136 HUMAN LONGEVITY. 



the due action of the nervous system, and of all the organs 

 of the body. And nature, where unspoiled by vitiated habits, 

 furnishes a rule and measure which everyone, whatever the 

 diversity of temperament, may safely and expediently consult 

 for himself. Here especially, however, men are more prone 

 to be governed by faulty habits and injurious maxims, than 

 to be convinced by reason or instructed by experience. That 

 appetite, for which the old epicure would pay any price, is 

 too much regarded as a condition to be instantly removed 

 by food. Even under disease, when nature resumes her 

 rights, and rejects with loathing the aliment the stomach has 

 no power to digest, the mischievous zeal of friends comes in ; 

 feeding the disorder and not the body, by what they force 

 upon the patient. The catalogue of ills which indigestion 

 directly or indirectly involves from the early oppression 

 after food, to those later and more various effects, both on 

 body and mind, for which the hesterna vitia are responsible, 

 might seem sufficient to enforce a rule, were they duly 

 recognised in their origin. We may reasonably regret that 

 the term dyspepsia, while actually expressing this origin, 

 should in effect throw a sort of classic veil over the simple 

 and certain source whence these ills arise. Common phrases 

 are better suited to common things, and more salutary in 

 their influence. 



It has been a question mooted of old and often revived, 

 whether intemperance in food, or in drinks, is most injurious 

 to health and life. An eminent physician of antiquity, 

 Celsus, pronounces against the former ; and if the question 

 be so put as to exclude the wilder forms of inebriety, we 

 may perhaps acquiesce in this opinion. There is some risk, 

 however, in discussing a matter of preference, where both 

 contingencies are so prolific of evil. It is not uncommon 

 to hear instances cited of prolonged life in drunkards, and 

 doubtless such do occur. But they are as certainly ex- 



