John Locke (1632 – 1704) is both the Father of Liberalism (Two Treatises on Government) and the Grandfather of Empiricism (An Essay Concerning Human Understanding).
But he wasn’t just a great philosopher. He was also a physician, and not surprisingly, he had some interesting thoughts on the subject of health ( which he would define as robustness).
Consider one of his “minor” works, Some Thoughts Concerning Education, which is a summary of letters he wrote to a friend giving advice on how to educate young children effectively. In it he discusses the elements of creating a healthy child, most of which would stand the test of time today.
Broadly speaking, he feels that the essence of a good education is putting a sound mind in a sound body, and he starts with several specific pieces of advice needed to create a sound body:
- Getting outside frequently.
- Eating simple foods.
- Minimizing sugary foods.
- Dressing loosely.
- Sleeping well.
- Minimizing any preventive medicines, especially medicines for constipation.
- Uniformly avoiding corporal punishment.
- Washing, particularly the feet, in cold water.
Now, I will grant you the washing your feet in cold water is a little bit odd! But, apart from this, the other pieces of advice are things which every pediatrician today would embrace.
But a reasonable follow-up question is this: To what extent should we embrace these philosophers of the distant past, these dead white men?
I believe looking down upon men like Locke, wearing our goggles of technological arrogance and evidence-based medicine (which, by the way, he was the great-grandfather of), is a great mistake.
Remember, Locke is one of only three men Thomas Jefferson looked upon as his intellectual mentor (the other two were Bacon and Newton), and, let’s face it, the philosopher who gave Jefferson inspiration for the words “Life, Liberty and The Pursuit of Happiness” should not be taken lightly.
Anyway, any physician who either works with children or has children would be well served reading this work.