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ARMED FORCES MEDICAL LIBRARY

      Washington, D. C.
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Q%/dtaA &/i#maj 
 
 
THE
ART OF PRESERVING HEALTH.
,/bv
              BY

     JOHN ARMSTRONG, M. D.


        TO WHICH IS PREFIXED

A CRITICAIi ESSAY ON THE POEM.
-t,
By J. 4%f}N,~&CD,

      WALPOLE, N. H.
THINTED FOR THOMAS &. THOMAS*
       BT CEEEVER FELCH.
1808. 
 
    PR.  ARMSTRONG'S POEM

               ON THE

ART OF PRESERVING HEALTH.
   THE Poems termed didaclic may be confidoreJ
as of two kinds.  Thofe to which the term is more
properly applied, are fuch as diredly profefs to teach
fome art  or  fcience.  The other fpecies conlids of
thofe which, taking up fome fpecul.itive topic, eftab-
Lfli a theory concerning it by argument and illuttra-
tion.  Of the former kind many  will familiarly occur
to the reader's memory; and the piece before us is
an example of it.  Of the latter are various  phiio-
fopliical and argumentative pieces, from the poem of
Lucretius  on the Epicurean fyftem, to Pope's  Ef-
fky on Man, and Akunside's Pleafures of the Imag-
ination.   A  middle place between the two feems to
be occupied  by moral poetry,  which,  at the fame
time that it lays down pradical rules for the condud
of life, difcuues the theoretical principles oa  which
they are founded. 
                        4

   Now,  in eftimating the refpedive valae of thefe
different produds of the poetic art, it will be necefla-
ry to begin with confidering  what poetry eflentially
is, and what are  its powers and purpofes.  It is, I
conceive, effential to poetry that it  fhould  prefent
ideas to the imagination,  either agreeable of them-
felves,  or rendered fo by the clothing  and accom-
paniments given  to them.   Its leading  aim is  to
pleafe ; and its powers are, to a certain degree,  to
make pleafmg what would not be fo of itfelf.  If,
therefore, by the poet's art, to the main end of giv-
ing  pleafure can be aflbciated that of communica-
ting inftrudion in fuch a way as will more ftrongly
and  agreeably imprefs it on the mind,  its complete
purpofe may be faid  to be attained.   Delight and
profit combined are all that can be wiflied from the
aobleft of the fine arts.

   Biit there are fubjeds the nature of which renders
fuch a combination fcarcely poffible, and in which
every attempt to  produce it, can only yield an incon-
gruous mixture of ill-placed ornament  and defedive
inftrudion.   Thefe are efpecially to be found in thofe
arts of life which depend upon the application of me-
chanical rules,  or the pradical {kill acquired by ex-
perience.   To defcribe the minute proctfles of manu.
al art in  verfe, in fuch a manner as that they fhall be
underftood, is not  only a very difficult talk, but a
wholly fruitlei, one ;  fince, after all, the defcription
cannot be fo clear and precife as one written in profe,
nor can the verfe rife to poetry.  We  may, indeed,
admire the fkill ihewn in the attempt to decorate a- 
5
barren fubjed, but we muft regret that the writer's
talents were fo ill employed.  So obvious is this con-
clusion that we may be aflured no one ever wrote a
didadic poem for the fimple purpofe of teaching aa
art.   The choice has therefore been  didated by a
fearch after novelty, or the  defire of exhibiting a
proof of poetical (kill.  Thefe motives are exprefsly
avowed by Virgil in his Georgics, and are much
more probable than the deep political defign attribu-
ted to that poem, of exciting the Roman nobility to
the purfuits of agriculture.

   But while perhaps every poem ftridly  didadic la-
bours under the inconvenience of a fubjed not calcu-
lated for  difplaying  the art of poetry in its faireft
form, fome, both from their nature,  and from the
manner  of treating them, are lefs defedive in this
refped than others.   Thus, certain arts  ate clofely
conneded in their theory with large and philofophic-
al views of the fyftem of the univerfe,  or of the prin-
ciples of the human mind*   Some, even in their prac-
tice, afFord matter for pleafing defcription, and ad-
mit of eafy illuftration  from  the mc!l ftriking and
agreeable objeds of external nature.  For examplo,
the arts of husbandry are evidently allied to  avaft
variety of great and  interefting topics; and we all
know  how  advantageously Virgil has employed
them as the ground-work of one of the moft pleafing
poems of antiquity.    This piece, however, will alio
ferve to fhew the unfavourable effed of attempting
to exprefs matter purely technical in a poetical man-
ner.   For no unprejudiced reader will deny, that in
                a2 
6*
many of the preceptive paflages, notwithftanding the-
variety of refources he employs to elevate them into
poetry, he is overpowered by his fubjed, and chained,
as it were, to the earth he is labouring ; while, on
the other hand, as a teacher of the art, he is frequent-
ly lb obfcure, as to have  embarrafled the whole race
of agricultural and literary critics fince his time.   It
may alfo be obferved, that had he extended his views
farther into the philofophical part of his fubjed, and
made a full ufe of the moral and phyfical variety it
was capable of affording, he would not have found it
neceflary to wander into digreffions fo remotely con-
nected with his  propofed topics, as fcarcely to be
juftified by any reasonable claim of  poetic licence.
For even the femblance of teaching is deftroyed by
deviations, the manifeft purpofe of which is to difen-
gage  the reader's  attention from the main fubjed,
and fix it upon fomewhat mere captivating  to  the
imagination.

  With refped to  the Piece before us,  its  fubjedt
feems on the whole as happily calculated  for didadic
poetry, as moft of thofe which have been taken for
the purpofe.   To  fay  that it is a peculiarly proper
one for a phyfician to  write upon, is faying nothing
of confequence to the reader.    But  the prefervation
of health is, in the  firft place, a matter of general im-
portance, and therefore interefting to readers of eve-
ry clafs.   Then, although its rules, fcientifically con-
fidered, belong  to a particular profeflion, and re-
quire previous  ftudies for their full comprehension,
yet in the popular ufe, they are level  to  the  under* 
t
(landing and experience of every man of reading and
refledion.   Had the fubjed been  more ftridly med-
ical, fuch as the nature and cure of a particular dif-
eafe, it would have been liable to the objedions at-
tending a( confined and profefllonal topic ; and, like
the Slphylis of Fracastorius, could fcarcely, by the
greateft poetical {kill, have been rendered generally
pleafmg  or  inftrudive.   But every man being in
fome meafure  entrufted with the care  of his own
health, and being  accuftomed to fpeculations con-
cerning Air, Diet, Exercife, and the Paffions, the
fubjed may be confidered as univerfal.   It is true,
thefe topics can be poetically treated only in  a popu-
lar manner, and the writer whochoofes  the vehicle
of verfe in treating of them, muff take up with com-
mon and perhaps fuperficial notions.   But  by aifo-
ciating thefe notions with images addrefled to the im-
agination, he may convey them in a more agreeable
form ;  and he may advantageoufly employ the dic-
tion of poetry to give to pradical rules an energy and
concifenefs of expreffion which may forcibly  imprint
them on the memory.  This power is,  indeed, the
principal circumftance which  imparts real utility to
didadic poetry ;  and  we all feel its effeds on becom-
ing acquainted with the moral and critical works of
fuch authors as Horacf, Boileau and Pope,  fur-
ther, the topics with which the Art of Health is con-
verfant, are conneded with various of the loftieft and
moft extenfive fpecvlations on general nature; and,
in purfuing the regular vein of thought, many four.
ces of truly poetical ideas  may be opened.   It re-
mains now to examine how far the author kas ayaik 
8
 ed himfelf of the advantage* of his fubjed,  and in
 what manner he has fupported the charader of a dU
 dadic poet.

   As Invocation is an eftablifhed part of a regular
 poem, it was neceflary that the piece before us fhould
 be provided with that decoration.  The choice of
 Hygeia, or the goddefs of Health, for the objed of
 addrefs,  was didated by  a very obvious propriety.
 The manner is imitated from that of Lucretius in
 his fine invocation to Venut; and much imagination
 is difplayed in the defcription of her approach, and
 of the various baleful forms of difeafc and death that
 fly from  her prefence.

   Of the fourcesfrom which health is drawn, falub-
 rious air  is one of the mod remarkable.   Air, there-
 fore, with propriety, is made the peculiar topic of the
 firft book.  Perhaps a  defcriptive paflage of more
 ftrength can fcarcely be met  widi than that which
enumerates the various contaminations of this  ele-
ment in a crowded city.  The ideas, indeed, in their
own nature difgufting, might be thought almoft too
vividly reprefented, did they not by contrail add to
the fweetnefs of the fubfequent rural pidure, the ef-
fed of which is almoft equal to that of the fabled ca-
lenture in calling forth irreliftible longings after the
country.   Every reader familiar with the vicinity of
the metropolis will feel peculiar pleafure from the
glimpfes given of thofe favourite fummer retreats,
 Windfor,  Richmond,  Dulwich,  and Hampflead,
 y/h\di will excite in his mind particular images, al« 
$
ways much more engaging to the fancy than general
ones.  The poet next exercifes his invention in one of
the higher efforts of the art, that of allegorical per-
fonification.  His figure and genealogy of Quartana,
arc well imagined; but like moft, of thofe who create
thefe fancy-formed beings, he fails  in the agency he
attributes to her ; for in merely infpiring a fit of the
ague, (he ads not as a perfon, but as an incorporeal
caufe.

   He goes on to.defcribe the different fites unfriendly
to health, particularly the too moift and the too dry,
which he makes the foundation of what are called in
the fchools of phyfic the phlegmatic and melancholic-
temperaments.   In his inftrudions  how to  guard
againft  the evils of different  fituations, he fomewhat
anticipates his  future topics  of diet arid exercife.
The paflage, however, is full  of vigorous defcription ;
and the means of correding the watery and the parch-
ed  foil, afford fpiritcd fketches of landfcape.   But
he is no where fo minute, as in that  perpetual topic
of an Englifhman, the bad weather under which our
iiland is fo frequently fubmerged.  A kind of fplen-
etic ftrength  of painting  diftinguifhes his gloomy
draught of loaded fkies and eaftern blafts,  and of that
vexatious ficklenefs of weather, in which  all the fea-
fons feem to " mix in every monftrous Say."

   We are, however, brought into good humour again
by the defcription of cheerful, dry, and fheltered fpota
in which atmofpherical evils may be palliated ; and
the concluding eulogy on the cheering and invigorat* 
14
 ing- influence of folar heat,  leaves the fancy agreea-
 bly imprefled with afenfation fimilar to that impart-
 ed  by aferene fummer's day.  On the whole, th«
 defcriptive beauties of this book  are  confiderable ;
 but as a leading head of his fubjed, it might, I con-
 ceive,  have beeen lengthened with  advantage, by
 fome circumftances relative to the influence of air
 upon health, which he has not touched upon.   The
 fudden operation upon the fpiiits by alterations in the
 weight of the atmofphere, as indicated by the barom-
 eter^ and the medicinal effeds of change of climate
 upon invalids, would have afforded matter both for
 curious difcuflion, and interefting, and even pathetic*
 narration.

  Bid, the fubjed of the fecond book, is-, as the writ-
er obierves on entering upon it, comparatively barren
 and  unfavourable to  poetry.  It  is evidently more
 immerfed in technical  inveftigations than the form-
 er ; and its connedion with the grofleft of the fenfu-
 al pleasures, renders it difficult to be treated on with-
 out derogating from the dignity of a philofophical
 poem.   Dr. Armstrong, however,has managed  it
 with judgment.  He begins with  a fcientific topic,
neceflary as a foundation for the preceptive  part
 which is to follow—the circulation  of the blood.
 This fundion, however, admits of eafy illuftration
 from the" common principles  of hydraulics, as dis-
 played in  the  motion  of water  through pipes and
 channels.   The conftant wafte of folid particles that
 fuch a perpetual current muft  produce, demonftrates
 the neceiSty for a new fupply by means of fomewhat 
11
taken in.  Hence naturally follows the consideration
of food, its  concodion, and the choice of aliments*
foltd and fluid, fuited to perfons of different conftitu-
tion*, and in different climates.   This is the general
plan of the book.  The poet's fkill confifts in taking
the fubjed out of the language and reafonings of fci-
ence, familiarifing it by apt illuttration, and diverfi-
fying it by amufing digreflion.   All this he has at-
tempted, and -with fuccefs.

  We fhall not clofely follow his fteps while he treats
of the digeftibility and falifbriousnefs of different
foods, and lays down nales for the regulation of ap-
petite.  The fubjed,  as we before hinted, is not of
the moft pleafing kind, and it is apparently  rather
from necCflity than choice that he enters into it.  His
expreffions and images are ftrong, but ftrengfh fo
employed is unavoidably a-kin to coarfenefs. A more
agreeable topic  is the praife of temperance and Am-
ple diet, from which he eafily Aides into a beautiful
moral paflage, fhewing how much better riches may
be employed than in the luxuries of the table—by re-
lieving indigence and unfriended merit.  One line is
almoft unrivalled in pathetic energy.

   Tho' hufiVd in patient wretchednefs at home.

  The oppofite evils arrfing from  too 'full and too
fcanty a diet are next enumerated,  and cautions are
given refpeding the progrefs from one to the  other.
The different regimen proper for the feveral feafons
of the year is then touched upon ; and thisnaturally 
12
leads the poet to open a new fource of variety in de«
fcription, derived from a view of human life as fub-
futing in climates removed to the two extremes from
our own.  The pidure of the frigid zone is but flight.
ly fketched ;  that of the torrid regions is much more
minute, and will ftrongly remind the reader ©f a fun.
ilar one by the hand of Thompson  ;  but I dare not
aflert that it will lofe nothing by the comparifon.   It
is  rendered lefs appropriate, by  the enum eration of
vegetable articles which in reality belong to very dif-
ferent climates ; the cocoa and anana  being many
degrees feparatcd from the countries rich in corn and
wine.  The cedar of Lebanon, likewife, as a native
of the bleak tops of high mountains, ough t not to be
placed by the fide of the palm and plaintain.

  The fucceeding paflage, however, which paints the
wonders of the Naiad kingdom,  though it alfo has
its parallel in  the Seafons, is not, I think, furpafled by
that, or any other poem, in ftrength and grandeur of
defcription.  The awful fublimity of the fcenes them-
felves, and the artifice of the poet in introducing him-
felf as a fpedator, and marking the fuppofed impref-
fions on his own mind, elevate this piece to the very
fummit of defcriptive poetry.

  The praife of water-drinking follows ; with the
precepts of the father of phyfic for choofing rightly
this pure and innocent beverage.  Notwithftanding
the apparent  earneftnefs with which the poet dwells
on this topic,  there is fome reafon to fufped that he
was not quite hearty in the caufe.   For he not only 
IS
 adopts the notion of thofe who have recommended
 an occafional debauch as a falutary fpur to nature;
 but, defcanting on the neeeffity a man may find him-
 felfjunder to pradife hard drinking in  order to pro-
 mote the purfuits of ambition and avarice, he advifes
 him (between  jeft and earnefl) to enure himfelf to
 the trial by flow degrees.  Here  the phyfician and
 fage feem loft in the jolly companion. He foon, how-
 ever, relumes thofe charaders ; and after remarking
 the tendency of a continued ufe of wine to bring on
 premature old  age, he digrefles into a theoretical ac-
 count of the procefs by which the animal machine is
 gradually impeded in its motions,and at length comes
 to a full flop.  This conduds him to a ftriking term-
 ination of the book, in a lofty defcription of the rav-
 ages made  by  time upon the works  of human  art,
 and the world itfelf.

