of the Eneid, is applied to all the coarfe fare already mentioned.

As the luxury of mankind increafed, their lives fhortened: The half of Abraham's age became regarded as a ftretch, far beyond the cuftomary period. So in profane history we find, that when the arts of luxury were unknown in Rome, its feven kings reigned a longer term, than, afterwards, upon the prevalency of thofe arts, was completed by its firft twenty empe

rors.

Such perfons, indeed, among the ancients, whofe precepts and practice moft recommended temperance in diet, were eminent inftances of the benefit accruing from it, in the health preferved, and long life attained by it.

Gorgias lived 107 years.

Hippocrates reached, according to fome writers, his 104th year, according to others his 109th.

Pythagoras, of whom it was obferved, that he was never known to eat to fatiety, lived to near 100 years; if Jamblichus may be credited. D. Laertius fays, that according to moft writers he was, when he loft his life, in his goth year. Out of his fchool came Empedocles, who lived, as fome fay, to 109; and Xenophilus, who lived to above 105.

Zeno lived to 98: his difciple and fucceffor Cleanthes to 99.

Diogenes, when he died, was about 90. Plato reach'd his 81ft year; and his follower Xenocrates his 84th.

Lycurgus, the lawgiver of the Lacedæmonians, who, when they obeyed his laws, were not lefs diftinguished by their abftemiousness than by their fortitude, lived to 85; and their King Agefilaus took pay of Tachos at 80; afterwards affifted Nectane bos; and, having established him in his kingdom, died, in his return to Sparta at 84.

Cato, the Cenfor, is introduced by Tully representing himself as, when in his 84th year, able to affift in the fenate-to fpeak in the affembly of the people, and to give his friends and dependents the affiftance, which they might want from him.

Lucian introduces his account of longlived perfons, with the observation, that it might be of ufe, as fhewing that they, who took the most care of their bodies and minds, lived the longeft, and enjoyed the

belt health.

To come nearer to our own times: the difcovery of a new world has confirmed the

obfervations furnished by the old; that in thofe countries, where the greatest fimplicity of diet has been ufed, the greateft length of life has been attained.

Of the ancient inhabitants of Virginia we are told, "That their chief dish was maiz, and that they drank only water: That their difeafes were few, and chiefly proceeded from exceffive heats or colds." Al. Geog. vol. v. p. 711. "Some of them lived to upwards of 200 years." PURCHAS, vol. v. p. 946. "The fobriety of the ancient inhabitants of Florida lengthen'd their lives in fuch fort, that one of their kings, fays Morgues, told me, he was three hundred years old; and his father, whom he then fhewed me alive, was fifty years older than himfelf." PURCHAS, Vol. v. p. 961.

And if we now fearch after particular inftances of perfons reaching to extreme old age, it is certain that we must not refort for them to courts and palaces; to the dwellings of the great or the wealthy; but to the cells of the religious, or to cottages; to the habitations of fuch, whofe hunger is their fauce, and to whom a wholefome meal is a fufficiently delicate

one.

Martha Waterboufe, of the township of North Bierley in Yorkshire, died about the year 1711, in the 104th year of her age: her maiden fifter, Hefter Jager, of the fame place, died in 1713, in the 107th year of her age. They had both of them relief from the township of Bierley nigh fifty years. Abridgment of Phil. Tranf. by JONES, vol. ii. p. 2. p. 115.

Dr. Harvey, in his anatomical account of T. Parr, who died in the 153d year of his age, fays-that, if he had not changed his diet and air, he might, perhaps, have lived a good while longer. His diet was old cheefe, milk, coarfe bread, fmall beer, and whey.

Dr. T. Robinfon fays of H. Jenkins, the fisherman, who lived 169 years, that his diet was coarfe and four.

Dr. M.Lifter, having mentioned feveral old perfons of Craven in Yorkshire, faysThe food of all this mountainous country is exceeding coarfe. Abr. of Pbil. Trans. by LOWTHORP, vol. iii. p. 307, &c.

