Children are commonly forbidden to ask for anything at table, for people think they can do nothing better in the way of education than to burden them with useless precepts
 Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Emile, or On Education (1762). copy citation

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Author Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Source Emile, or On Education
Topic education burden
Date 1762
Language English
Reference
Note Translated by Barbara Foxley
Weblink http://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/5427/pg5427-images.html

Context

“compare them with boys of the same age, and I am greatly mistaken if you do not find the little boys heavy, silly, and foolish, in comparison. Let me give one illustration in all its childish simplicity. Children are commonly forbidden to ask for anything at table, for people think they can do nothing better in the way of education than to burden them with useless precepts; as if a little bit of this or that were not readily given or refused without leaving a poor child dying of greediness intensified by hope. Every one knows how cunningly a little boy brought up in this way asked for salt when he had been overlooked at table.” source