   Exercife, the fubjed of the third book, is a theme
 more adapted to poetry, and lefs immerfed in profef-
 fional difquifitions, than that of the preceding.  Its
 benefits in the  prefervation of health are univerfally
 known ; and the poet's tafk is rather to frame: upon
 it pidures agreeable to the imagination, than to treat
 ©f it in a clofely preceptive or fcientific manner.  Dr.
 Armstrong begins with a lively portrait of the ruf-
 tic,  rendered firm and robuft by toil,  like a fturdy
 oak  of the foreft ; and he produces him as a fpecimen
 oi the influence of exorcife on the human frame.  He
 then exhorts the votary of health to partake of the
 various kinds of rural paftime,  the walk in all fea-
fons, the chafe, and t|ie fport of fifliing.  This  laft 
H<
amufement intrc&jces a very pleafing paflage, in
which the poet characlerifes various ftreams, partic-
. nlarly the Liddel, on whofe paftoral banks he firft
.drew breath.  The tribute of affedion he pays tu
bis native place, and the retrofped of his own boyifli
years, are fweetly interefting, and vie with all that
Thompson and Sjiollet have written on a fimilar
topic.

   The  fpecies  of exercife  afforded by gardening,
gives occafion to a moral pidure, of a man retired
from public life  to the cultivation of his eftate, fur-
rounded with a  feled fociety of old companions of
the fame taftes and purfuits with himfeJk This is
wrought fo much in the manner of Thompson, that,
were it not for feme difference of ftyle, it mig;ht pafs
undiftinguifhed  as a paflage of the Seafons.  . Th«
•* nodes ccenseque deum" of Horace,have contrivu-
ted to adorn the piece.

   Refuming the medical confideration of exercife,
he next adverts  to its power in ftrengthening weak
parts by habitual exertions ; an#  he dwells on the
propriety of a gradual progrefs from reft to labour,
and on themifchiefs attending too violent and heed-
lefs  toils.  This leads him to. a ferioias and pathetic
apeftrophe  on the fatal effeds  proceeding from ex-
pofure to cold, or draughts off ;old liquor, when heat-
ed,  which he reprefents  a? tb .e moft frequent of all
caufes of mortal difeafe.  TJ e ancient ufe «f warm
baths, and undions after exqj cife is his next t©pic, in
fpeaking of which, he finds i{ neceffary to touch upon 
15
that important fun&lon of the body, infenfible per-
foration.   The ftrid  connexion of tliis with health
and difeafe, according as it is regular  or deranged,
has been a favourite argument with certain medical
fchools, and is here briefly illuftrated in poetical lan-
guage.  The ufe of cold bathing in fteeling the frame
ngainft the inclemencies of a cold climate, and the
advantages of frequent ablution in hot ones, and of
cleanlinefs in all, are further fubjeds of digreflion.

  He returns to-the confidefation of exercife, as it is
limited by recurring changes of the day and year  ;
warning againft it while  the  body is  loaded with-
food, and during the heatsof a fummer's noon, and1
the chills of evening.  Thefe preceptive  remarks
lead him to a vein more  fertile of ideas addrefTed to
the imagination ;  for, conceiving the day to be funk
into the filence and gloom of midnight, he views the
toii-fpent hind, wrapt in the arms of profound repofe,
the fweet foother of his labours;   Hence he digrefles
to the fubjed of dreams, and paints in vivid colours
the horrid fcenes  that difturb the  mind during the
delirium of unquiet {lumber.   The proper period in
which fleep  is to be indulged, with its  due meafure
to different conftitutions, are next confidered.  The
Influence of habit in this refped, brings  on an exhor-
tation to  proceed  very  gradually in altering every
corporeal habit; and this is made an introdudion to
a defcription of the fucceflive changes  of the  year,
with the diftempers they bring.   All  this, and the
remainder of the book,  might perhaps with greate?
propriety have nj^c]e a part 0i tne nrft head j  fince 
16
its connexion with exercife is lefs obvious than with
air.  To introduce in fome part of his plan an ac-
count of epidemic difeafes was, however, evidently
proper, both as matter of important  inftrudion re-
fpeeting the prefervation of health, and as afFordirg
fcope for poetical variety.  After fome common ob-
fervations on the difeafes of Spring  and Autumn,
and  the means of guarding againft them, with a for-
cible injundion againft  delay as foon as fyuiptoms
01 dan?tr appear ; the poet proceeds to an imitation
of Virgil and Lucretius in the particular defcrip-
tion of a peftilence ;  and he very happily choofes for
his fubjed the Sweatin^-Sicknefs, which prevailed
iii-ft in England when the Earl of Richmond, after-
wards Henry VII. came hither on  his expedition
againft the tyrant Richard.  So many graphical de-
scriptions  in prole and verfe have been made of vifit-
taions of this kind., that fcarcely any fource of nov-
tlty remained in the general circumftances accompa-
nying them.   Dr. Armstrong has  therefore judi-
cioufly introduced as much as poflible of the particu-
lar character  of this Angular diftemper, which, as far
as we learn,  was entirely unknown before, and has
never appeared fince that period.  He has not even
rejeded certain popular errors prevalent refpeding •
it, which, though they ought carefully to be avoided.
in\ a medical  treatife,. may perhaps be permitted to. ■
enhance  the wonder of  a poetical narration.   Such
is that,  which -aflerts Englifhmen • to have heenits.
only vidims, both-in their own country and  abroad
r-»a .notion which certainly adds to the interefl with
which a  native of this  CQWgxy re*ds the relation.. 
IT
 The concltffion of this book is a clofe copy from Vi r-t
 gJl in the defign, fuitably varied in the circumftan-
 ces.   The deaths beyond, the Atlantic allude to the
 unfortunate expedition to Carthagena, a popular top-
 ic of complaint at that period*

   The title with which the fourth and laft book is in-
 fcribed, is the Paffions ; but its fubjed would be more
 accurately exprefled by the influence of the mind over
 the body—a large and elevated topic, detached from
 the technical matter of any particular profeflion, and.
 in its full entent comprifing every thing  fublime and
 affeding in moral poetry.  The theory of the union
 of a fpiritual principle with the grofs corporeal fub-
 ftance, is that which the writer adopts as the bafis «f
 his reafonings-.  It is ah is ruling  power which

     Wields at his will the dull material world*
     And is the body's health or malady.

 He evidently confounds, however, (as all writers on
 this fyfte'm do) matter of great fubtilty, with what is
 not matter—or fpirit.  Thefe " viewlefs atoms," he
 fays, " are loft in thinking," yet thought itfelf rs not .
 the enemy of life, but painful thinking, fuch as that
 proceeding from anxious ftudies and fretful emotions.
 To prevent the'baneful effeds of  thefe,  he counfels
us frequently  to vary our  objeds, and  to-join the
badily exercife of reading aloudj  to the mental la-
bour of meditation.  Solitary brooding over thoughts
of a particular kind, fuch, efpecially,  as pride or fear
prefents-to-the  imagination, is warned againft, in a-
                b2 
is:
paflage^fulhof energy, as theufualparent of-mad--
nefs".-and melancholy.   Sometimes what -the poet
terms a chronic paffio'ri, or tone arifirig from atnisfor*.
tune ?which Jias made a lairing .impreffion* fuch. as the.
lofs of a beloved friend, produces/a iympatheticlan-. i
guor in the body, which c2n only be removed by
fhiftmgrthefcene, and,plunging, in .amufexne-nt orbu-
iinefs,. (Spmeperfons, however, take a lefs innocent,
method of difpelling grief,     '■       "  ,,-....

 r •"•'.■■^';;->;:-i:,f--,«-/itndin the tempting bowl  >$ &
 .'  Of poifori?d nedar, fweet oblivion fwill.   '>:fit-'

The immediately exhilarating effeds, And the fad
lubfequent  reverie'attending  this  baneful pradiee,
are here painted in  the  moft vivid colouring,  and:
form a'highly inftrudive and pathetic leiTon.   Par-
ticularly, the gradual degradation of charader which
it infallibly brings, is finely touched.

  A kind of moral ledure fucceeds,  introduced as
the fuppo'fed precepts of a fage in huniatf life, Whole
character  is reprefented  as  acompound- of  manly'
fenfe and  "cheerfulnefs. ''■>  Hew to acquire happiriefs -
by'moderatianjnthepuTfuit of pleafure, and by the
pradiee of vfrtue, is the topic of this  paflage, whioh,
though certainly digrefflve, has, however^ a natural;
affinity with!the  leading fubjed -of the book. -:  V trtue
has feldom.-been chafaderized with more fpirit and .
dignity; and trite as the fentiments "are,  the energy
vrith which; they; are expfeffed commands attention.
 i ,'v ;- i.b',:^ a a'itAy*  '«  ■*.■•  *■        -T-  -
 ^Thefpoetnext reyertg  to his, more dired, purpose,.. 
l&
tbatof: ieOnfrde?ing'Tthe.paffi©ns in their influence up?
on bodily healths  In general,, he lays it, down as a .
rule,,  that all';€?potionpw<hich are pleafing  to  the..
mind, are ajfpfalutary ;to'the body.  $ut there are
exceptions, fomebeing prone in their nature to hurt-
ful excefs ;  as an inftance of which he gives the paf-
fion of Love.  Here, again, he.tries his ftrength with
Thompson, ancj, his defcription cannot  but remind.
the, reader of .that, fine pidure of 3. love-fick  youth,
drawn by this writer  .in'.his .Spring.  Thompson*
however,.dwells much more minutely on the mental.
effeds of love.  Arm strong, with propriety, fixes
the attention more on the change* it induces in the .
corporeal frame, and this, both as it is a paffion, and.
as,, it leads- t;a fenfual indulgences.   With great force*
yet with {Efficient delicacy, he  paints the  condition
of oije.unnerved andexhaufted by excefs in amorous.
delights.. .This, indeed,  is deviating from, the ex-
prefs  purpofe ©f the book ;  fince love as a paffion,
and the appetite for fexuaj, enjoyment,  are  diftind
things, the latter being certainly able to fubfift with*.
out the  former* if not the former without the latter.,
But an  infenfible gradation led him eafily from the^
on© to-the other.,        '

 , The. paffion .of Anger is his next theme, and the .
bold personification with which he has introduced it,
isadmivably fuited to its violent and precipitate charr..
a#qr.,  A fit of rage  has frequendy been  known at
once to  oyerpty.wsr.the vital faculties,  and ftrike with'
inftant death, , T.o guard againft it was.therefore a;
point  of peculiar importance i «pd the poet has pre- 
gtr
 fented rriahy linking  moral arguments againiV tli^i
 indulgence of that habit which mak«s us prone to
 ungoverned fallies of this paffion.   But where reat
 fon proves too weak for the controul of this and other
 uhtuly affedions of the  mind*  to What other power
 fhall we refdrt for aid ?  We may, (he hints) oppofe
 paffion to paffion, and extinguifh one by its oppofite.
 But without dwelling on this contrivance (which, in--
 deed, is neither very philofophical not manageable)
 h£ proceeds to-recognize a power in Nature,' which
 may be rendered  the univerfal tranquillizer c<£ the
 breaft ; and this power is Mufio:  With a contrafted
 defcription of the mufic  Which  exercifes this fympa--
 thetic dominion over the emotions, and that which is
 only the execution  of difficult trifles, followed  by an
 allufion to the fabulous  ftories  of fome ancient rriaf-
 ters, and the  praife of the art itfelf, the poet, fome-
 what abruptly, clofes the bock  and the work.

  From this  curfory view of  the contents  of Dr.
 Armstrong's piece, it will  probably appear, that
 together with a fufficient variety  for the purpofe of
 amufement, there is uniformity of defign enough to-
 conftituiethe proper chara&er  of a- didadic poem.
 Almoft every  thing effential to the prefervation of
health is touched upon during  its courfe';  and the
digrcflive parts are neither Wholly impertinent to the-
main objed, nor do they occupy a difproportionate
fpace.  Many topics of an elevated nature are occa*
 fionally introduced ; and moral fentiment is agreea-
bly interwoven with precept and  defcription.    The
writer has, apparently, found fome difficclty in xd* 
21
hering to the arrangement of his defign ; lor neither
are the propofed topics of the four books equally co-
pious of matter, nor has he with precifion confined
himfelf to the fubjeds belonging to each.  However,
as the real intention of fuch a work is not to afford fyf*
tematic inftmdion, but to imprefs the mind with de-
tached particulars, and  to amufe it with variety,  ob-
jedions in point of method are little to be regarded.
If this performance on the whole offers a fund of ufe-
ful advice and rational entertainment to every  culti-
vated reader, and at the fame time is in a good de-
gree what it profeffes to be, it has fulfilled its purpofe.

   It now remains to confider how far this work is
charaderifed by any peculiarity of ftyle and manner.

   Englifh blank verfe in its ftrudure approaches fo
ncaily to profe, that they who have employed  it on
elevated fubjeds have adopted a variety of methods
to give it the ftamp of poetry.   Some have tranf-
planted as much as poflible of the idiom of the  an-
cient languages into their own.  1"-,  have ufed
words in uncommon fenfes, derived rather from ety-
mology than pradice ;  and in the formation .of fen*
tences, they have ftudioufly deviated from the natur-
al order, and c -pied  the involutions and inverfions of
the La:in  eeeai Greek.   Others have  enriched  their
ftyle with  novel terms and compound epithets, and
have aimed at an uncommon mode of faying the com-
moneft things.  Very different from thefe is the man-
ner of Armstrong.  It is diftinguifhed by its fim-
plicity—by a free ufe  of words which owe  their 
2»*
ffrengtlvto their plainnefs—by tlie rejection of ambi«-
tious Jornamentsi and a near  approach to common
phrafeology.  His fentences are generally fliort and
eafy, his fenfe clear and obvious.  The full extent of
his conceptions is taken at the firft glance ;  and there
are no lofty myfteries to be unravelled* by repeated
perufal.  What keeps his language  from being pro-
faic,  is the vigour of his fentiments.   He thinks bold-
ly, feels ftrongly, and therefore expreffes himfelf po--
etically.  Where the fubjed finks, his ftyle finks with
it; but he has for  the moft part excluded topics in-
capable either of vivid defcription, or of the  oratory
of fentiment.  He had  from nature a  mufical  ear,
whence his lines, fcarcely ever haifh, are ufually me-
lodious, though apparently without mnch ftudy  to
render them  fo.   Perhaps  he has not been  careful
enough to avoid the monotony of making feveral fuc-
cefllve lines clofe u ith a reft-or paufe in the fenfe. On
the whole, it may not be too much to affert,  that no
writer in blank verfe can be found  more free from
ftiffnefs and affedation,-moi« energetic without harfh--
nefs, and more dignified without formality. 
/
THE
TIRST BOOK
OF THE
ARTif'F PRESERVING HEALTh,
/         AIR,
t
{
 i
 i
I 
 
            THE

          ART

             OF

PRESERVING  HEALTH.
                    BOOK  I.

                      AIR.

   DAUGHTER, of Pseon, queen of every joy,
Hygeia ;*  wlrofe indulgent fmile fuftains
The various race luxuriant nature pours,
And on th' immortal efiences beftows
Immortal youth ;  aufpicious, O defcend !
Thou cheerful guardian of the rolling year,
Whether thou wanton'ft on the weftern gale,
Or fhak'ft the rigid pinions of the north,
DifFufc-ft life and vigour through the trads
Of air, thro' earth, and ocean's deep domain.

  * Hygeia, the Goddefs of Health, was,  according  to
the genealogy of the heathen deities,  the daughter of Efcu-
lapius ; who,  as well as Apollo, was didinguifbed by ihe
name of Peon.
               c 
.26             THE ART  OF
When thro* the blue ferenity of heaven
Thy power approaches, all the wafteful hoft
Of pain and iicknefs, fqualid and deform'd,
Confounded fink into the loathfome gloom,
 Where in deep Erebus involv'd, the fiends
Grow more profane.   Whatever fhapes of death,
Shook from the hideous chambers of the globe,
Swarm thro'the fliudd'ring air : v.'hatever  plagues
Or meagre famine breeds, or with flow wings
Rife from the putrid watery element,
The damp wafte foreft, motionlefs and rank,
That  fmothers earth and all the breathlefs winds,
Or the vile carnage of the inhuman field ;
Whatever baneful breaths the rotten South ;
Whatever ills the extremes or fudden change
©f cold and hot, or moid and dry produce ;
They fly thy pure effulgence : they, and all
The fecret poiftms of avenging heaven,
And all the pale tribes halting in the train
Of Vice and heedlefs Pleafure : or if aught
The comet's glare amid the burning Iky,
Mournful eclipfe, or planets ill combin'd,
Fortenol diaftrous to the vital world ;
Thy falutary  power averts their rage,
Averts the general bane ; and but for thee
'Nature would fickcn, nature foon would die.

