368 Analysis of Scientific Books. 
proper quant'ty or quality of food; and how grievous are the 
_sufferings which may be ascribed to excess of nutriment among 
the higher classes of society, more especially of those resident 
in London, who live full and high, without that proportion of 
air, exercise, and employment, which is requisite to its due ela- 
boration. How many bilious and nervous disorders, as our 
doctors call them, are thus excited or generated, and how much 
bodily and mental suffering might be spared by temperance in 
eating. In our days, the degrading fashion of hard-drinking 
has certainly declined, and a corresponding improvement in 
health and morals has been the consequence. We have but 
few tipplers left, and they are deservedly excluded from ail 
decent society. But hard-eating has unfortunately gained a 
proportionate ascendency, and the appetite is artificially stimu- 
lated and excited hy a thousand mischievous combinations 
unknown to our ancestors, and infinitely seductive and hurtful. 
The roast beef of Old England bas ceded its wholesome do- 
minion toa host of French entremets and hors d’euvres, and 
with them a series of disorders have become prevalent, quite as 
grievous as those which our forefathers derived from the bottle : 
in short, gluttony has succeeded inebriety ; and althoughthe con~ 
noisseurs and bon vivants, the mouthicians and palaticians of Dr. 
Kitchener, may be shocked at the term, they are neither more nor 
less than downright gluttons, and but a shade better than the 
drunkard. It is not, however, to one, or even two good dishes, 
that we object, but to the system of an almost indefinite suc- 
cession of stimuli. The stomach, distended with soup, is next 
tempted with all manner of fish, flesh, and fowl; the vegetable 
world is ransacked from the cryptogamia, upwards ; and to this 
miscellaneous aggregate are superadded the pernicious pas- 
tiecios of the pastry-cook, and the complex combinations of the 
confectioner. All these evils, and many more, have those who 
move in good society to cope with; and it is with this variety of 
temptation, with this series of successive stimulants, that the 
stomach, good-natured and accommodating viscus as it is, has 
tocontend. We repeat, thatit is not to one or two good things, 
even abundantly indulged in, that we object; but to the system of 
overloading the stomach: nine persons in ten eat as much soup 
and fish as would amply suffice for a meal, and as far as soup 
and fish are concerned, would rise from their dinner satisfied, - 
and even saturated. A new stimulus appears in the form 
of stewed beef, or coutelettes 4 la supréme—then comes a 
Bayonne, or Westphalia ham, ora pickled tongue, or some ana- 
logous salted but proportionately indigestible dish, and of 
each of these enough for a single meal, is super-added to the 
burthen under which the stomach is already groaning: but this 
js not all—game follows, and to this succeed the sweets, and 
that most indigestible of all coagula, cheese, associated, per- 