Buchanan fpeaks of a fifherman in his own time, who married at 100, went out in his little fishing boat in the roughest weather at 140, and at laft did not die of any painful diftemper, but merely worn out by age. Rer. Scot. Hift. lib. i. ad, fin.

Plutarch mentions our countrymen as,

in his time, growing old at 120. To account for this, as he does, from their climate, feems lefs rational than to afcribe it to their way of living, as related by Diodarus Siculus, who tell us-that their diet was fimple, and that they were utter frangers to the delicate fare of the wealthy.

In our feveral neighbourhoods we all of us fee, that they who leaft confult their appetite, who least give way to its wantonnefs or voraciousness, attain, generally, to years far exceeding theirs, who deny themselves nothing they can relifh, and conveniently procure.

Human life, indeed, being expofed to fo many thousand accidents, its end being hatened by fuch a prodigious diverfity of means, there is no care we can take of ourselves, in any one refpect, that will be our effectual prefervative; but, allowing for cafualties and difference in conftitutions, we every where perceive, that the age of thofe, who neglect the rules of temperance, is of a much fhorter date than theirs, by whom these rules are carefully followed.

And if we attend to our ftructure, it mut thence be evident that it cannot be otherwife. Dean Bolton.

$133. On Intemperance in Eating.
SECT. IV.

The human body may be confidered as compofed of a great variety of tubes, in which their proper fluid is in a perpetual motion. Our health is according to the condition, in which thefe veffels and this fluid are.

The ruptured, or too relaxed, or too rigid ftate of the one; and the redundancy or deficiency, the refolved or vifcid, the acefcent or the putrefcent ftate of the other, is a diforder in our frame. Whether our excefs be in the quantity or quality of aliment, we must fuffer by it, in fome or other of these ways.

By the ftomach being frequently loaded, that fulness of the veffels enfues, by which the fibres are weakened-the circulation becomes languid-perspiration is leffened -obstructions are formed-the humours become vifcid and foon putrid.

In the progress to this laft ftate, different difeafes take place, according to the general ftrength or weakness of the folids, or according to the debility of fome particular organ; according to the conftitution of the air; according to our reft or motion; according to the warmth in which we keep, or

the cold, to which we expofe ourselves, &c.

Excefs may be in the quantity of our food, not only when we eat fo as to burthen the ftomach; but, likewife, when our meals bear not a just proportion to our labour or exercife.

We are tempted to exceed in the quantity of our food, by the feafoning of it, or by the variety of it.

The ftimulus of fauce ferves but to excite a falfe appetite-to make us eat much more than we should do, if our diet were quite fimple.

The effect is the fame, when our meal is compofed of feveral kinds of food: their dif ferent taftes are fo many inducements to excefs, as they are fo many provocations to eat beyond what will fatisfy our natural wants.

And thus, tho' we were never to touch a dith, which had its relish from any the leaft unwhole fome ingredient; tho' our diet were the plaineft, and nothing came ever before us, that had any other elegance than from the feafon, in which it was brought to our table, or the place in which it appeared there; we yet might greatly hurt ourselves: we might be as intemperate, and as fpeedily deftroy ourselves by our intemperance with roaft and boiled meat, as with fricaffees and ragouts.

The quality of our aliment may be mischievous to us, either as univerfally prejudicial to the human conftitution, or as unfuitable to our own;-unfuitable to the weakness of our whole frame, or to fome defect in the formation of a part of it, or to that taint we have in us, from the diseafes or vices of our parents.

We may be greatly prejudiced by the kind of our food, in many other ways; and we, ordinarily, are fo, by not regarding what agrees with the climate, in which we are-what with the country we inhabitwhat with the manner of life we lead.

From the great heat that fpices occafion, and from the length of time they continue it, we may truly fay, that their copious and daily ufe in food must be injurious to all constitutions.

