"that employment, is fucceeded by John Sowton; to "whofe place of enterer of meffages and firft coffee"grinder, William Bird is promoted; and Samuel Bur"dock comes as fhoe-cleaner in the room of the faid "Bird." R No. XXV. THURSDAY, MARCH 29. Egrefcitquo medendo. And fickens by the very means of health. VIRG. THE following letter will explain itself, and needs no apology. • Sir, I AM one of that fickly tribe who are commonly known by the name of Valetudinarians; and do confefs to you, that I first contracted this ill habit of body or rather of mind, by the study of phyfic. I no fooner began to perufe books of this nature, but I found my pulfe was irregular; and fcarce ever read the account of any disease that I did not fancy_myself af'flicted with. Doctor Sydenham's learned Treatise of Fevers threw me into a lingering hectic, which hung upon me all the while I was reading that excellent piece. I then applied myfelf to the ftudy of several authors who have written upon phthifical diftempers, and by that means fell into a confumption; till at length, growing very fat, I was in a manner fhamed out of that imagination. Not long after this, I found in myself all the fymptoms of the gout, except pain; but was cured of it by a Treatife upon the Gravel, written by a very ingenious author, who (as it is ufual for phyficians to convert one diftemper into another) eafed me of the gout by giving me the ftone. I at length ftudied myfelf into a complication of diftempers; but accidentally taking into my hand that ingenious • difcourfe difcourfe written by San&torius, I was refolved to direct myfelf by a scheme of rules, which I had collected from his obfervations. The learned world are very well acquainted with that gentleman's invention; who, for the better carrying on of his experiments, 'contrived a certain mathematical chair, which was fo • artificially hung upon fprings, that it would weigh any thing as well as a pair of fcales. By this means he ⚫ difcovered how many ounces of his food pass'd by perfpiration, what quantity of it was turned into nou• rishment, and how much went away by the other channels and diftributions of nature. Having provided myself with this chair, I used to study, eat, drink, and fleep in it; infomuch that I may be faid, for thefe three laft years, to have lived in a pair of scales. I compute myfelf, when I am in full health, to be precifely two hundred weight, falling 'fhort of it about a pound after a day's faft, and exceeding it as much after a very full meal; fo that it is my continual employment to trim the balance between thefe two volatile pounds in my constitution. In my ordinary meals I fetch myf:lf up to two hundred weight and half a pound; and if after having dined I find myfelf fall fhort of it, I drink just fo much fmall beer, or eat fuch a quantity of bread, as is fufficient to make me weight. In my greateft exceffes I do not tranfgrefs more than the other half pound; which, for my health's fake, I do the firft Monday in every month. As foon as I find myself duly poifed after dinner, I walk till I have perfpired five ounces and four fcruples; and when I difcover, by my chair, that I am fo far re⚫duced, I fall to my books, and study away three ounces more. As for the remaining parts of the pound, I keep no account of them. I do not dine and fup by the clock, but by my chair; for when that informs me my pound of food is exhaufted, I conclude myfelf to be hungry, and lay in another with all diligence. In my • days of abstinence I lose a pound and an half, and on folemu fafts am two pounds lighter than on other days in the year. • I allow myself, one night with another, a quarter of a pound of fleep within a few grains, more or less; and if upon my rifing I find that I have not confumed 6 my whole quantity, I take out the reft in my chair. Upon an exact calculation of what I expended and received the laft year, which I always register in a book, I find the medium to be two hundred weight; fo that I cannot difcover that I am impaired one ounce in my health during a whole twelvemonth. And yet, Sir, notwithstanding this my great care to ballaft myfelf equally every day, and to keep my body in its proper poife, fo it is that I find myfelf in a fick and languishing condition. My complexion is grown very fallow, my pulfe low, and my body hydropical. Let me therefore beg you, Sir, to confider me as your patient, and to give me more certain rules to walk by than those I have already obferved, and you will very much oblige • Your humble fervant.' This letter puts me in mind of an Italian epitaph, written on the monument of a valetudinarian "- Stavo ; "ben, ma per ftar meglio fto qui:" which it is impoffible to tranflate. The fear of death often proves mortal, and fets people on methods to fave their lives, which infallibly deftroy them. This is a reflection made by fome hiftorians, upon obferving that there are many more thoufands killed in a flight than in a battle; and may be applied to thofe multitudes of imaginary fick perfons that break their conftitutions by phyfic, and throw themselves into the arms of death, by endeavouring to efcape it. This method is not only dangerous, but below the practice of a reasonable creature. To confult the prefervation of life as the only end of it, to make our health our bufinefs, to engage in no action that is not part of a regimen or courfe of phyfic, are purposes so abject, so mean, fo unworthy human nature, that a generous foul would rather die than fubmit to them. Befides that, a continual anxiety for life vitiates all the relishes of it, and cafts a gloom over the whole face of nature; as it is impoffible we should take delight in any thing that we are every moment afraid of losing. I do not mean, by what I have here faid, that I think any one to blame for taking due care of their health. On the contrary, as cheerfulness of mind and capacity for business, are in a great measure the effects of a well-tempered conftitution, a man cannot be at too much pains to cultivate and preferve it. But this care, which we are prompted to, not only by common fenfe but by duty and inftinet, fhould never engage us in groundlefs fears, melancholy apprehenfions, and imaginary diftempers, which are natural to every man who is more anxious to live than how to live. In fhort, the prefervation of life fhould be only a fecondary concern, and the direction of it our principal. If we have this frame of mind, we fhall take the best means to preserve life, without being over folicitous about the event; and fhall arrive at that point of felicity which Martial has mentioned as the perfection of Happinets, of neither fearing nor wishing for death. In anfwer to the gentleman who tempers his health by ounces and by fcruples, and, inftead of complying with thofe natural folicitations of hunger and thirit, drowfinefs or love of exercife, governs himfelf by the prefcriptions of his chair, I fhall tell him a thort fable. Jupiter, fays the mythologist, to reward the picty of a certain countryman, promifed to give him whatever he would afk: the countryman defired that he might have the management of the weather in his own eftate: he obtained his requeft, and immediately diftributed rain, fnow, and funthine among his feveral fields, as he thought the nature of the foil required. At the end of the year, when he expected to fee a more than ordinary crop, his harvest fell infinitely fhort of that of his neighbours; upon which, fays the fable, he defired Jupiter to take the weather again into his own hands, or that otherwife he fhould utterly ruin himself. C. No. XXVI. FRIDAY, MARCH 30. Pallida mors æquo pulfat pede pauperum tabernas Vitæ fumma brevis fpem nos vetat inchoare longam. With equal foot, rich friend, impartial fate HOR. CREECH. WHEN I am in a ferious humour, I very often walk by myself in Weftminfter-Abbey; where the gloominefs of the place, and the ufe to which it is applied, with the folemnity of the building, and the condition of the people who lie in it, are apt to fill the mind with a kind of melancholy, or rather thoughtfulnefs, that is not disagreeable. I yesterday paffed a whole afternoon in the church-yard, the cloifters, and the church, amusing myself with the tomb-ftones and infcriptions that I met with in thofe feveral regions of the dead. Most of them recorded nothing elfe of the buried perfon, but that he was born upon one day, and died upon another: the whole hiftory of his life being comprehended in thofe two circumftances, that are common to all mankind. I could not but look upon these registers of existence, whether of brafs or marble, as a kind of fatire upon the departed perfons; who had left no other memorial of them, but that they were born and that they died. They put me in mind of feveral perfons mentioned in the battles of heroic poems, who have founding names given them, for no other reafon but that they may be killed, and are celebrated for nothing but being knocked on the head. Γλυκόν |