   Without thy cheerful adive energy,
No rapture fwells the bre.ift, no poet fings,
"No more the maids of  Helicon delight.
 CVmethcn with me, O Goddefs heavenly gay!
 Ile^va thefeng ; and let it fwectly flow, 
          PRESERVING HEALTH;.       27

And let it fweetly teach thy wholefome laws:
" How beft the fickle fabric to fupport
«« Of mortal man ;  in healthful body how
" A healthful mind the longeft to maintain."
'Tis hard, in fuch a-fttire of rules, to choofe
The beft, and thofe of moft extenfive ufe ;.
Harder in clear and animated long
Dry philofophic precepts to convey.
Yet with thy aid  the fecret wilds I trace
Of nature, and with daring lleps proceed
Thro' paths the mufes never trod before.

  Nor fliould I wander doubtful of my way,
Hud I the lights of that fagacious mind
Which taught to check the peftilential fire,
And quell the deadly Python of the Nile.
O thou, beiov'd by all the graceful arts,
Thou long the fav'rite of the healing powers,
Indulge, O Mead  ! a well-defign'd effay,
Howe'er imperfed : and  permit that I
My little knowledge with my country fhare,
Till you  the rich Afclepian ftores unlock,
And with new graces dignify the theme.

  YE  who amid this fev'rifli world would wear
A body free of pain,   of cares a mind j
Fly the rank city, fhun it's turbid air ;
Breathe not the chaos of eternal fmoke
And volatile  corruption, from the dead,
The dying, fick'ning, and the living world
Exhal'd, to fully heaven's tranfparent dome
With dim mortality.   It  is not air 
n
THE ART  OF
That from a thoufand lungs reeks back to thine>
Sated with exhalations rank and fell,
The fpoils of dunghills and the putrid thaw
Of nature ; when from fhape and texture fhe
Relaxes into fighting elements:
It is not air, but floats a naufeous mafs
Of all obfeene, corrupt, offenfive things.
Much moifture hurts : but here a fordid bath*
With oily rancour fraught, relaxes more
Thefolid frame than fimple moiflure can.
Befides, immur'd in  mapy a fullen bay
That never felt the freflinefs of the breeze,
This flumb'ring Deep remains, and ranker grows
With ficklyreft :  and (tho' the  lungs abhor
To drink the dun fuliginous abyfs)
Did not the acid vigour of the mine,
Roll'd from fo many thund'ring chimneys, tame
The  putrid ftreams that overfwarm the fky ;
This cauftic venom would perhaps corrode
Thofe tender cells that draw the vital air,
In vain with all their undwous rills bedew'd ;
Or by the drunken venous tubes, that yawn
In countiefs pores o'er all the  pervious fkin
Imbib'd, would poifon the balfamic blood,
And roufe the heart  to every fever's rage.
While yet you breathe, away ;  the rural wilds
Invite ;  the mountains call you, and the vales 5
The woods, the ftreams, and each ambrofial breeze
That fans the ever undulating fky ;
A kindly fky, whofe  foft'ring pow'r regales
Man, beaft, and all the vegetable reign.
Find then fome woodland fcene where nature fmiles 
          PRESERVING HEALTH.        29

 Benign, where all her lioneft children thrive.
 To us there wants not many a happy feat:
 Look round the fmiling land, fuch numbers rife
 We hardly fix, bewilder'd in our choice.
 See where enthron'd in adamantine ftate,
 Proud of her bards, imperial Windfor fits ;
 There choofe thy feat in fome afpirlng grove,
 Fail by the flowly-winding Thames;  or where
 Broader fhe laves fair Richmond's green retreatS|
 (Richmond that fees an hundred villas rife
 Rural or gay.) O ! from the fummer's rage,
 O !  wrap me in the friendly gloom that hides
 Umbrageous Ham !—But if the bufy town
 Attrad thee ftill to toil for power or gold,
 Sweetly thou may'ft thy vacant hours poffefs
 In Hampftead, courted by the wcftern wind ;
 Or Greenwich, waving o'er the winding flood ;,
 Or lofe the world amid the fylvan  wilds
 Of Dulwich, yet by barb'rous arts unfpoil'd.
 Green rife the Kentifh hills in cheerful air;
 But  on the marflvy plains that Eflex fpreads
 Build, not, nor reft too  long thy  wand'ring feet:
 For on a ruftic throne of dewy turf,
 With baneful fogs her aching temples bound/.
 Quartana there prefides : a meagre fiend
 Begot by Eurus, v/hen his brutal force
 Compreff'd the flothful Naiad of the Fens.
 From fuch a mixture fprung, this fitful peft-
 With fev'rifh blafts fubdues the fick'ning land i
Coid tremors come, with mighty love of reft,
Convuliive yawnings, laffitude and pains
That fting the burden'd brows3 fatigue the  loins,
             e2 
;^C             THE ART OF

And rack the joints and every torpid limb ;
Then parching heat fucceeds, till copious fweats
O'erflow ; a fhort relief from former ills.
Beneath repeated fhocks the wretches pi.ae ;
The vigour finks, the habit melts away ;
The cheerful, pure, and animated bloom
Dies from the face, with fqualid atrophy
Devour'd, in fallow melancholy clad.
And oft the Sorcerefs, in her fated wrath,
Refigns them to the furies of her train ;
The bloated Hydrops, and the yellow fiend
Ting'dwith her own accumulated gall.

   In queft of fites, avoid the mournful plain
Where ofiers thrive, and trees that love the lake j
Where many lazy muddy rivers flow :
Nor for the wealth that all the Indies roll
Fix near the marfhy margin of the main.
For from the humid foil and wat'ry reign
Eternal vapours rife ;  the fpo.ngy air
Forever weeps ; or turgid with the weight
Of waters,vpours a founding deluge down.
Skies fuch astkefe let ev'ry mortal fhun
Who dreads the dropfy, palfey, or the gout,
Tertian, corrofive fcurvy, or the moift catarrh
Or any other injury that, grows
From raw-fpun fibres, idle and unftrung,
Skin ill-perfpiring, and the purple flood
In languid eddies loit'ring into phlegm.

   Yet not alone from humid fkies we pine ;
 For air may be too dry.  The fubtile heaven, 
         PRESERVING HEALTH.        U

That winnows into duft the blafted downs,
Bare and extended wide without a ftream,
Too faft imbibes th' attenuated lymph
Which, by the fivrface, from the blood exhales.
The lungs grow rigid, and. with toil eflay
Their flexible vibrations ;  or  inflam'd,
Their tender, ever-moving ftrudure thaws.
Spoil'd of its limpid vehicle, the blood
A mafs of lees remains, a croffy tide
That flow as Lethe wanders thro' the veins ;:
Unadive in the fervices of life,.
Unfit to.lead its.pitchy current through
The fecret mazy channels of the brain.
The melancholic Fiend (that word defpair
Of phyfic,) hence  the ruft complexion'd man
Purfues, whole blood is dry, whofe fibres gain
Too ftretch'd a tone : and hence in climes aduffc
So fudden tumults feize the trembling nerves,
And burning fevers glow with double rage.

   Fly, if you can, thefe violent extremes
Of Air; the wholefome is nor moift nor dry.
But as the power of choofing is deny'd
To half mankind, a farther tafk enfues ;
How beft to mitigate thefe fell extremes,
How breathe unhurt the with'ring element,
Or hazy atmofphere :  though Cuftora moulds
To ev'ry clime the foft Promethean clay ;
And he who firft the fogs of Eflex breath'd
(So kind is native air) may in the fens
Of Eflex from the inveterate ills revive
At pure Montpelier or Bermuda caught. 
82-             THE ART OF

But if the raw and oozy heaven offendj.
Corred the foil, and dry the fources up
Of wat'ry exhalation ; wide and deep
Condud your trenches thro' the quaking bog ;
Solicitous, with all your winding arts,
Betray th' unwilling lake into  the ftream ;
And weed the foreft, and invoke the winds
To break the toils where ftranglcd vapours lie;
Or thro' the thickets fend the crackling flames.
Mean time at home with cheerful fire difpel
The humid air : and let your  table fmoke
With folid ioaft or bak'd; or what the herds
Of tamer breed fupply ; or what the wilds
Yield to thetoilfome pleafures of the chafe.
Generous your wine, the boaft of rip'ning years,
But frugal be your cups : the languid frame,
Vapid and funk from yefterday's debauch,
Shrinks from the cold embrace of wat'ry heaven..
But neither thefe nor all Apollo's arts,
Difarm the dangers of the dropping fky,
Unlefs with exercife aed manly toil
You brace your nerves, and fpur the lagging blood*
The fat'ning clime let all the fons of eafe
Avoid ; if indolence would wifli to live,
Go, yawn and loiter out the long, flow year
In fairy fkies.  If droughty regions parch
The fkin and lungs, and bake the thick'ning blood j
Deep in the waving foreft choofe your feat
Where fuming trees refrefb the thirfty air ;
And wake tho fountains from  their fecret beds,
And into lakes dilate the rapid ftream.
Here fpread your gardens wide j and let the cool, 
          PRESERVING HEALTH.       33

 The moift relaxing vegetable ftore,
 Prevail in each repaft :  Your food fupplied
 By bleeding life, be gently wafted down,
 By foft decodion and a mellowing heat,
 To liquid balm j or, if the folid mafs
 You choofe, tormented in the boiling wave ;
 That thro' the thirfty channels of the blood
 A fmooth diluted chyle may ever flow.
 The fragrant dairy from the cool recefs
 Its nedar acid or benign will pour
 To drown your thirft ;  or let the mantling bowl
 Of keen Sherbet the fickle tafte relieve.
 For with the vifcous blood the  fimple ftream
 Will hardly mingle ; and fermented cups
 Oft diffipate more moifture than they give.
 Yet when pale feafons rife, or winter rolls
 His horrors o'er the world, thou may'ft indulge
 In feafts more genial, and impatient broach
 The mellow cafk.   Then too the fcourging air
 Provokes to keener toils than fultry droughts
 Allow.  But rarely we fuch ikies blafpheme.
 Steep'd in continual rains, or with raw fogs
 Bedew'd,  our feafons droop : incumbent ftill
 A pond'rous heaven o'crwhelms the finking foul.
 Lab'ring with ftorms in heapy mountains rife
 Th' imbattled  clouds, as if the  Stygian fhades
 Had left the dungeon of eternal night.
 Till black with thunder all the fouth defcends.
 Scarce in a fhowerlefs day the heav'ns indulge
 Our melting clime ; except the baleful eaft
 Withers the tender  fpring, and fourly check*-
The fancy of the year.  Our fathers talk 
§4
THE ART'OF
 Of fummers, balmy airs, and fkies ferene.
 Good heaven !  for what unexpiated crimes
 This difmal change 1 The brooding elements*'
 Do they, your powerful minifters of wrath,
 Prepare fome fierce exterminating plague i
 Or is it fiVd in the decrees above
 That lofty Albion melt into the main ?
 Indulgent nature ! O diflblve this gloom ;
 Bind in ciernal adamant the winds
 That drown or wither  : Give the genial we!l
To bn*athe, and in its turn the fprightly north ?.
And rua)  ..nee more the circling feafons rule
The year j  not mix in every monftrous day.

  Meantime the moift malignity to fhun
Of burthen'd fkies ;  mark where the dry champai*.
Swells into cheerful hills ; where Marjoram
And Thyme, the love of bees, perfume, the air ;
And where the Cynorrhodon* with the rofe
For fragrance vie3 ;  for in the thirfty foil
Moft fragrant breathe the aromatic tribes.
There bid thy roofs high on the bafking fteep
Afcend, there light thy hofpitable fires.
And let them fee the winter morn arife,
The fummer ev'ning blufhing in the weft ;
While with umbrageous oaks the ridge behind
O'erhung, defends you from the bluft'ring north,
And bleak afflidion of the peevifh eaft.
O ! when the growling winds contend, and all

  * The wild rofe,  or that which grows on the common
hriar.. 
          PRESERVING HEALTH.        35

 The founding foreft fluduates in the fUrm ;
 To fink in warm repofe, and hear the din
 Howl o'er the fteady battlements, delights
 Above the luxury of common fleep.
 The murmuring riv'let, and the hoarfer ftrain
 Of waters ruffling o'er the flippery rocks,
 Will nightly lull you to ambrofial reft.
 To pleafe the fancy is no trifling good,
 Where health is ftndied ; for whatever moves
 The mind with calm delight, promotes the juft
 And natural movements of th'harmonious frame.
 Befides, the fportive brook forever fnakes
 The trembling air ; that floats from hill to hill,
 From vale to-mountain, with inceffant change
 Of pureft element, refrefhing ftill
 Your airy feat, and uninfeded Gods.
 Chiefly for this-I praife the man who builds
 High on the breezy ridge, whofe lofty fides
 Th' etherial deep  with endlefs billows chafes.
 His purer manfion nor contagious years
 Shall reach, nor deadly putrid airs annoy.

   But may  no fogs, from lake of fenny plain,
Involve my hill! And wherefoe'er you build,
 Whether on fun-burnt Epfora, or trie plains
 Wafh'd by the filent Lee  ; in Chelfea low,
Or high Blackheath with wintry winds affail'd^
Dry be your houfe :  but airy more than warm.
Elfe every breath of ruder wind will ftrike
Your tender body thro' with rapid pains ;
 Fiercecoughs willteize you,hoarfenefsbind yourvoice,
 Or moift Gravedo load your aching browf. 
46            THE ART  OF, &c-

Thefe to defy, and all the fates that dwell
In cloifter'd air, tainted with ftreaming life,
Let lofty ceilings grace your ample rooms;
And ftill at azure noontide may  your dom«
At every window drink the liquid fky.

  Need we the funny fituation here,
And,theatres open to the fouth, commend ?
Here, where the morning's mifty breath infefts
More than the torrid noon ?  How fickly grow,
How pale, the plants in thofe ill-fated vales
That, circled round with the gigantic heap
Of mountains, never felt, nor ever hope
To feel, the genial vigour of the  fun !
While on the neighb'ring hill the rofe inflames
The  vercknt fpring ; in verdant  beauty blows
The  tender lilly, languifhingly fweet;
O'er every hedge the wanton woodbine roves,
And autumn ripens  in the fummer's ray.
Nor  lefs the warmer living tribes demand
The  foft'ringfun ; wh»fe energy divine
Dwells not in mortal fire ; whofe gen'rous heat
Glows thro' themafs of groffer elements,
And kindles into life the ponderous fpheres.
Chcer'd by thy kind, invigorating warmth,
We court thy beams, great majefty of day !
If not the foul, the regent of this world,
Firft-boria of heaven, and only lefs than God! 
THE
SECOND BOOK
or THE
ART OF PRESERVING HEALTH.
DIET. 
 
THE
                    ART

                       OF

          PRESERVING HEALTH.




                   BOOK II.

                    DIET.

   ENOUGH of Air.   A defert fubjed now,
 Rougher and wilder, rifes to my fight,
 A barren wafte, where not a garland grows
 To bind the Mufe's brow ;  not e'en a proud,
 Stupendous  folitude frowns o'er the heath,
 To roufe a noble horror in  the foul :
 But rugged paths fatigue, and  error leads
 Thro' endlefs labyrinths  the devious feet.
 Farewel, ethereal fields !  the humbler arts
 Of life ; the  table of the homely Gods
 Demand my fong : Elyfian gales, adieu !