So for falted meats, the hurt that may be feared from them, when they are our conftant meals, is eafily collected, from the irritation they muft caufe in their paffage thro' the body-from the injury, that must hence enfue to its finer membranes-from the numerous acrid particles, that mufthereby be lodged in the pores of the skin, the obftructions which this must produce, and

I 3

the

the large quantity of perfpirable matter which will, therefore, be detained in, and, confequently, greatly foul the blood-from the dreadful fymptoms, that attend a high degree of the fcurvy; the relief of which by vegetables, by fresh meat, by liquids fitteft to remove the effects of a muriatic caufe, plainly fhews them to be owing to fuch a caufe.

Whatever has the haut-gout may be looked upon as confifting of fuch active particles, as cannot but make our frequent eating of it very dangerous-as muft render it much fitter to be used as phyfic, than as food.

From a mixture of meats, each of them wholefome in its kind, a bad chyle may be formed and the rule in phyfic is, that an error in the first digeftion will not be mended in the fecond.

A delicate conftitution is, fpeedily, either quite deftroyed, or irrecoverably difordered, when the diet is not exactly adapted to it is not fuch as leaft irritates, as least heats, as is most eafily concocted, as fooneft paffes out of the body, and leaves the feweft impurities behind it there.

The weakness, or the wrong formation, of a part of our frame is, generally, a call to the utmost care about our food; and as our obferving this may extend our life, even under either of thofe circumftances, as far as we could have hoped it would have been prolonged, if we had been without any fuch defect; fo our failure therein may, in a very fhort time, be fatal to us.

The moft fimple aliment will, perhaps, be unable to hinder our feeling, in fome degree, the bad confequences of the dif cafes, or irregularities of our parents: but how far they shall affect us, depends, very often, in a great meafure, upon ourselves.

They may neither much contract the terin, nor much interrupt the comfort, of life, if we will make hunger our fauce, and, in every meal we eat, regard the diftempers we inherit; but early, alas! and heavy will our fufferings be, our years few and full of uneafinefs, when, without any fuch regard, our tafte is directed by that of the found and athletic-when the folicitations of appetite lead us to forget the reafons we have to restrain it.

In this climate and country, where, for fo many months in the year, the cuticular difcharges are fo fmall-where the air fo often, to fuddenly, and to fo great a degree, varies its equilibrium, and where our

veffels, therefore, are as frequently, as fuddenly, and as greatly contracted or expan ded-where fogs fo much abound, and fo much contribute to impair the elasticity of our fibres-to hinder the proper both fe cretions and excretions to deftroy the due texture of the blood, and vitiate our whole habit, it must be obvious, what we have to fear, when our aliment hurts us in the fame way with our air-when the one heightens the diforder, to which we are expofed by the other.

An inattention to the nutriment fit for us, when we feldom ufe any exercise, or, always, very gentle-when our life is fedentary, either from the business by which we maintain ourselves, or from our love of eafe, or from our literary purfuits, is perhaps, as fatal to us, as almost any inftance of wrong conduct, with which we can be chargeable. By high feeding and little or no exercife, we are not only exposed to the most dangerous diseases, but we make all difeafes dangerous: we make thofe fo, which would, otherwise, be flight and eafily removed-we do not only fubject ourfelves to the particular maladies, which have their rife wholly from luxury, but we render ourselves more liable to thofe, which have no connexion with it. We, then, are among the firft, who are feized with the diftempers, which the conftitution of the air occafions.-We are most apt to receive all thofe of the infectious kind—We take cold whence we might leaft fear it; and find its immediate confequence, a malignant or an inflammatory fever, or fome other difeafe equally to be dreaded.

A writer in phyfic of the first rank afferts, that our diet is the chief caufe of all our difcafes-that other caufes only take effect from the difpofition of our body, and the ftate of its humours.

