236 LETTERS TO BROTHER JOHN. 



strength : he only accumulates fat, and incurs the 

 evils thereunto appertaining; one amongst the many 

 of which I will mention I mean, the accumulation 

 of fat about the heart; making him puff and blow 

 like a grampus, and interfering, to a most dan- 

 gerous degree, with the heart's action. 



But neither does he add to the size and weight 

 of his body, properly so called. He may indeed 

 add to the size and weight of his body's fatty enve- 

 lop, as the tailor may add to the padding of the 

 coat; but both the one and the other, properly so 

 called, still remain unaltered. 



A man's strength resides in his arterial current 

 in his muscles, and bones, and tendons, and liga- 

 ments in his brawn and sinew ; and his degree of 

 strength depends upon the vigour, size, and sub- 

 stance of these : and if he were to eat a heca- 

 tomb of oxen every morning for his breakfast, 

 and, like Gargantua, swallow a windmill for his 

 dinner and a church for his supper, he could not 

 add to their size and substance one atom, nor alter 

 their original healthy dimensions no, not in the 

 estimation of a single hair. 



Remember, then, my dear John, that it is a most 

 miserable and mischievous fallacy to suppose that 

 the more a man eats, the stronger he grows. If a 