  The blood, the fountain whence the fpirits flow,
The generous ftream that waters every part,
And motion, vigour, and  warm life conveys 
49              THE ART  OF
To every particle that moves or lives;
This vital fluid, through unnumber'd tubes
Pour'dby the heart, and to the heart again
Refunded ; fcourg'd for ever round and round ;
Enrag'dwith heat and toil, atlaft forgets
Its balmy nature ; virulent and thin
It grows ; and now, but that a thoufand gates
Are open to its flight, it would deftrcy
The  parts it cherifiYd, and repair'd before.
Befides, the flexible and tender tubes
Melt in the mudeft, moft nedareous tide
That ripening  nature rolls; as in the ftream
Its crumbling banks ; but what the vital foice
Of plaftic fluids hourly batters down,
That very force, thofe plaftic  particles
Rebuild : fo mutable the  ftate of man !
For this the watchful appetite was giv'n,
Daily, with frefh materials, to repair
This unavoidable expenfe of life,
This neceffary  wafte of flefh and blood.
Kence the  concodive powers, with various art>.
 Subdue the cruder aliments to chyle ;
The chyle to blood ; the foamy purple tide
To liquors, which, through finer arteries,
To different parts their winding courfe purfue ;
To try new changes, and new forms put on,
 Or for the  public, or fome private ufe.

   Nothing lb foreign but th' athletic hind
 Can labour into blood.   The hungry meal
 Alone he fears, or aliments too thin ;
 By  violent powers too eafily fubdued, 
          PRESERVING  HEALTH.       41

 Too foon expell'd.  His daily labour thaws,
 To friendly chyle, the mod rebellious mafs
 That fait can harden, or the fmoke of years ;
 Nor does his gorge the rancid bacon rue,
 Nor that which Ceftria  fends, tenacious pafte
 Of folid milk.  But ye  of fofter clay,
 Infirm and delicate ; and ye  who wafte,
 With pale and bloated floth,  the tedious day *
 Avoid the ftubborn aliment, avoid
 The full repaft ; and let fagacious age
 Grow wifer, leffbn'd by the dropping teeth.

   Half fubtiliz'd to chyle, the liquid food
 Readied obeys th' affimilating powers ;
 And foon the tender vegetable mafs
 Relents ; and foon the young of thofe that tread
 The fteadfaft earth, or cleave the green abyfs,
 Or pathlcls fky.   And if the fteer muft fall,
 In youth and fanguine  vigour let him die ;
 Nor ftay till rigid age, or heavy ails,
 Abfolve him, ill requited, from the yoke.
 Some with high forage, and luxuriant eafe,
 Indulge the veteran ox ; but  wifer thou,
 From the bald mountain or the barren downs,
 Exped the flocks by frugal nature fed ;
A race of purer blood, with exercife
Refi.i'd and fcanty fare ; for, old or  young,
The ftall'd are never healthy ; nor the cramra'd :
Not all the culinary arts can tame,
To wholefome food, the abominable growth
Of reft and gluttony ; the prudent tafte
Rejeds, like bane, fuch loathfome lufcioufneft.
V u 
4*2              THE ART  OF

The languid ftomach curfes e'en the pure
Delicious fat, and all the race of o:!;
For more the oily aliments relax
Its feeble tone ; and with the eager lymph
(Fond to incorporate with all it meets)
Coyly they mix, and fhun with flippery wiles
The woo'd embrace.  Th' irrefoluble oil,
So gentle late, and blandifhing,  in floods
Of rancid bile o'erflows:  what tumults hence,
What horrors rife, were naufeous to relate.
Choofe leaner viands, ye whofe jovial make
Too faft the gummy nutriment imbibes :
Choofe fober meals ;  and roufe to adive life
Your  cumbrous clay, nor on th' enfeebling down*
Irrefolute, protrad the morning hours.
But let the man whofe bones are thinly clad,
With cheerful eafe and fucculeut repaft
Improve his habit if he can ;  for each
Extreme departs from perfed fanity.

   I could relate what table this demands,
 Or that complexion ; what the various powers
 Of various foods :  but fifty years would roll,
 And fifty more,  before the tale were done.
 Befides, there often lurks fome namelefs, ftrangej
 Peculiar thing ;  nor on the fkin difplay'd,
 Felt in the pulfe, nor in the habit feen ;
 Which finds a poifon in the food, that moft
 The temp'rature affeds.   There are, whofe blo»d
 Impetuous rages through the turgid veins,
 Who better bear the fiery fruits of Ind,
 Than the moift Melon, or pale Cucumber. 
PRESERVING HEALTH.       &
Of chilly nature, others fly the board
Supply'd with flaughter, and. the vernal powers*
For cooler, kinder fuftenance implore.
Some e'en the generous nutriment deleft
Which, in the fhell, the fleeping embryo rear;,
Some, more unhappy ftill, repent the gifts
Of pales ; foft, delicious, and benign :
The balmy quinteffence of every flower,
And every grateful herb that decks the fpring•;.
The foft'ring dew of tender fprouting life ;
The beft reftdion o£ declining age ;
The kind reftorative of thofe who lie
Half dead, and panting, from the doubtful flrife
Of nature ftruggling in the grafp of death.
Try all the bounties of this fertile globe,
Thereis not fuch a falutary food
As fuits with every  ftomach.   But (except*.
Amid the mingled mafs of fifli and fowl,
And boil'd and bak'd, you hefitate by which
You funk opprefT'd, or whether not by all;)
Taught by experience foon you may difcern,
What pleafes, what  offends.  Avoid the catej
That lull the ficken'd appetite too long ;
Or heave with, feverifh flufhings all the face,
Burn in the palms, and parch the rough'ning tongue }
Or much diminlfh,  or too much increafe
Th' expenfe, which nature's wife economy,
Without or wafte or avarice, maintains.
Such cates abjur'd,  let prowling hunger loofe,
And bid the curious palate roam at will;
Thoy fcarce can err  amid the various flores
That burft the teeming entrails of the world, 
U              THE ART OF
   Led by fagacious tafte, the ruthlefs king
Of beafts on blood and flaughter only lives ;
The tiger, form'd alike to cruel meals,
Would at the manger ftarve : of milder feeds
The generous horfe to herbage and to grain
Confines his wifh ; though fabling Greece refound
The Thracian fteeds with human carnage wild.
Prompted by inftind's never-erring power,
Each creature knows its  proper aliment ;
But man, th' inhabitant o£ every clime,
With all the commoners  of nature feeds.
Direded, bounded, by th»s power within,
Their cravings are well aim'd : voluptuous man
Is by fu peri or faculties mifled ;
Mifled from pleafure e'en in queft of joy.
Sated with nature's boons, what thoufands feek,
With difh.es tortured from their native tafte,
And mad variety, to fpur beyond
Its wifer will the jaded appetite !
Is this for pleafure ? Learn a jufter tafte ;
And know that temperance is true luxury.
Or is it pride ?  Puriue fome nobler aim.
Difmifs your parafites, who praife for hire ;
And earn the fair efteem  of honeft men,
Whofe praife is fame.  Form'd of fuch clay as yours,
The fick, the needy, fhiverat your gates.
E'en modeft want may blefs your hand unfeen,
Though hufh'd in patient wretchednefs at home.
Is there no virgin, grac'd with every charm
But that which binds the mercenary vow ?
No youth  of genius, whofe negleded  bloom,
Unfofter'd, fickens  in the barren fhade 1 
          PRESERVING HEALTH.        45

 No worthy man, by fortune's random blows,
 Or by a heart too generous and humane,
 Conftrain'd to leave his happy natal feat,
 And figh for wants more bitter than his own ?
 There are, while human miferies abound,
 A thoufand ways to wade fuperfluous wealth,
 Without one fool or flatterer at your board,
 Without one hour of ficknefs or difguft.

   But other ills th' ambiguous feaft purfue,
 Befides provoking the lafcivious tafte.
 Such various foods, tho' harmlefs each alone,.*
 Each other violate ; and oft we fee
 What fti iie is brew'd, and what pernicious bane,,
 From combinations of innoxious things.
 Th' unbounded tafte  I mean not to confine
 To hermit's diet, needlefsly fevere.
 But would you long the fweets of health enjoy,,
 Or hufband pleafure ; at one impious meal
 Exhauft not half the bounties of the year,
 Of every realm.   It matters not meanwhile
 How much to-morrow differ from to-day ;
 •^o f.ir indulge : 'tis fir, bolides, that man,
 To change obnoxious, be to change inur'd.
 But ftay the curious appetite, and tafte
 With caution fruits you never  tried before.
 For want of ufe the kindeft  aliment
 Sometimes offends; while cuftom tames the rage
 Of poifon to mild amity with life.

  Soheav'n has form'd us to the general tafte
Of all its gifts ; fo cuftom has improv'd 
40
THE ART OF
This bent of nature ; that few fimple foods,
Of all that earth, or air, or ocean  yield,
But by excefs offend.   Beyond the fenfe
Of light refedion, at the genial board
Indulge not often ; nor protrad the feaft
To dull fatiety ;  till foft and flow
A drowfy death  creeps  on, th' expanfive foul
Oppreff'd, and fmother'd the celeftial fire.
The ftomach, urg'd beyond its adive tone,
Hardly to nutrimental chyle fubdues
The fofteft food : unfinifh'd and deprav'd,
The chyle, in all its future wanderings, owns
Its turbid fountain ;  not by purer ftreams
So to be clear'd, but foulnefs will remain.
To fparkling wine what ferment can exalt
The unripen'd grape ?  Or what mechanic flcill
From the crude ore can fpin the dudile gold ?

  Grofs riot treafures up a wealthy fund
Of plagues ; but more immedicable ills
Attend the lean extreme.  For phyfic knows
How to difburden the too tumid veins,
Even how to ripen the half-labour'd blood :
But to unlock the elemental  tubes,
Collapf'd and fhrunk with long inanity,
And with balfamic nutriment repair
The dried and worn-outliabit, were to bid
Old age grow green, and wear a fecond fpring j
Or the tall afli, long ravifh'd from the foil,
Through wither'd veins imbibe the vernal dew.
When hunger calls, obey ; nor often wait
Till hunger fharpen to corrofive pain: 
           PRESERVING HEALTH.        4?

 For the k een appetite will feaft beyond
 What nature well can bear; and one extreme
 Ne'er without danger meets its own reverfe.
 Too greedily th* exhaufted veins abforb
 The recent chyle, and load  enfeebled powers
 Oft toth' extindion of the vital flame.
 To the pale cities, by the firm-fet fiege,
 And famine, humbled, may this verfe be borne ;
 And hear, ye hardieft fons that Albion breeds,
 Long toff'd and famifh'd on the wintry main ;
 The war fhook off, or hofpitable fhore
 Attain'd, with temperance bear the fhock of joy;
 Nor crown with feftive rites th' aufpicious day :
 Such feaft might prove more fatal than the waves*
 Than war or famine.  While the vital fire
 Burns feebly, heap not the  green fuel on ;
 But prudently foment the wandering fpark
 With what the fooneft feels its kindred touch :
 Be frugal e'en of that; a  little give
 At firft ; that kindled, add  a little more ;
 Till, by deliberate nourifhing, the flame
 Reviv'd, with all its won ted vigour glows.

   But though the two (the full and jejune)
 Extremes have each their  vice ; it much avails
 Ever with gentle tide to ebb and flow
 From this to that; So nature learns to  bear
 Whatever chance or headlong appetite
 May bring.  Befides a meagre  day fubdues
 The cruder clods by floth or luxury
Colleded, and unloads the wheels of life.
 Sometimes  a coy averfion to the feaft 
*$             THE ART OF
Comes on, while yet no blacker omen lours j
Then is a time to ihun the tempting board,
Were it your natal or your nuptial day.
Perhaps a faft fo feafonable ftarves
The latent feeds of woe, which, rooted once,
Might coft your labour.  But the day retum'd
Of feftal luxury, the wife indulge
Moft in the tender vegetable breed ;
Then chiefly, when the fummer beams inflame
The brazen heavens ; or angry Sirius fheds
Afeverifh taint  through the ftill gulph of air.
The moift cool viands then, and flowing cup
From thefrefh dairy-virgin's liberal hand,
Will fave your head from harm, tho' round the world
The dreaded Caufos* roll his wafteful fires.
Pale humid Wintei loves the generous board,
The meal more  copious, and a warmer fare ;
And longs with  old wood and old wine to cheer
His quaking heart.  The feafons which divide
Th' empires  of heat and cold  ; by neither claim'd,
Influenc'd by both, a middle  regimen
Impofe.  Thro' autumn's languifhing domain
Defcending, nature by degrees invites
To glowing luxury.  But, from the depth
Of winter when th' invigorated year
Emerges ;  when Favonius flufh'd with love,
Toyful and young, in every breeze defcends
More warm and wanton on his kindling bride ;
Then, fhepherds, then begin tofpare your flocks j
And learn, with wife humanity, to check
* The turning fever. 
          PRESERVING HEALTH.       49

 The luft of blood.   Now pregnant earth commits
 A various offspring to th' indulgent fky ;
 Now bounteous nature feeds with lavifh hand
 The prone creation, yields what once fuffic'd
 Their dainty fovereign, when the world was young;
 Ere yet the barbarous thirft of blood had feiz'd
 The human breaft.  Each rolling month  matures
 The food that fuits it moft; fo does each clime.

   Far in the horrid realms of winter, where
 Th' eftablifh'd ocean heaps a monftrous wafte
 Of fhinrag rocks and mountains to the £ole ;
 There lives a hardy race, whofe plained, wants
 Relentlefs earth, their cruel ftep-mother,
 Kegards not.  On the wafte of iron fields,
 Untam'd, intradable, no harvefts wave:
 Pomona hates them, and the clownifli god
 Who tends the garden.  In this frozen world
 Such cooling gifts were vaiij:  a fitter meal
 Is earn'd with eafe ; for here die fruitful fpawn
 Of Ocean fwarms, and heaps their genial  board
 With generous  fare, and luxury profufe.
 Thefe are their bread, the oaly bread they know;
 Thefe, and their willing  flave the deer, that crops
 The fcrubby herbage on  their meagre hills,
 Or fcales, for fattening mofs, the favage rocks.
 Girt by the burning Zone, not thus the South
 Her fwarthy fons, in either Ind, maintains;
 Or thirfty Lybia ; from whofe fervid loins
The lion burfts, and every fiend that roams
Th' affrighted wildernefs.  The mountain herd,
Aduft and dry, no fwcet repaft aiTords;
               E 
60
THE ART OF
Nor does the tepid main fuch kinds produce
So perfed, fo delicious, as thefhoals
Of icy Zembla.   Rafhly where the blood
Brews feverifli frays j where fcarce the tubesiUftain
Jts tumid fervc a-r and tempeftuous courfe ;
Kind nature tempts not to fuch gifts as thefe.
But here in livid ripenefs melts the Grape ;
Here, finifh'd by invigorating funs,
Thro' the green fhade the golden Orange glows;
Spontaneous here the turgid Melon yields
A generous pulp ; the Cocoa fwells on high
With milky riches ; and in horrid mail
The crifp Ananas wraps its poignant fweets :
Earth's vaunted progeny—In ruder air
Too coy to flourifu, e'en too proud to live ;
Or hardly raif'd by artificial fire
To vapid life.  Herewith a mother's-frnile
Glad Amalthea pours her copious horn ;
 Here buxom Ceres reigns; th' autumnal fea
 In boundlefs billows fluduates o'er their plains.
 What fuits-the climate beft, what fuks the men,
 Nature profufes moft, and moft the tafte
 Demands.  The fountain, edg'd with racy wine
. Or acid fruit, bedews their ifiirfty fouls.
 The breezeetgwial breathing round their limbs
 Supports in elfe intolerable air :
 While the cool Palm, the Plantain, and the grove
 That waves on gloomy Lebanon, afluage
 The torrid hell that beams upon their heads.