'There is, I am perfuaded, much truth in this affertion. For, as in countries, where the inhabitants greatly indulge themfelves, few die of old age; fo where a strict temperance is obferved, few die but of old age. We find, likewife, perfons, as Socrates for inftance, who, by their regular living, have preferved themselves from the infection of a

difeafe, that has made the cruelleft havock around them. We perceive, alfo, the reflorers of health ufually attempting its recovery by fome or other discharge, by draining the body in fome way or other. And if evacuation is the cure of our diforders, we may juftly think, that repletion is their most

general

general caufe.

But if this may admit of a dispute, which, I think, it hardly can do; yet is it on all hands agreed that there are feveral distempers, to which few are ubjed but for want of felf-denial in themelves, or their ancestors-that most of the e cittempers are of the painfullest fort, and that fome of them are fuch as we for years lament, without the leaft hope of recovery, and under an abfolute certainty, that the loger they continue upon us the in re grievofly they will dift.eis us; the acutenes of our fufferings from them will be conftantly increafing. Dean Bolton.

$134 On Intemperance in Eating.

SECT. V.

Let me, alo, confider intemperance in what we eat, as frequently interrupting the ufe of our nobler faculties; and fare, at length, greatly to enfeeble them. Ha long is it before we are really ourfelves, after our ftomach has received its full load! derit, our fenfes are dulled, our memory cheded, heaviness and ftupidity poffefs us: fece beurs muft pafs, before our vivacity returns, before reafon can again act with its full vigour. The man is not feen to advantage, his real abilities are not to be diftowered, till the effects of his gluttony are removed, till his conftitution has thrown off the weight that oppreffed it.

The hours preceding a plentiful meal, or thuie, which fucceed its entire digeftion, are, we all find, fuch, in which we are fitteft to traníact our affairs, in which all the a&s of the understanding are beft exerted.

Iv fmall a part of his time is therefore, the locurious man himself! What between te length of his repaf-the space during which he is, as it were, ftupified by his exces in them—the many hours of fleep that Le wants to refresh, and of exercise to frengthen him; within how fmall a compas is that portion of his life brought, in which his rational powers are fitly difplayed!

In the vigour of youth, in the full frength of manhood, an uncontrouled gratification of appetite allows only fhort intervals of clear apprehenfion, of clofe attention, and the free ufe of our judgment: but if, either through an uncommonly firm conftitution, or by pending all thofe hours in exercife, which are not paffed at our tabies or in our beds, we are enabled, notwithstanding fuch gratification, to reach a more advanced age; what a melancholy

fpectacle do we then frequently afford! our memory, our wit, our fenfe almoft wholly deftroyed-their remains (carce allowing a conjecture to be formed thence, what they have been the ruins of the man hardly furnishing a trace of his former ornaments.

Molt of thofe difeafes, which luxury brings upon our bodies are, indeed, a gradual impairing of our intellectual faculties: the mind fhares the diforder of its companion, acts as that permits, difcovers a greater or leis capacity, according to the other's more or lefs perfect ftate. And as the body, when dead, is totally unfit to be a&ed upon by the foul; fo the nearer it is brought to death by our gluttony, the more we increase its unfitnefs to difplay, by how noble a principle it is actuated-what the extent of thofe abilities is, which the bounty of our infinitely good and powerful Creator has afforded us.

It only remains that I confider, how ruinous the excefs I am cenfuring is to our fortune; and to what a mean dependence, to what vile dishonest practices, it often reduces us.

'There are few eftates, that can bear the expence, into which what is called an elegant table will draw us. It is not only the price of what is fet before us, that we are here to regard, but the waste that the minifters to our luxury occafion-their rapine -the example they fet to all, who are concerned in our affairs, and the difqualification, under which we put ourselves to look into them.

He who is determined to pleafe his palate at any price, infects not only thofe about him with his extravagant turn; but gives them opportunities of defrauding him, which are feldom neglected. houfe is the refort of the worst of mankind; for fuch they always are, whom a wellfpread table affembles; and who, by applauding the profufenefs that feeds them, by extolling, as proofs of a refined underftanding, what are the fureft marks of a weak one, or rather of the total want of one, hurry on the ruin, that was, otherwife, with too much speed advancing.

