evanson and Henry Maunsell.
- Evanson, Richard Tonson, 1800-1871.
- Date:
- 1843
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: A practical treatise on the management and diseases of children / by Richard T. Evanson and Henry Maunsell. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)
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![religion, are among the latest to come into operation, requiring some assistance from the understanding for their direction and support. Before we are generous we should be just; but to be just we must be wise—knowledge is necessary to justice. No doubt can exist that the child is endowed with certain powers, moral and intellectual, varying in different individuals, and consti- tuting natural differences of character; but this militates not against the necessity for education or training, and the vast influence exer- cised thereby ; on the contrary, it serves as a guide and a limitation, —pointing out what requires to be cultivated, and what to be re- pressed ; and shows us what is possible to be done. How important, then, to acquire a knowledge of the primitive faculties of man, and the laws by which they are regulated in their natural development, or influenced by artificial training. Nor is the necessity for such knowledge confined to the system more immediately connected with mental manifestation. The same holds good respect- ing all the other systems in the body, muscular, circulatory, and digestive, as well as nervous; for without due attention to each, we shall not be able to do justice to any, nor secure for the whole its best advantages during the period of development or growth. With regard to the general growth of the body, and the advance in height, weight, and strength, differences arise from age and sex ; and these have been accurately investigated by M. Quetelet.* According to him, the average weight of the male infant at birth, is about half a pound more than that of the female, and the length about an inch more; and the annual growth of the female infant is less than that of the male, but her development is more early com- pleted. Immediately after birth, the weight of the infant is found to dimmish; nor does it begin again sensibly to increase until after the first week. The growth of the stature is most rapid during the first year, when it amounts to nearly eight inches; it is less rapid as the child ap- proaches the fourth or fifth year, appearing to diminish in direct ratio to the age, up to that time ; the growth in the second year being only half that of the first; in the third year,t only one-third; but afterwards it increases with a tolerably regular progression. A remarkable difference is often to be observed in the degree of development, or proportional growth of one organ or system of organs more than another, and in the consequent predominance of the class of functions which this system of organs performs. In some children, the head is very large, and great liveliness and intelligence are early displayed, the cerebro-spinal system of nerves being that which pre- ponderates ; and this lays the foundation for a particular tempera- ment, which, according to the rational view of M. Thomas,:}: would, in this instance, be the cranial or nervous temperament. * Sur I'Homme et le Developpement de ses Facultes, &c., &c. ■j It is a popular observation that the height is never more than doubled after the third year, the maximum medium, particularly in females, being attained at that age. [Note to 4th Edition.] t See Physiologic des Temperamens ou Constitutions, &c., &,c., par F. Thomas, D.M.P. 3*](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b21118346_0033.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