    Now come, ye Naiads, to the fountains lead ;
- JJow lot me-wander through  your gelid reign; 
PRESERVING HEALTH.        3b
I born to view th'enthufiaftic wilds ~
By mortal elfe untrod,   I hear the din
Of waters thundering o'er the ruin'd cliffs.
With holy reverence I approach the rocks
Whence' glide the ftreams renown'd in ancient fong.
Here from the defert down the rumbling fteep
Firft fprings the Nile ; here burftsthe founding Po
In angry waves ;  Euphrates hence devolves
A mighty flood to water half the eaft ; ■
And there, in Gothic folitude reclin'd,
The cheerlefs Tanais pours his hoary urn.
What folemti twilight » What flnpendous fhades
Enwrap thefe infant floods ! Thro' every nerve
A facred horror thrills, a pleaflng fear
Glides o'er my frame.   The foreft deepens round;
And more gigantic ftill th' impending trees.
Stretch their extravagant arms athwart the glooms
Are thefe the confines of fome  fairy world ?
The land of Genii? Say, beyond thefe wilds
What unknown nations ? If indeed beyond
Aught habitable lies.  And whither leads,
To what ftrdnge regions, or of blifs or pain,
That fubterraneous way ? Propitious maids,
Condud me, while- with fearful fteps I tread
This trembling ground.  The tafk remains to fiog"
Your gifts (fo Paeon, fo the powers of health
Command) to praife your chryftal element:
The chief ingredient in heaven's various works j
Whofe flexile genius fparkles in the gem,
Grows firm in oak, and fugitive in wine;
The vehicle, the fource of nutriment
And life, to all that vegetate or live;. 
52              THE ART  OF
  O comfortable ftreams!  with eager lips
And trembling hand the languid thirfty quaff
New life in you; frefh vigour fills their veins.
No warmer cups the rural  ages knew ;
None warmer fought the fires of human kind.
Happy in temperate peace  ! Their equal days
Felt not th' alternate fits of feverifli mirth,
And fick dejedion.  Still ferene and pleafM,
They knew no  pains but what the tender foul
With pleafure yields to, and would ne'er forget.
Bleft with divine immunity from ails,
Long centuries they liv'd ;  their only fate
Was ripe old age, and rather fleep than death.
Oh ! could thofe worthies from the wo Id of Gods
Return to vifit their degenerate  fons,
How would they fcorn the joys of modern time
With all our art and toil improv'd to pain !
Too happy they !  But wealth brought luxury,.
And luxury on floth begot difeafe.

  Learn temp'rance,friends; and hear without difdahl
The ch©ice of water.  Thus the Coan* fage
Onin'd, and thus the learn'd of every fchool.
What lead of foreign principles partakes
Is beft :  the lighted then ;  what bears the touch
Of fire  the leaft, and fooneft mounts in air;
The moft infipid ;  the moft void of fmell.
 Such the rude mountain from his horrid fides
 Pours down ;  fwch waters in the fandy vale
 Forever boil, alike of winter's froft
* Hippocrates. 
          PRESERVING HEALTH.        53

 And fummer's heat fecure.   The cryftal ftream,
 Thro' rocks redounding, or for many a mile
 O'er the chaf'd pebbleshurl'd, yields wholefome,pure
 And mellow draughts ;. except when winter thaws,
 And naif the mountains melt into the tide.
 Though thirft were e'er fo refolutc, avoid
 The fordid lake, and all fuch drowfy floods
 As fill from Lethe Belgia's flow canals ;
 (With reft corrupt, with vegetatien green;
 Squalid with generation, and the birth
 Of little raonfters ;) till the power of fire
 Has from profane embraces difengag'd
 The violated lymph.  The virgin dream;
 In boiling wades its finer foul in auv.

   Nothing like fimple element dilutes
 The food, or gives the chyle fo foon to flow.
 But where the ftomach, indolent and cold,
 Toys with its duty, animate with wine
 Th-' infipid ftream ; the golden Ceres yields •
 A more voluptuous, a more fprightly draught ;  .
 Perhaps more  adive.  Wine unmix'd, and all
 The gluey floods that from the vex'd abyfs
 Of fermentation fpring', with fpirit fraught,
 And furious with intoxicating fire ;
 Retard concodion, and preferve unthaw'd '
 Th' embodied  mafs.  You fee what countlefs years,
 Embalm'd in fiery quintefcenee ofwine,
 The puny wonders of the reptile world,
 The tender rudiments of life, the Aim
 Unravellings of minute anatomy,
Maintain their texture, aad unchang'd remain,
                e 2 
54              THE ART OF
  We curfe not wine : the vile excefs we blame ;
 More fruitful than th' accumulated board,
 Of pain and mifery.  For the fubtile draught
 Fafter and furer fwells the vital tide ;
And with more adive poifon, than the floods
 Of groffer crudity convey, pervades
The far remote meanders of our frame.
Ah ! fly deceiver !  branded o'er and o'er,
Yet ftill believ'd ! exulting o'er the wreck
Of fober vows!—But the Parnaffian maids
Another time,* perhaps fhall fing  the joys,
The fatal charms, the many woes of wine ;
Perhaps its various tribes, and various powers.

  Meantime, I would not always dread the bowl,
Nor every trefpafs fhun.  The feverifli ftrife,
Rouf'd  by the rare  debauch, fubdues, expels,
The loitering crudities that burden life ;
And, like a torrent full and rapid, clears
Th' obftruded tubes.  Befides, this reftiefs world
Is full of chances, which by habit's power
To learn to bear, is eafier than to  fhun.
Ah ! when ambition, meagre love of gold,
Or facred country calls, with mellowing wine
To moiften well the thirfty fuffrages :
Say how, unfeafon'd to die midnight frays
 Of Comus and his rout, wilt thou contend
With Centaurs long to  hardy deeds inur'd ?
 Then learn to revel; but by flow degrees :
 By flow degrees the liberal arts are won ;
 And Hercules grew ftrong.  But when you fmootli
                * See Book iv. 
         PRESERVING  HEALTH.       SI

The brows of care, indulge your feftive vein
In cups by well-inform'd experience found -;
The leatt your bane ; and only with, your friends.
There are fweet follies; frailties to be ken
By friends alone, and men of generous minds.

   Oh ! feldom may the fated hours return
 Of drinking deep! I would not daily  tafte,
 Except when'life declines,, even fober cups.
 Weak withering age no rigid law forbids,
 With frugal nedar* fmooth and flow with balm,
 The fapkfs habit daily to bedew,
 And give the hefitating wheels of life
 Gliblier  to play.  But youth has better jeys :
 And is it wife, when youth with pleafure flows,
 T© fquander the reliefs of age and pain i

   What dextrous thoufands juft within the goal
 Of wild debauch dired their nightly courfe I
 Perhaps no  fickly qualms bedim their days,
 No morning admonitions fhock the head.
 But ah ! what woes remain !  life rolls apace,
 And that incurable difeafe,  old age,
 In youthful bodies more feverely felt,
 More fternly adive, fhakes  their blafted prime :
 Except kind nature by fome hafty blow
 Prevent the lingering, fates.   For know, .whate'cr
 Beyond, its natural fervour  hurries on..
 The fanguine tide ; whether the frequent bowl,
 Fligh-feafon'd fare, or exercife to toil
.Pr©traded ; fpurs to its laft ftage tir'd life,
 And fows the temples'with untimely fnpw. 
S6               THE  ART  OT
When life is new, the dudile fibres feel
The heart's increafing force; and, day by day)
The growth advances ;  till the larger tubes,
Acquiring (from their elemental* veins,
Condenf'd tofolid chords) % firmer tone,
Suftain, and jud  fuftain, th' impetuous blood.
Here flops the growth.   With cvt rbearing pulfe
And preffure, ftill the great deftroy the fmall j
Still with the rains of the fmall gvow ftrong.
Life glows meantime, amid the^grinding force
Of vifcousfluids and elaftic tubes.;
Its various fundions vigoroufly are plied
By ftrong machinery ; and in folid health
The man confirm'd long triumphs o'er difeafe.
But the full ocean ebbs ;  there is a point,
By nature fix'd, whence life mull downward, tend.
For ftill the beating tide  confolidates
The flubborn veffels, more reludant ftill
To the weak throbs of th' ill-fupported heart.
This lauguiftiing, thefe ftreagth'ning by degrees

   * In the human body, as well as in thofe  cf other ani-
mals, the larger blood veffels are compofed of fmaller ones ;
which, by  the violent motion and preffure of the fluids in
the large veffels,  lofe their cavities by degrees, and degener-
ate into impervious chords or jibreti  In proportion as
theft fmall veffels  become folid,  the larger mufl of courfe
grow lefs extenfile, more rigid, and make a flronger refin-
ance to the adnon  of the heart,  and forte of the  Mood.
From this gradual condenfation of the fmaller veffels, and
confequcni rigidity  of the larger ones, tht progrefs  of tbt
human body, frcm infancy to old age, is accounted for. . 
          PRESERVING HEALTH.       #

To hard, unyielding, unelaftic bone,
Through tedious channels the congealing flood
Crawls lazily, and hardly wanders on ;
It loiters ftill :  and now it flirs no more.
This is the period few attain ;, the death
Of nature ; thus (fo heav'n ordain'd it) life
Dedroys itfelf;  and could thefe laws have chang'd
Neftor might now the fates of Troy relate ;
And Homer live immortal as his fong.

   What does not fade ? The tower that long had flood
The crufh of thunder and the warring winds,.
Shook by the flow but fure deftroyer Time,
Now hangs in doubtful ruins o'er its bafe.
And flinty pyramids, and walls of brafs,
Defcend : the Babylonian fpires are funk ;
Achaia, Rome, and Egypt moulder down.
Time fhakes the liable tyranny of thrones,
And tottering empires rufh by their own weight.
This huge rotundity we tread grows old,
And all thofe worlds that roll around the fun,
The fun himfelf, fhall die, and ancient Night]
Again involve  the defolate  abyfs:
Till the great Father thro' the lifelefsgloonv
Extend his arm to light another world,
And bid new planets roll by other laws.
For thro' the regions of unbounded fpace,
Where unconfin'd Omnipotence has room,
Being, in various fyftems, fluduates ftill
Between creation and abhor'd decay :
It ever did : perhaps and ever will.
New worlds are ftill emerging from the deep ;
The old defending, in their turns to rife. 
•* 
      THIRD BOOK





         OF THE





ART OF PRESERVING HEALTH.
EXERCISE. 
 
           THE

          ART

            OF

PRESERVING HEALTH
                  BOOK III.

                 EXERCISE.

  THRO* various toils th'ad venturous Mufe has paft 5
 But half the toil, and more than half, remains.
 Rude is her theme, and hardly fit for Song ;
 Plain and of little ornament; and I
 But little pradif'd in th'  Aonian arts :
 Yet not in vain fuch labours have we tried,
 If aught thefe lays the fickle health confirm.
 To you, yc delicate, I write ;  for you
 I tame ray youth to philofophic cares,*
 And grow ftill paler by the midnight lamp.
 Not to debilitate with timorous rules
 A hardy frame; nor needlefsly to brave
 Inglorious dangers, proud of mortal ftrength,
 Is all the leffon that in wholefome years
Concerns the ftrong.  His care were ill beftow'd
                F 
G2
THE ART  OF
 Who would with warm effeminacy nurfe
 The thriving oak, which on the mountains brow
 •Bears all the blafls thatfwegp the wintry heav'.n.

   Behold the labourer of the glebe who toils
 In duft, in rain, in cold and fultry fkies :
 Save but the grain from mildews and the flood,
 Nought anxious he what fickly ftars afcend.
 He knows no laws by Efculapius given ;
 He fludies none.   Yet him nor midnight fogs
 Infeft, nor tbofe envenpm'd fhafts that fly
 When rapid Sirius fires the autumnal noon.
.His habit pure  with plain and temperate meals,
 Robufl with labour, and by cuftom fleel'd
 To every cafualty of varied life ;
 Serene he bears the peevifh eaftern blad
 And uninfeded breathes the mortalfouth.

   Such the reward of rude and fober life ;
. Of labour fuch.  By health the peafant's toil
 Is well repaid ; if exercife  were pain
 Indeed, and temperance pain.  By arts like thefe
 laconia nurf'd of old her hardy fons;
 And Rome's unconquer'd legions urg'd their way,
 Unhurt, through every toil in every clime.

   Toil, and be  drong.   By toil the flaccid nerve*
 Grow firm, and gain a more compaded tone ;
 The  greener juices are by toil fubdu'd,
 Meliow'd, and  fubtilifd ;  the vapid old
 E>:pell'd, and all the rancour of the blood.
 Come, my companions, ye who feel the charms 
            PRESERVING HEALTH.       63

 Of nature and the year ; come, let us ftray
 Where chanoe or fancy leads our roving walk":
 Corrte, while the foft voluptuous breezes fan
 The fleecy heavens, enwrap the limbs in balm,
 And fired acharm'mg languono'er the foul.
 Nor when bright Winter fows with prickly fiod
 The vigorous ether, in unmanly warmth
 Indulge at home ;  nor even when Eurus' blafts
 This way and that convolve the lab'ring woods.
 My liberal walks, fave when the fkies in rain
 Or fogs relent, no feafon fhould confine
 Or to the cloider'd gallery or arcade.
 Go, climb the mountain; from th' ethereal fource
 Imbibe the recent gale.  The cheerful morn
 Beams o'er the hills ;  go, mount th'exulting deed.
 Already, fee, the deep-mouth'd beagles catch
 The tainted mazes; and, on eager fport
 Intent, with emulous impatience try.
 Each doubtful traces  Or, if a nobler prey
 Delight you  more, go chafe the defperate deer ;
 And through its deeped folitudes awake
 The vocal foreft with  the jovial horn.

   But if the breathlefs chafe o'er hill and dale
 Exceed your  ftrength ; a fport of lefs fatigue,
 Nor lefs delightful, the prolific ftream
 Affords.   The cryftal rivulet, that o'er
 A ftony channel rolls its rapid maze
 Swarms with the filver fry.   Such, thro' the bounds
Of padoral Stafford, runs the brawling Trent;
Such Eden, fprung from Cumbrian mountains; fuch
 The Efk, o'erhung with woods; and fuch the ftreams 
64              THE ART OF

On whofe Arcadian banks I firft drew air,
Liddal;  till now, except in Doric lays
Tun'd to her murmurs by her love-fick fwains,
Unknown in fong : though not a pu rer ftream,
Thro' meads more  flowery, more romantic groves,
Rolls towards the weftern main. Hail, facred flood !
May ftill thy hofpitable fwains be bleft
In rural innocence ; thy mountains ftill
Teem with the fleecy race ; thy tuneful woods
Forever flourifh ; and thy vales look gay
With painted meadows, and the golden grain !
Oft, with thy blooming fons, when life was new
Sportive and petulant, and charm'd with toys,
In thy tranfparent eddies have I lav'd :
Oft trae'd with patient ft^ps thy fairy banks
With the well imitated fly to hook
The eager trout, and with  tlieflendcr line
And yielding rod foiicitto the fhore
Tho ftruggliiig, panting prey : while vernal clouds
A:.d tv ->id gaks obicur'd the ruffled pool,
And from ihe d.-cps call'd forth the wanton fwarms..