But fmall is their number, whom it concerns to be told, how a large fortune my be reduced: how the making any must be hindered, is the argument, in which the gnerality are interested. This hindrance is the fure, the undeniable confequence of giving way to our appetite. I have already obferved, what hurt our very capacity often receives from it-to what a degroe

our intellect is at length impaired by it: I may, further, truly reprefent it as always indifpofing us to that diligence, to that application, without which no fcience is to be mastered, no art learned, nɔ business well conducted, no valuable accomplishment, of any kind, obtained.

Let us have our fupport, and feek the increase of our ftore, from our traffick, or from our labour; it is plain, that he who indulges himself less than we do, as he needs lefs to maintain him than we do, fo he can fell, or can work, cheaper, and muft, therefore, make thofe advantages, which we are not to expect; muft by his leffer gains be, at length, enriched, while we, with our larger, fhall be in a conftant poverty.

A flill worse effect of our luxurious turn I reckon thofe mean and base practices, to which it tempts us. When the plain meal, that our fcanty circumftances, after a liberal and expenfive education, furnish, cannot content us; and we must either live at another's table, or provide a chargeable entertainment at our own; we defcend to the vileft flattery, the moft fervile complaifance; every generous fentiment is extinguished in us; we foon become fully convinced, that he, who will often eat at another's coft, must be fubject to another's humours, muft countenance him in his follies and comply with him in his vices.

Let his favour at length exempt us from fo dishonourable an attendance, by furnishing us with the means of having plenty at home: yet what is plenty to the luxurious? His wantonnefs increases with his income; and, always needy, he is always dependent. Hence no fenfe of his birth or education, of honour or confcience, is any check upon him; he is the mean drudge, the abandoned tool of his feeder, of whoever will be at the charge of gratifying his palate.

So, if our trade be our maintenance, as no fair gains can answer the expence, which what is called good eating occafions, we are foon led to indirect artifices, to fraudulent dealing, to the moft tricking and knavish practices.

In a word, neither our health nor life, neither our credit nor fortune, neither our virtue nor understanding, have any fecurity but from our temperance. The greateft bleffings, which are here enjoyed by us,

have it for their fource.

Hence it is that we have the fullest use of our faculties, and the longest. Hence it is, that we fear not to be poor, and are fure to be independent.

Hence difcafe and pain are removed from us, our decay advances infenfibly, and the approaches of death are as gentle as thofe of fleep.

Hence it is we free ourselves from all temptations to a bafe or ungenerous action.

Hence it is that our paffions are calmed, our lufts fubdued, the purity of our hearts preferved, and a virtuous conduct throughout made easy to us.

When it is made fo-when by the eafe, which we find in the practice of virtue, we become confirmed therein-render it habitual to us; we have then that qualification for happiness in a future ftate, which, as the best title to it, affords us the best grounds to expect it.

Dean Bolton.

The hindrance it is to any confidence being repofed in us, fo far as our fecrecy is concerned:

The dangerous advantage, which it af fords the crafty and the knavish over us; The bad effects, which it hath on our health:

The prejudice, which our minds receive from it:

Its difpofing us to many crimes, and preparing us for the greatest:

The contemptible figure, which drunkenne's gives us, is no weak argument for avoiding it.

Every reader has found the Spartans mentioned as inculcating fobriety on their children, by expofing to their notice the behaviour of their flaves in a drunken fit. They thought, that were they to apply wholly to the reafon of the youths, it might be to little purpose: as the force of the arguments, which they ufed, might not be fufficiently apprehended, or the impreffion thereof might be foon effaced: but when they made them frequently eye-witneffes of all the madnefs and abfurdities, and at length the perfect fenfeleffness, which the immoderate draught occafioned;

the