Importance of Learning to Cook.
By Nellie F. Heald
THAT health is in a large measure dependent upon the quality of the material which we select for our daily food, none will deny. But however excellent the material selected, it may be rendered unhealthful and indigestible by the manner in which it is prepared. It thus becomes unfit to nourish the system; hence great care should be taken in cooking and preparing food for the table. Much suffering, physical and mental, is the result of unhealthful cooking. We know that our blood is formed from the food we eat, and unless our food is such that it can be converted into pure blood, it will not meet the demands of the system. Ill-cooked food cannot be converted into pure blood. It disturbs the digestive organs, causing fretfulness, gloomy and disagreeable feelings, and benumbs the moral sensibilities. Since health and happiness are so closely connected with the art of cooking, it becomes of the utmost importance to learn to cook healthfully. To be a skillful, hygienic cook is a rare and valuable accomplishment, and should be deemed an essential branch of household education. Very many, especially young ladies, seem to think it degrading to perform household labor. To learn the art of cooking seems beneath them. We think there is some reason for this prejudice, from the fact that so many families who employ girls to do housework look upon them simply as servants. But why should it be thought a menial service to be a good cook? Life cannot be sustained without food, much of which requires cooking, and health demands that it should be properly cooked. Life and health are very precious, and it cannot be a menial service to aid in their preservation. By preserving the health of the body, we aid in securing a healthy action of the moral powers; hence it becomes the Christian duty of those who cook to learn to prepare simple, healthful, and inviting food. "To cook well, and present healthful food upon the table in an inviting manner requires intelligence and experience. The one who prepares food that is to be placed in our stomachs, to be converted into blood to nourish the system, occupies a most important and elevated position. The position of copyist, dress-maker, or music-teacher, cannot equal in importance that of the cook." We should seek simplicity in cooking, while we may have a suitable variety. Food should be agreeable to the taste, not only because it adds to our enjoyment, but it promotes digestion. The delicate sense of taste was designed as a detective to guide us in the selection of food, but it has been so abused and perverted by the use of injurious and highly seasoned food, and other wrong habits, that it is not safe to follow its guidance without the aid of reason and judgment. Taste and appetite are greatly modified by habit. Indulgence in stimulants, etc., lessens the sensibility of the nerves of taste and destroys the natural relish for food, so that what might otherwise be delicious seems insipid. The taste should be cultivated so as to relish plain, healthful, well-cooked food. Mothers should deem it a Christian duty to understand the art of cooking according to the laws of health, and to educate their daughters very young in this important branch of household labor. It will be much easier for them to learn thus early in life, under the loving, patient, skillful guidance of a mother, than in after years, when compelled by necessity, and obliged to bear the responsibility alone. Mothers who understand their duty, and have true love for their daughters, will take them into the kitchen when young and carefully instruct them in its duties. They may make mistakes, but these should be corrected with patience, and they should be encouraged by a word and smile of approval in all their efforts to do well. Thus they will be fitted to be useful; very many temptations will be avoided, and mothers will reap a reward in their dutiful, well-trained daughters. RELIGIOUS NEWS AND NOTES.
—A hundred Chinese have professed faith in Christ, at a recent revival at Pekin, China. —Mr. Spurgeon's church has now 5,055 members, having had a net increase of 100 the past year. —A Sandwich Islander recently died, leaving $4,000 to be divided among various missionary societies. —There are in London 1,030 charitable institutions, of which the total income for last year was $23,255,660. —It will take three years to finish the revision of the Bible which is now being made by the American and British committee. —The Baptists in Texas are seeking to combine their educational institutions, and to have one central university for the State. —There are ninety-four church edifices in Washington county, N. Y., valued at $925,450. The aggregate membership is 14,065. —In seven years the students of Talladega College alone have organized Sunday-schools in which have been taught over 20,000 scholars. —The Presbyterian Board of Home Missions has commissioned ten missionary teachers for women in Utah, and two for Alaska, besides having six in New Mexico. There is room for more. —The Hindoos have a strange religious prejudice which forbids them to kill snakes, and yet according to statistics, 17,000 human lives were sacrificed in India last year, to the bite of poisonous snakes. —The applications for admission to the ministry of the Methodist Episcopal church being now more numerous than can be entertained, it is proposed to raise the standard of qualifications required of candidates. —The receipts of the Reformed (Dutch) Foreign Mission Board have been greater during this than the preceding fiscal year. Still, the sum needed for outstanding obligations and to close the year without debt is $40,000. —Two Seventh-day Baptists were recently fined four dollars each in a town in central Pennsylvania for working on Sunday. They refused to pay, and were sent to jail for four days. They claim that the State law of 1794 is unconstitutional, and that it is opposed to any Sabbath at all, since it abolishes the Sabbath of Scriptures and ordains a new one, which is really no Sabbath. —An exchange says: "The Catholic schools in St. Louis, which have heretofore accommodated 15,000 pupils, are to be closed and the pupils placed in the public schools. This is the result of mutual arrangement between the Public School Department and the Catholic authorities. The Department dispenses with reading the Bible and morning services, and also eliminate objectionable selections from the readers. All sects agree to relegate religious teaching and training to the home circle, the Sunday-school and the church." —The activity of the Romanists among the negroes in the South, and the success of their work is seen from the statement of President Tanney, that "the Romish church spends $600,000 a year upon the freedmen, and counts 150,000 of them in her schools. It has nearly 10,000 young men in its higher schools and seminaries; with 750 professors, chiefly Jesuits. There are 500,000 scholars in its schools of lower grade. There are seven religious orders of men, and thirty-six of women, to whom this work is committed." —Persecution is not at an end yet in Mexico, as the missionaries have daily cause to know. A gentleman connected with the American Board in the state of Jalisco describes some of the outrages committed on converts. Recently one of them was assassinated on the streets. Many lose their employment, are driven from their houses, and are looked upon as the filth of the world by their own families. In the Pueblas one had his house burned down because he spoke of Jesus, instead of Mary; another was stoned in the plaza for not taking off his hat when the bell struck twelve o'clock; a third was followed with the cry of "Death to the Protestant," because he read the Bible to his family and others who would listen to him. Four persons, because they possessed a Bible, had to leave their homes at midnight, under cover of darkness, to save their lives, the priest having said that the inhabitants of the place had proved themselves cowards for allowing such books in their midst, and tolerating the persons who had them. It is this church that has undertaken, for us, to educate and religiously instruct the Freedmen of the South in the United States.—Ex. —A lively discussion has been in progress for some time between a certain class of spiritualistic scientists and Dr. Carpenter, one of the leading physiologists of the present day. Dr. Carpenter repudiates the claims of mesmerists, clairvoyants, animal magnetizers, etc., and demands of them more satisfactory evidence of the genuineness of their claims than they have yet given. Among other interesting facts developed in this discussion is the following: In 1837, Mr. Burdin, a member of the French Academy of Science, put the claims of clairvoyance to a very simple and seemingly decisive test. He placed the sum of 3,000 francs, equal to $600, in the hands of a notary, subject to the order of the Academy, to be paid to any person who could read writing placed in an opaque box carefully sealed. Three years' time was given to the mediums of the world to read the writing, but all utterly failed; and in many instances in which the attempt was made, the manner of the fraud was discovered. It was not long ago that Dr. Lankester, one of England's foremost scientists, thoroughly exposed the renowned letter-reader, Slade, and even secured his arrest and prosecution as a vagrant.