  Form'd on the Samian fchool, or thofe of Ind,
There are who think thefe pallimes fcarce humane,
Yet in my mind (and not relentlefs 1)
His life is pure that wears no fouler flams.
But if, thro' genuine tendernefs of heart,
Or  fecret want of relifh for the game,
You fhun the glories of the chafe, nor care
To haunt the peopled ftream ;  the garden yields
A foft amufement, an humane delight.
T-*   :fe  th' infipid nature  of the ground j 
PRESERVING HEALTH.        66
 0r tame its favage genius to the gf ace
 Of carelefs, fweet rufticity, that feems
 The amiable refult of happy chance,
 Is to create; and gives a god-like joy,
 Which every year improves.  Nor thou difdain
 To  check the lawlefs riot of the trees,
 To plant the grove, or turn the barren mould.
 O happy he !  whom, when his years decline,
 (His fortune and his fame by worthy means
 Attain'd, and equal to his moderate mind ;
 His life approv'd by all the wife and good,
 Even envied by the vain,) the peaceful groves
 Of  Epicurus, from this ftormy world,
 Receive to reft ; of all ungrateful  cares
 Abfolv'd, and facred from the felfifh crowd.
 Fappieft of men ! if the fame foil invites
 A chofen few, companions of his youth,
 Once fellow-rakes, perhaps, now rural friends ;
 With  whom, in eafy commerce, to  purfue
 Nature's free charms, and vie for fylvan fame :
 A fair ambition ;  void of ftrife or  guiler
 Or jealoufy, or pain to be outdone*
 Who plans th' enchanted garden, who direds
 The vifto beft, and beft conduds the ftream ;
 Whofe groves the fatleft thicken and afcend'}
 Who firft the welcome fpring falutes ; who (hew.
 lhe earheft bloom, the fweeteft; proudeft charms
 Of Flora ; who beft gives Pomona's juice
 To match the fprightly genius of Champaign.
 1 hnce happy days !  in rural bufinofs pail ;
Bled winter  nights !  when, as the  genial fire
Cheers the wide hall, his cordial family
               f 2 
66              THE ART OF
With foft domeftic arts the hours beguile,
And pleafing talk that ftarts no timorous fame,.
With witlefs wantonnefs to hunt it down :
Or through the fairy-land of tale or fong
Delighted,  wander, in fiditious fates
Engag'd, and all that ftrikes humanity :
Till loft in fable, they the ftealing hour
Of timely reft forget.  Sometimes, at eve,
His neighbours lift the latch, and blefs unbid
His feftal roof; while, o'er the light repaft,
And fprightly cups, they mix in focial joy j
And, thro' the maze of converfation trace
Whate'er amufes or improves the mind.
 Sometimes at eve (for I delight to tade
The native zeft and flavour of the fruit,
Where fenfe grows wild and takes of no manure}>
The decent, honed, cheerful nufbandman
 Should drown his labour in my friendly bowl ;
 And at my table  find himfelf at home.

   Whate'er your dudy, in whate'er you fweat,
 Indulge your tade.   Some love the manly foils j.
 The tenuis fome; and fome the graceful dance.
 Others, more hardy, range the purple heath,
 Or naked dubble ;  where from field to field
 The founding coveys urge their labouring flight :
 Eager amid the rifing cloud to  pour
 The gun's uneiring thunder ; and there are
 Whom dill the meed* of the green archer charms.

   * This word is much ufd by fome of the old Englifb
 poets, and fgnifies reward cr prize. 
PRESERVING HEALTH.       67
He choofes beft, whofe labour entertains
His vacant fancy moft:  the toil you hate
Fatigues you foon, and fcarce improves your limbs*

   As beauty ftill has blemifh ;  and the mind
 The moft accomplifh'd its imperfed fide;
 Few bodies are there of that happy mould
 But fome one part is weaker than the reft :
The legs, perhaps, or arms refufe their load;
Or the cheft labours.  Thefe afliduoufly,
 But gently, in their proper arts employ'd,
Acquire a vigour and elaftic fpring
To which they were not born.  But weaker parts
Abhor fatigue and violent difcipline.

   Begin, with gentle toils; and, as your nerves
 Grow firm, to hardier by juft fteps afpire.
 The prudent, even in every moderate walk,
 At firft but faunter; and by flow degrees
Increafe tlieir pace.   This dodrine of the wife
Well  knows themafter of the flying fteed.
Firft from the goal the manag'd courfers play
On bended reins j  as yet the fkilful youth
Reprefs their foamy pride; but  every breath
The race grows warmer, and the tempeft fwells j
Till all the fiery mettle has its way,
And the thick thunder hurries o'er the plain.
When  all at once from indolence to toil
You fpring, the fibres by the hafty fhock
Are tir'd and crack'd, before their unctuous coats
Compreff'd, can pour the lubricating balm.
Befides, colleded in the paffive veins, 
88              THE ART  OF

The purple mafs a fudden torrent rolls;
O'erpowers die heart, and deluges the lungs ■
With dangerous-inundation : oft the fource
Of fatal woes ; a cough that foams with blood,
Afthrna, and feller Peripneumony,*
Or  the flow minings of the hedic fire.-

  Th' athletic Fool, to whom what heav'n deni'd
Of foul* is well compenfated in limbs,
Oft from his rage, or brainlefs frolic, feels
His vegetation and brute force decay.
The men of better clay and finer mould
Know nature, feel the human dignity.;
And fcorn to vie with oxen and with apes.
Purfued prolixly, even the gentleft toil
Is wafte of health : repofe by fmall fatigue
Is earn'd; and (where your habit is not prone
To thaw) by the firft moifture of the brows.
The fine and fnbtile fpirits coft too much
To be profuf'd, too much the rofcid balm-
But when the hard varieties of life
You -toil to learn ;  or try the dufty chafe,
Or the warm  deeds of fome important day ;
Hot from the field, indulge not yet your limbs
In .wifh'd repofe ;  nor court the fanning gale,
Nor tafte the  fpring.   O  ! by the facred tears
Of widows, orphans, mothers, fitters, fires,
Forbear !  No other pedilence has driven
Such Myriads o'er th' irremeable deep.
Why this fo fatal, the fagacious Mufe
* The inflammation of the lungs* 
         PRESERVING  HEALTH.       6S>

Thro' nature's cunning labyrinths could trace :
But there are fecrets which who knows not now,
Mud, ere he reach them, climb the heapy Alps
Of fcience ; and devote feven years to toil.
Befides, I would not dan your patient ears
With what it little boots you to attain.
He knows enough, the mariner, who knows
Where lurk the fnelves,and where the whirlpools boil -r
What figns portend the dorm : to fubtler minds
He leaves to lean, from what myfterious caufe
Chirybdis rages in th' Ionian wave ;
Whence thofe impetuous currents in the main
Which neither oar nor fail can dem ;  and why
The roughening deep expeds the dorm, as fure
As red Orion mounts the fhrouded heaven,

   In antient times, when  Rome with Athens vied
Fer polifh'd luxury and ufeful arts ;
All  hot and reeking from the Olympic drife,
And warm Paledra, in the tepid bath
Tli'  athletic  youth relax'd their weary limbs.
Soft oils bedew'd them, with the grateful pow'rs
Of Nard and Caffia fraught, to footh and heal
The cherilh'd nerves.   Our  lefs voluptuous clime
Not  much invites us to fuch arts as thefe.
'Tis not for thofe whom gelid fkies embrace,
And chilling fogs; whofe perfpiration feels
Such frequent bars from Eurus and the North ;
'Tis not for  thofe to cultivate a fkin
Too foft;  or teach the recremental fume
Too fad to crowd through fuch precarious ways*
For  thro' the fmall arterial  mouths, that pierce 
ro
THE ART  OF
 In endlefs millions the clofe woven fkin,
 The bafer fluids in a condant ftream
 Efcape, and viewlefs melt into the winds.
 While this eternal, this mod  copious wafte
 Of blood, degenerate into vapid brine,
 Maintains its wonted meafure, all the powers
 Of health befriend you, all the wheels of life
 With eafe and pleafure move  ; butthis reftrain'd
 Or more or lefs, fo more  or lefs you feel
 Thefundions labour : from  this fatal fource
 What woes defcend is never to be fung.
 To take their numbers were to count the fands
 That ride in whirlwind the parch'd Lybian air ;
 Or waves that, when the bluftering North embroils
 The Baltic,  thunder on the German fhore.
 Bubjed not  then by foft  emollient arts
This'grand expenfe, on which your fates depend,
 To every caprice of the fky ;  nor thwart
 The genius of your clime : for from the blood
Lead fickle rife the recremental dreams,
And lead obnoxious to the ftyptic air,
Which breathe thro' ftraiter and more callous pores.
 rl he  temper'd Scythian hence, half naked treads
 His boundlefb fnows, nor rues th' inclement heaven ;
 And hence our painted anceftors defied
 The Eaft ; nor curf'd, like us, their fickle fky.

  The body, moulded by the clime, endures
 Th'  Equator heats or Hyperborean froft :
 Except by habits foreign to its turn,
 Unwife you counteract its forming pow'r.
 Rude at the firft, the winter (hocks you lefs- 
PRESERVING HEALTH.
•71
<By long acquaintance :  ftudy then your fky,
 Form to its manners your obfequious frame,     ,
 And learn to fuffer what you cannot fhun.
 Againft the rigours of a damp cold heav'n
 To fortify their bodies, fome frequent
 The gelid ciflern ; and, where nought forbids,
 I praife their dauntiefs heart: a frame fo fteel'd
 Dreads-not the comgh, not thofe ungenial blafts
 That breathe the tertian or fell rheumatifm :
 The  nerves fo temper 'd, never quit their tone,
 No chronic languors hauat fuch hardy breads.
 But all things have their bounds,: and he who makes..
 By daily ufe, the kinded regimen
 Effential to his,health, fliould never mix
 With human kind,  nor art nor. trade  purfue.
 He not the fafe viciflitudes of life
 Without fome fhock endures ; ill-fitted he
 To want the known, or bear unufual things.
 Befides, the powerful remedies  of pain
;(Since pain in fpiteof all our care will come)
 Should never with your  profperous days of health
 Grow too familiar : for  by frequent ufe
 The ftrongefl medicines  lofe their healing power,
 And  even the fureft poifons theirs to kill.

   Let thofe who from the frozen Ardos reach
Parch'd Mauritania, or the fultry Weft,
Or the wide -flood through rich Indoftan roll'd,
Plunge thrice a day, and in the tepid wave
Untwift their ftubborn pores ; that full and free
Th' evaporation through the foften'd fkin
May bear proportion to the fuelling blood. 
72
THE ART  OF
 So fhall they Tcape the fever's rapid flames;
 So feel untainted the hot breath of hell.
 With us, the man of no complaint demands
 The warm ablution juft enough to clear
 The fluices of the fkin, enough to keep
 The body facred from indecent foil.
Still to be pure, even did it not conduce
 (As much it does) to health, were greatly worth
 Your daily pains.   'Tis this adorns the rich ;
The want of this is Poverty's worft woe ;
With this external virtue, age maintains
A decent grace ; without it youth and charms
Are loathfome.  This the venal Graces know;
 So doubtlefs do your wives :  for married fires,
 As well as lovers, ftill pretend to tafte ;
Nor is it lefs (all prudent wives can tell)
To lofe a hufband's than a lover's heart.

   But now the hours and feafons when to toil
From foreign themes recal my wandering fong.
Some labour fading, or but {lightly fed,
To lull the grinding ftomach's hungry rage.
Where nature feeds too corpulent a frame
 'Tis wifely done ;  for while the thirfty veins,
Impatient of lean penury, devour
The treafur'd oil, then is the  happieft time
To fhake the lazy balfam from its cells.
Now while the ftomach from the full repaft
 Subndes, but ere returning hunger gnaws,
Ye leaner habits, give an hour to toil :•
 And ye, whom no luxuriancy of growth
 Oppreffes  yet, or threatens to opprefs. 
          PRESERVING HEALTH.        73

 But from the recent meal no labours pleafe,
 Of limbs or mind.  For now the cordial powers
 Claim all the wandering fpirits to a work
 Of ftrong and fubtile toil, and great event:
 A work of time :  and you may rue the day
 You hurried, with untimely exercife,
 And half-concoded chyle into the blood.
 The body overcharg'd with unduous phlegm
 Much toil demands : the lean elaftic lefs.
 While winter chills the blood, and binds the veins,
 No  labours are too hard : by thofe you 'fcape
 The flow difeafes of the torpid year ;
 Endlefs to name ; to one of which alone,
 To  that which tears the nerves, the toil of flaves
 Is pleafare : Oh ! from fuch inhuman pains
 May ali be free who merit not the wheel!
 But from the burning Lion when the fun
 Pours  down his fultry wrath ; now while the blood
 Too much already maddens in the veins,
 And all the finer fluids through the fkin
 Explore their flight;  me, near the cool cafcade
 Reclin'd, or faunt'ring in the leafy grove,
 No needlefs, flight occafion fhould engage
 To pant and fweat beneath the fiery noon.
 Now the frefh morn alone and mellow eve
 To fhady walks and adive rural fports
 Invite.    But, while the chilling dews defccnd,
 May nothing tempt you to the cold embrace
Of humid fkies ; though 'tis no vulgar joy
To trace the horrors of the folemn wood
While the foft evening faddens into night:
               G 
H             THE ART OF
Though the fweet Poet of the vernal groves
Melts all the night in drains of am'rous woe.

   The fhades defcend, and midnight o'er the worll
Expands her fable wings.  Great Nature droops
Through all her woi ks.  :How happy he whofe toil
Has o'er his languid, powerlefs limbs diffuf 'd
A pleafing laflitude:  he not in vain
Invokes the gentle Deity of dreams.
His powers the moft voluptuoufly diffolve
In foft repofe : on him the balmy dews
Of Sleep with double nutriment defcend.
But would you fweetly w?fle the blank of night
In deep oblivion ;  or on Fancy's wings
Vifit theparadife of happy dreams,
And waken cheerful as the lively morn ;
Opprefs not Nature finking down to reft
With feafts too late, too folid, or too full:
But be the firft concodion half-matur'd
Ere you to mighty indolence refign
Your paflive faculties. He from the  toils
And troubles of the day to heavier toil
Retires, whom trembling from the tower that rocks
Amid the clouds, or Calpe'sbideous height,
The bufy demons hurl; or in the main
O'erwhelm ; or bury  ftruggling under ground*
Not all a monarch's luxury the woes
Can counterpoife of that moft wretched man,
Whofe nights are fhaken with the frantic fits
Of wild Oreftes ; whofe delirious brain,
Stung by the Furies,  works with poifon'd thought:
While pale and monftrous painting fhocks the foul; 
          PRESEP.VING HEALTH.        75

 And mangled confcioufnefs bemoans itfelf
 For ever torn ;  and chaos floating round.
 What dreams prefage, what dangers thefe or thofe
 Portend to fanity, though prudent feers
 Reveal'd of old, and men of deathlefs fame,
 We would not to the fuperftitious mind
 Suggeft new throbs, new vanities  of fear.
 'Tis ours to teach you from a peaceful night-
 To banifh omens and all reftiefs woes.

   In ftudy fome protrad the filent hours,
 Which  others confecrate to mirth and wine ;■
 And fleep till noon, and hardly live till night:
 But furely this  redeems not from the fhades
 One hour of life.  Nor does it nought avail
 What feafon you to drowfy Morpheus give
 Of th' ever varying circle of the day ;
 Or whether, through the tedious  winter gloom,
 You tempr the  midnight or the morning damps.
 1 he body, frefh and vigorous from repofe,
 Defies the early fogs :  but, by the toils
 Of wakeful  day, exhaufted and unflrung,
 Weakly refill the night's unwholefome breath:
 The grand difcharge, th' effufion of the fkin,
 Slowly  impair'd, the languid maladies
 Creep on, and through the fick'ning fundions fteal.
 So, when the chilling Eaft invades the fpring,
 The delicate- Narciffus pines away
 In hedic languor :  and a flow difeafe
Taints all the family of flowers, condemn'd
To cruel heav'ns.  But why, already prone
To fade, fhould beauty cherifh its own bane ? 
76              THE ART OF

O fhame ! O pity! nipt with pale quadrille,
And midnight cares, the bloom of Albion dies *

  By toll fubdu'd, the warrior and the hind
Sleep faft and deep: their adive  fundions foon
With generous ftream the fubtile  tubes fupply ;
And foon the tonic, irritable nerves
Feel the frefh impulfe, and awake the foul.
The fons of indolence, with long repofe,
Grow torpid : and with flowed Lethe drunk,
Feebly and ling'ringly return to life,
Blunt every fenfe, and pow'rlefs every limb.
\'c prone to fleep, (whom fleeping moft annoys):
On  the hard mattrefs or elaftic couch
Extend your limbs, and wean yourfelves from floth j
Nor grudge the lean projedor, or dry brain
And fpringy nerves, the blandifhm^r.ts of down :
Nor envy, while the buried bacchanal
Exhales his fuifeitin prolixer dreams.

  He, without riot, in the balmy  fsaft
Of life, the wants of nature has fuppli'd,
Who rifes cool, fereae, and full of lord.
But pliant nature more or lefs demands,
As  c i tt.m forms her ; and all fudden change
L  he hates of" habit, even from bad to good.
If faults  in life, or new emergencies,
From habits urge you by long time confirm'd,
Slow may the change arrive, and ftage by ftage ;
:*o / ak thefhadow o'er the dial moves,
t'lov *s the dealing progrefs of the year. 
          PRESERVING HEALTH.       #7

  Obferve the circling year.   How unperceiv'd
Her feafons change ! Behold ! by flow degrees,
Stern Winter tam'd into a ruder Spring ;
The ripen'd Spring a milder Summer glows ;
Departing Summer fheds Pomona's flore ;
And aged Autumn brews the winter-ftorm.
Slow as they come, thefe changes come not void:
Of mortal fhocks :  the cold and torrid reigns,
The two great periods of th' important year,
Are in their firft approaches feldom fafe :
Funereal Autumn all the fickly dread,
And the black fates deform the lovely Spring.
He well advif'd who taught our wifer fires
Early to borrow Mufcovy's warm fpoils,
Ere the firft froft has touch'd the tender blade ;
And late refign them,  though the wanton Spring
Should deck her charms with all her fifter's  rays.
For while the effluence of the fkin maintains
Its native meafure, the pleuritic  Spring
Glides harmlefs by ; and Autumn, fick to death
With fallow quartans, no contagion breathes.

   I in prophetic numbers could unfold
The omens of the year : what feafons teem
With what difeafes ; what the humid South
Prepares,  and  what the demon of the Eaft  :
But you perhaps refufe the tedious fong.
Befides, whatever plagues in heat, or cold,
Or drought, or moifture, dwell, they hurt not you
Skill'd to  corred the vices of the fky,
And taught already how to each extreme
To bend your life.  But fhould the public bane
                Q2 
78              THE ART  OF
Infect you ;  or fome trefpafc of your cv,:;,
Or flaw of nature, hint mortality :
Soon as a not unpleafing horror glides
Along the fpine, thro' all your torpid limbs;
When firil the head throbs, or the ftomach fools
A fickly load, a weary pain the loins ;
Be Celfus call'd ; the Fates come rufhing on ;
TheN rapid Fates admit of no delay.
While wilful you, and fatally fecure,
Exped to-mcrrow's more aufpicious fun,
The growing peft, whofe infancy was weak
And eafy vanquifh'd, with triumphant fway
O'erpow'rs your life.  For want of timely care,
Millions have died of medicable wounds.

   Ah !  in what perils is vain life engag'd !
What flight negleds, what trivial faults deftroy
The hardieft frame 1 of indolence, of toil,
We die ; of want, of fuperfluity :
The all-furreunding heaven, the vital air,
Is big with death.  And tho' the  putrid South
Be fhut; tho' no convulfive agony
Shake, from the deep foundations  of the world,
Th' imprifon'd plagues ; a fecret venom oft
 Corrupts the air, the water, and the land.
 What livid deaths has fad Byzantium fecn !
 Hew eft has Cairo, with a mother's woe,
 Wept o'er her flaughter'd fons and lonely ftreets !
 Even Albion, girt with lefs malignant fkies,
 Albion the poifon of the Gods has drunk,
 And felt the fting of monfters all her own. 
PRESERVING  HEALTH.
7^
  Ere yet the fell Plantagenets had fpent
Their ancient rage, at Bofworth's purple field ;
While, for which tyrant England fhould receive-,
Her legions in inceduous murder mix'd,
And daily horrors ;  till the Fates were drunk
With kindred blood by kindredhands profuf'd j.
Another plague of more gigantic arm
Arofe, a monder never known before,
Rear'd from Cocyt.us its portentous head.
This rapid Fury, not like other pefls
Purfu'd a gradual courier but in a day
Rufh'd as a dorm o'er half the aftonifh'd ifle,
And  llrew'dwith fudden carcafes the land.

  Fird through thefhoulders, or whatever part
Was  feiz'd the firft, a fervid vapour fprung.
With rafh combuftion, thence the quivering fpark
Shot  to the heart, and kindled all within ;
And foon the furface caught the fpreading fires.
Thro' all the yielding pores, the melted blood
Gufh'd out in fmoky fvveats ;  bat nought affuag'd
The torrid heat within, nor aught reliev'd
The ftomach's anguifh.  With inceffant toil,
Defperate of eafc, impatient of their pain,
They toff'd from fide to fide.   In vain the dream
Ran full  and clear, they burnt andthirfted ftill.
The redlefs arteries with rapid blood
Beat drong and frequent.  Thick and pantingly
The breath was fetch'd, and with huge ub'ringheav'd.
At lad a  heavy pain opprefT'd the head,
A wild delirium came ; their weeping friends
Were drangers now, and this no home of theirs. 
,80             THE  ART' OF

 Harraff'd with toil on toil, the finking powers
 Lay proftrate and o'erthrown ; a ponderous fleep -
 Wrapt all the fenfes up : they flept and died.

   In fome a gentle horror crept at firft
 O'er all the limbs; the fluices of the fkin
 Withheld their moifture, till, by art provoked,
 The fweats o'erflow'd ; but in a clammy tide :
 Now free and copious, now reftrain'd and flow ;
 Of tindures various, as the temperature
 Had mix'd the blood ; and rank with fetid fleams : ■
 As if the pent-up humours, by delay
 Were grown more fell, more putrid, and malign.
 Here lay their hopes (tho' little hope remain'd)
 With full effufion of perpetual fweats
 To drive the venom out.  And here the fates
 Were kind, that long they linger'd not in pain-
 For, who furviv'd the fun's diurnal race,
 Rofe from the dreary gates of hell redeem'd :
 Some the fixth hour oppreff'd, and fome the third.;

   Of many thoufands few untainted 'fcap'd;:
 Of thofe infeded fewer 'fcap'd alive :
 Of thofe who liv'd, fome felt a fecond blow ;
 And whom the fecond fpar'd a third deftroy'd.
 Frantic with  fear, they fought by flight to fhun
 The fierce contagion.  O'er the mournful land
 Th' infeded city pour'd her hurrying fwarms :
 Rouf'd by the flames that fir'd her feats around, -
 Th' infeded country rufh'd into the town.
 Some fad at home, and in the defert fome,
 Abjur'd the fatal commerce of mankind : 
         PRESERVING  HEALTH.        &J

in vain: where'er they fled,  the Fates purfu'd.
Others, with hopes more fpecious, croff'd the main>
To feek protedion in far diftant fkies ;
But none they found.   It feem'd the general air,
From pole to  pole, from Atlas to the Eaft,
Was then at enmity with Englifli blood.
For, but therace of England,all werefafe
In foreign climes ;  nor did this fury tafte
The foreign blood which England then contained.
Where fhould.they fly ?^ The circumambient heaven
Involv'd them ftill; and every breeze was bane.
Where find relief ?  The falutary art
Was mute ; and ftartled at the new difeafe,
In fearful whifpers hopelefs  omens gave.
To heaven with fuppliant rites they fent their pray'rs j.
Heaven heard them not.  Of every hope depriv'd j
Fatigu'd with vain refources;. and fubdued
With woes refiftlefs and enfeebling fear ;
Paffive they funk beneath the weighty blow.
Nothing but lamentable founds was heard,
Nor aught was feen but ghaflly views  of death.
Infedious horror ran from face to face,
An.I pale defpair.  'Twas all the bufinefs then.
To tend die fick, and in their turns to die.
In heaps they fell ; and oft  one bed,  they fay,
The fick'ning, dying, and the dead contain'd.

   Ye guardian Gods, on whom the Fates depend
Of tottering Albion !  ye eternal fires
That lead thro' heav'n the wand'ring year ! ye powers
That o'er th' encircling elements prefide !
May nothing worie than what this age has feen. 
02          THE  ART OF, &c.

Arrive !  Enough abroad, enough at home
Has Albion bled.  Here a diftemper'd heaven
Has thinn'd hercities ; from thofe lofty cliffs
That awe proud Gaul, to Thule's wintry reign ;
While in the Weft, beyond th' Atlantic foam,
Her braveft fons, keen for the fight, have di'd
The death of cowards and of common men ;
Sunk void of wounds, and fall'n without renown-

  But from thefe views the weeping  Mufes turn,
And other themes invite my wandering, fong,. 
      FOURTH BOOK





          OF THE





JIRT OF PRESERVING HEALTH
THE PASSIONS, 
 
THE
          ART

            OF

PRESERVING HEALTH, '
                  BOOK IV.

              THE PASSIONS.

  THE choice of Aliment, the choice of Air,
The ufe of Toil, and all external things,
Already fung ;  it now remains to trace
What good, what evil from ourfelves proceeds:
And how the fubtile Principle within
Infpires with health, or mines with fti ange decay
The paffive body.  Ye poetic Shades,
That know thefecrets of the world unfeen;
Affift my fong ! For, in a doubtful theme
Engag'd, I wander thro' myfterious ways.

  There is, they fay, (and T believe there is)
A fpark within us of th' immortal firo,
That animates and meulds the groffer frame;
And, when the body finks, efcapes to heaven,
               H 
86             THE ART  OF

Its native feat, and mixes with the Gods.
Meanwhile this heavenly particle pervades
The mortal elements:  inevery nerve
It thrills with pleafure, or grows mad with pain.
And, in its fecret conclave, as it feels
The body's woes and joys, this ruling power
Wields at its will the dull material world,
And is the Jbody's health.©r malady.

   By its own toil the grofs, corporeal frame
Fatigues, extenuates, or deflroys itfelf,
Nor lefs the labours of the mind corrode
The folid fabric : for by fubtile parts
Andviewlefs atoms, fecret  Nature moves
The mighty wheels of this ftupendous world.
By fubtile fluids pmir'dthro' fubtile tnbes
The natural,  vital fundions are perform'd.
By thefe the flubborn aliments are  tam'd ;
The toiling heart didributcs life and. ftrength ;
Thefe the dill-crumbling frame rebuild ; and thefe
,Are lod in thinking, and diffolve in air.

  But'tis-not thought (for dill the foul's employ'd)
'Tis painful thinking that corrodes.our clay.
All day the vacant eye  withqut fatigue
Strays o'er the heaven and earth ;  but long intent
On microfccpic arts its vigour fails.
Jud fo the mind, with various thought amuf'd,
Nor aches itfelf, nor gives the body pain.
But anxious Study, Difcontent, and Care,
.Love without hope, and Hate without revenge,
And Fear, and Jealousy, fatigue the foul, 
          PRESERVING HEALTH.        S7

 Engrofs the fubtile minifters of life,
 And fpoil the lab'ring fundions of their fhare.
 Hence the lean gloom that Melancholy wears ;
 The Lover's palenefs ; and the fallow hue
 Of Envy, Jealoufy ; the meagre flare
 Of fore Revenge : the canker'd body hence
 Betrays each fretful motion of the mind.

   The ftrong-built pedant; who both niglit and day
 Fteds on the coarfefl fare the fchools bodow,
 And crudely fattens at g.rofs Burman's [lall ;
 O'crv.helm'd with phlegm lies in a dropfy drown'd,
 Or finks in lethargy before his time.
 With ufeful ftudies you, and arts that pleafe,
 Employ your mind, amufe but not fatigue.
 Peace to each drowfy metapliyfic fage !
 And ever may all heavy fy items red!
 Yet fome there are, even of elaftic parts,
 Whom ftrong and obdinate ambition leads
 Thro''all the rugged roads of barren lore,
 And gives to relilh what their generous tade
 Would elfe refufe.  But may not third of fame,
 Nor love of knowledge, urge you to fatigue
 With condant drudgery the liberal foul.
 Toy with your books : and, as the  various fits
 Of humour feize you, from philcfophy
 To fable fhift; from ferious Antonine
 To Rabelais' ravings, and from profe to fong.

  While reading pleafes, but no longer,  read j
And read aloud refeunding Homer's flrain,
And wield the thunder of Demofthenes. 
88             THE ART OF

The cheft fo exercif'd improves its ftrength \
And quick vibrations thro' the bowels drive
The reftiefs blood, which in unadive days
Would loiter elfe thro' unelaftic tubes.
Deem iTnot trifling while I recommend
What pofture fuits:  to fland and fit by turns,
As nature prompts, is beft.   But o'er your leaves
To lean forever, cramps the vital parts,
Aid robs the fine machinery of its play.

  'Tis the great art of life to manage well
The redlefs mind.   Forever on  purfuit
Of knowledge bent, it darves the groffer powers a
Quite unemploy'd, againft its own repofe
It turns its fatal edge, and fharper pangs
Than what the body knows embitter life.
Chiefly where Solitude, fad nuife of Care,
To  fickly mufing gives the penfive mind,
There Madnefs enters ; and the dim-ey'd fiend,
Sour Melancholy, night and day provokes
Ker own eternal weund.   The fun grows pale ;
A mournful viiionary light o'orfpreads
The cheerful face  of nature : earth becomes
A dreary defert, and heaven frowns above.
Then various fhapes of cuif'd iilufion rife :
Whate'er th-- wretched fears, creating fear,
Forms out cf nothing ; and with monfters teems
Unknown in hell.   The proftrate foul beneath
 A  load of huge imagination heaves ;
 And all the horrors that the murderer feels
 V,  ith aaxious flutterings wake the guiltlcfs breaft. 
          PRESERVING HEALTH.        SU

   Suck phantoms Pride in folitary fcenes,
 Or Fear, on delicate Self-love creates.
 From other cares abfolv'd, the bufy mind
 Finds in yourfelf a theme to pore upon ;
 It finds you miferable, or makes you fo.
 For while yourfelf you anxioufly explore,
 Timorous Self-love, with fick'ning Fancy's aid,
 Prefents the danger that you dread the mod,
 And ever galls you in your tender part.
 Hence fome for love, and fome for jealoufy,
 For grim religion fome, and fome for pride,
 Have lod their reafon : fome for fear of want
 Want all their lives; and others every day
 For fear of dying differ worfethan death.
 Ah ! from your bofoms banifh, if you can,
 Thofe fatal gucfts  : and fird, the demon Fear,
 That trembles at impoffible events ;
 Left aged Atlas fhould refign his load,
 And heaven's eternal battlements rulh down.
 Is there an evil worfe tkan Fear itfelf ?
 And what avails it that indulgent Heaven
 From mortal eyes  has wrapt the woes to come,.
 If we, ingenious to torment oui fdves,
 Grow pale at hideous fictions  of our own i
 Enjoy the prefent ; nor with needlefs cares,
 Of what may fpring from blind Misfortune's  womb,
 Appal the fured hour that life beftows.
 Serene,  and mafter of yourfelf, prepare
 For what may come; and leave the red to Heaven.

  Oft from the body, by long ails mif-tun'd,
Thefe evils fprung ; the m oft important health.
              11 2 
90             THE ART OF
That of the mind, deftroy :  and when the mind
They fird invade, the confcious body foon
In fympathetic languifliment declifies.
Thefe chronic paffions, while from real woes
They rife, and yet without, the body's fault
Infeft the foul, admit one only care }
Diverfion, hurry, and a refllefs life.
Vain are the confolations of the wife ;
In vain your friends would reafon down your pain.
O ye, whofe fouls relentlefs love has tam'd
Tofoft diftrefs, or friends untimely fall'n !
Court not the luxury of tender thought;
Nor deem it impious to forget thofe pains
That hurt the living,  nought avail the dead.
Go, foft enthufiad ! quit the cyprefs groves,
Nor to the rivulet's lonely meanings tune
Your fad complaint.   Go, feek the cheetful haunts
 Of men, and mingle with the builling crowd ;
 Lay fchemes for wealth, or power, or fame, the wifh
 Of nobler minds, and pufh them night and day.
 Or join the caravan in queft of fcenes
 New to your eyes, and fhifting every hour,
 Leyond the Alps, beyond the Appenines.
 Or, more advent'rous, rufh into the field
 Where war grows hot; and, raging thro' the fky,
 The lofty trumpet fwclls the madd'ning food :
 And in the hardy camp and toilfome march
 Forget all fofter and lefs manly cares.

    But moft too paflive, when the blood runs low,
  Too weakly indolent to drive with pain,
   *ind bravely by redding conquer fate, 
         PRESERVING HEALTH.        91

Try Circe's arts; and in the tempting bowl
Of poifon'd nedar fweet oblivion fwill.
Struck by the pow'rful charm, the gloom diffolves
In empty air: Elyfium opens round,-
A pleafing phrenzy buoys the  lighten'd foul,
And fanguine hopes difpel your fleeting care j;
And what was difficult, and what was dire,
Yields to your prowefs and fuperior ftars :
The happieft you of all that e'er were mad,
Or are, or fhall be, could this folly laft.
But foon your heaven is gone ; a heavier gloom
Shuts o'er your head : and as the thund'ring ftream*
Swoln o'er its banks  with fudden mountain rain,
Sinks from its tumult to a filent brook ;
So, when the frantic raptures in your breaft
Subfide, you languifh into mortal man ;
You  fleep, and waking find yourfelf undone.
For prodigal of life, in one rafh night
You lavifh'd more than might fupport three days.
A heavy morning comes ;  your cares return
With tenfold rage.  An anxious ftomach well
May  be end"r'd ; fo may the  throbbing head :
But fuch a dim delirium, fuch a dream,
Involves you ; fuch a daftardly defpair
Unmans your foul, as madd'ning Pentheus felt,
When, baited round Cithasron's cruel fides
He faw two funs, and double  Thebes afcend.
You  curfe the fluggifh Port ; you curfe the wretch,
The felon, with unnatural mixture firft
Who dar'd  to violate the virgin wine.
Or on the fugitive Champain you pour
A thoufand curfe s j  for to heav'n it wrapt 
92              THE ART OF
Your foul, to plunge you deeper In defpalr^
Perhaps you rue even that divinefl gift,
The gay, ferene, good-natur'd Burgundy,
Or thefrefh, fragrant vintage of the Rhine :
And wifh that Heaven from mortals had withheld1
The grape, and all intoxicating bowls.

  Befides, it wounds you fore to recoiled
What follies in your loofe unguarded hour
Efcap'd.   For one irrecoverable word,
Perhaps that meant no harm, you lofe a friend.
Or in the rage of wine your hafty hand
Perform'd a deed to haunt you to  the grave.
Add that your means, your health, your parts decay ^
Your friends avoid you ; brutifhly traniTorm'd
They hardly know you ; or if one remains
To wifh you well, he  wifhes you ia heaven.
Defpif'd, unwept you fall ;  who might have left
A facred, cherifli'd, fadly-pleafing name ;
A name ftill to be utter'd with a figh.
Yourlaft ungraceful fcene has quite effae'd'
All fenfe and memory of your former worth.

   How to live happieft ;  How avoid the palas,.
The difappointments, and difgufts of thofe
Who would in pleafure all their hours employ ;,
The precepts here of a divine old man
I could recite.  Tho' old, he ftill ietain'd
His manly fenfe, and energy of mind.
Virtuous and wife  he was, but not fevere ;
He ftill remember'd  that he once was young j
His eafy prefence check'd no decent joy. 
PRESERVING  HEALTH.       9$
Him even the diffolute admir'd ; for he
A graceful loofenefs when he pleaf'd put on,
And laughing could inftrud.   Much had he read*
Much more had feen ; he ftudied from the life.
And in th' original peruf'd mankind.

   Verf d in the woes and vanities of life,
He pitied man :  and much he pitied thofe
Whom falfely-fmiling Fate has curf'd with means
To diffipate their days in queft of joy.
Our aim is happinefs ;  'tis yours, 'tis mine.
He faid, 'tis the  purfuitof all that live j
Yet few attain it, if 'twas e'er attain'd.
But they the wideft wander fr®m the mark,
Who thro' the flowery paths of faunt'ring joy
Seek  this coy goddefs ; that from ftage to ftage
Invites us ftill, bu t ftiifts as we purfue.
For, not to name the pains that pleafure brings
To counterpoife  itfelf, relentlefs rate
Forbids that we  thro' gay voluptuous wilds
Should ever roam ; ana were the fates more kind;
Our narrow luxuries would foon grow  ftale.
Were thefe exhauftlefs, Nature would grow C\ck,
An3, clov 'd with pleafure, fqueamiftily complain
That all was vanity, and life a dream.
Let nature red ;  be bufy for yourfelf,
And for your friend ; be bufy ev'n in vain
Rather than teize her fated appetites.
Who never fads,  no banquet e'er enjoys,
Who never toils or watches, never fleeps.
Let nature red ;  and when the tade of joy
Grows keen, indulge; but fhun fatiety. 
S*             THE  ART OF

   'Tis not for mortals always to be bleft.
But him theleaft the dull-or painful hours
Of life ©ppreffes, whom  fober fenfe conduds,
And virtue, thro' this labyrinth we treadi
Virtue and fenfe. I mean not to difjoin ;
Virtue and fenfe are one : and, truft  me, ftill
A faithlefs heart betrays the head unfound.
Virtue (for mere good-nature is a fool)
Is fenfe  and fpirit, with humanity :
'Tis fometimes angry, and its frown confounds ;
'Tis ev'n vindidive, but in vengeance juft.
Knaves fain would laugh at it; fome great ones dare 5,
But at his heart the moft  undaunted fon
Of fortune  dreads its name and awful charms.
To nobler- ufes this determines wealth ;
This is the folid pomp of profp'rous days ;
The peace and fhelter of adverfity.
And if you pant for glory, build your fame
On this foundation, which the fecret fh©ck
Defies of envy and all-fapping time.
The gaudy glofs of Fortune only ftrikes
The vulgar eye : the fuffiage of the wife,
The praife that's worth ambition, is attain'd<
By fenfe alone, and dignity of mind.

   Virtue, the ftrength and beauty of the foul,
Is the beft gift of heaven : a happinefs
That even above the fmiles and frowns of fate
Exalts great Nature's favourites :  a wealth
That ne'er  encumbers, nor can be transferr'd.
Riches are  oft by guilt and  bafenefs earn'd ;
Or dealt by chance, to fhield a lucky knave, 
          PRESERVING HEALTH.        9$

Or throw a cruel funfhine on a fool.
 But for one end, one much-negleded ufe,
 Are riches worth your care: (for nature's wants
 Are few, and without opulence fuppli'd.)
 This noble end is, to produce the foul;
 To fhew the virtues in their faired light;
 To make humanity the minifter
: Of bounteous  Providence; and teach the bread
 That generous luxury the gods enjoy.

   Thus, in his graver vein, the friendly fage
 Sometimes deciaim'd.  Of right and wrong he taught
 Truths as refin'd as ever Athens heard ;
 And (drange to tell!) he pradif 'd what he preacli'd.
 Skili'd in the paffions, how to check their fway
 He knew, as far asTeafon can control
 The lawlefs powers.   But other cares are mine :
 Form'd in the fchool of Pseon, I relate
 What paffions hurt the body, what improve :
 Avoid them, or invite them, as you may.

   Know then, whatever cheerful anil ferene
"Supports the mind, fupports the body too.
Hence, the mod vital  movement mortals feel
Is hope :  the balm and life-blood of the foul.
It pleafes, and it lads.  Indulgent Heaven
Sent down the kind delufton, thro' the paths
■Of rugged life to lead us patient on ;
And'make our happied date no tedious thinj*.
Our greated good, and what we lead can fpare,
3s hope ;  the laft of all our evils, fear. 
m             THE ART  OF
  But there are paffions grateful to the breaft,
And yet no friends to life :  perhaps they pleafe
Or to excefs, and diflipate the foul;
Or while they pleafe, torment. The ftubborn clown,
The ill-tam'd ruffian, and pale uferer,
(If love's omnipotence fuch hearts can mould)
May fafely mellow into love ; and grow
Refin'd, humane, and generous, if they can.
Love in fuch bofoms never to a fault
Or pains or pleafes.  But, ye finer fouls,
Form'd to foft luxury, and prompt  to thrill
With all the tumults, all the joys and pains,
That beauty gives;  with caution and referve
Indulge the fweet deftroyer of repofe,
Nor court too much the queen of charming cares.
For, while the cherifh'd poifon in your breaft
Ferments and maddens ; fick with jealoufy,
Abfence, diftruft, or even with anxious joy,
The wholefome appetites and powers of life
Diffolve in languor.  The coy ftomach loathos
The o-enial board :  your  cheerful days are gone ;
The generous bloom that nufh'd your cheeks is fled.
To fiehs devoted and to  tender pains,
Penfive you fit, or folitary  ftray,
And wafte your youth inmufing.   Mufing firft
Toy'd into care your unfufpeding heart :
It found a liking there, a fportful fire,
And that fomented int© ferious love ;
Which mufing daily ftrengtrens and improves
Thro' ail the heights of for.dnefs and romance :
And you're undone, the fatal fhaft has fped.,
If once you doubt whether you love or ro, 
PRESERVING HEALTH.        97
The body wades away ; th' infeded mind,
Diffolv'd in female tendernefs, forgets
Each ma*ly virtue, and grows dead to fame.
■Sweet Heaven, from fuch intoxicating charms
Defend all worthy breads ! Not that I deem
Love always dangerous, always to be fhunn'd.
Love well repaid, and not too weakly funk
In wanton and unmanly tendernefs,
Adds bloom to health ; o'er ev'ry virtue fheda.
A gay, humane, a fweet, and generous grace,
And brightens all the ornaments of man.
But fruitlefs, hopelefs, difappointed, rack'd
With jealoufy» fatigu'd with hope and fear,
Too ferious, or too languifhingly fond,
Unnerves the body and unmans the foul.
And fome have died for love ; and fome run mad ;
 And fome with defperate hands themfelves have flain.

   Some to extinguifli, others to prevent,
A mad devotion to one dangerous fair,
Court all they meet; in hopes to diflipatc
The cares of love amongd an hundred brides.
Th' event is doubtful:  for there are who find
A cure in this ; there are who find it not,
 'Tis no relief, alas ! it rather galls
The wound, to thofe who are fincerely fick.
 For while from feverifli and tumultuous joys
 The nerves grow languid, and the foul fubfides,
 The tender fancy fmarts with every ding,
 And what was love before is madnefs now.
 Is health your care, or luxury your aim,
 Be temperate ftill:  when Nature bids, obey $
                 I 
98              THE ART OF

Her wild impatient fallies bear no curb :
But when the prurient habit of delight,
Or  loofe imagination, fpurs you on
To  deeds above your ftrength, impute it not
To  nature , nature all compulfion hates.
Ah ! let nor luxury nor vain renown
Urge you to feats you well might fleep without;
To  make what fhould be rapture a fatigue,
A tedious tafk ; nor in the wanton arms
Of twining Lais melt your manhood down.
For from the colliquation of foft joys
How chang'd you rife! the ghoft of what you was !
Languid, and melancholy, and gaunt, and wan ;
Your veins exhaufted, and your nerves unftrung.
Spoil'd of its balm and fprightly zed, the blood
Grows vapid phlegm ; along the tender nerves
(To each flight impulfe tremblingly awake)
A fubtile fiend that mimics all the plagues,
■Rapid and.redlefs fprings from part to part.
The blooming honours of your youth are fallen;
Your vigour pines; your vital powers decay ;
Difeafes haunt you ; and untimely age
Creeps on ; unfocial, impotent, and lewd.
Infatuate, impious, epicure !  to wade
The flores of pleafure, cheerfulnefs, and health I
Infatuate all who make delight their trade,
And coy perdition every hour purfue.

  Who pines with love, or in lafcivious flames
Confumes, is with his own content undone ;
He choofes to be wretched, to be mad ;
Ajad warn'd proceeds* and wilful to his fate. 
          PRESERVING  HEALTH.       99

But there's a paffion, whofe ternpeftuousfway
Tears up each virtue planted in the bread,
And fhakes to ruins proud philofophy.
For pale and trembling Anger ruihes in.
With falt'ring fpeech, and eyes that wildly dare j
Fierce as the tiger, madder than-the feas,
Defperate, and arm'd w ith moFe than mortal drength.
How foon the calm, humane, and polifti'd man
Forgets compundion, and darts up a fiend !
Who pines in love, or wades with filent cares,
Envy, or, ignominy, or tender grief,
Slowly defcends, and ling'ring, to the fhadesi
But he whom  anger dings, drops, if he dies,
At once, and rufhes apopledic down ;
Or a fierce fever hurries him to hell.
For, as the body thro' unnumber'd flringi
Reverberates each vibration of the foul ;
As is the  paffion, fuch is dill the pain
The body feels ; or chronic, or acute.
And oft a fudden dorm at once o'erpowero
The life, or gives your reafon to the winds.
Such fates attend the rafh alarm of fear,
And fudden grief, and rage, and joy.

   There are, meantime, to whom the boid'rous fit
Is health, and only fills the fails of life.
For where the mind a tcrpid winter leads,
Wrapt in a body corpulent and cold:
And each clogg'd fundion lazily moves  on ;
A generous fally fpurns th' incumbent load,
Unlocks the bread, and gives a cordial glow.
But if you: wrathful blood is apt to boil, 
100             THE ART OF
Or are ycur nerves too mitably fining,
Wave all difpute ; be cautious, if you joke ;
Keep Lent forever, and forfwear the bowl.
For one rafli moment fends you to the fhades,
Or fhatters ev'ry hopeful fcheme  of life.
And gives to horror all your days to come.
Fate,  arm'd with thunder, fire, and ev'ry plague,
That ruins, tortures, or diftrads mankind,
And makes the happy wretched in an hour,
O'envhelms you not with woes fo horrible
As your own wrath, nor gives more fudden blows.

  While choler works, good friend,you maybewrong;
Diftrud yourfelf, and fleep before  you fight.
'Tis not too late to-morrow to be brave ;
If honour bids, to-morrow kill or die.
But calm advice againft a raging  fit
Avails too little ; and it braves the power
Of all that ever taught in profe or fong,
To tame the Jnendjth-rf fleeps a gentle lamb,
And wakes a lion.  Unprovok'd and calm,
You reafon well; fee as you ought to fee,
And wonder at the maanefs of man&ind :
Seiz'd with the common rage, you foon forget
The fpeculations of your wifer hours.
Befct with furies of all deadly fhapes,
.Tierce and infidious, violent and  flow :
With all that urge or  lure us  on to fate :
What refuge fhall we feek ? what arms prepare, ?
Where reafon proves too weak, or void of wiles
To cope with fubtle or impetuous powers,
;I would invoke new paffions to your aid  : 
          PRESERVING HEALTH.       101

With indignation wotild extinguilk fear,
With fear or generous pity vanquifh rage,
And love with pride ; and force to force oppofe.'

   There is a charm, a power, that fways the breaft ;
Bids every paffion revel or be ftill j
Infpires with rage, or all your cares diffolves ;
Can footh diftradion, and almod defpair.
That power is mafic : far beyond the ftretch
Of thofe unmeaning warblers on our ftage ;
Thofe clumfy heroes, thofe fat-headed gods,
Who move no paffion juftly but contempt:
Who, like our dancers (light indeed and ftrong !)
Do wond'rous feats, but never heard of grace.
The fault is ours ; we bear thofe monftrous arts ;
Good heaven! we praife them: we,withloudeft peals*
Applaud the fool that higheft lifts his heels;
And, with infipid faew of rapture, die
Of idiot notes impertinently lon£.
But he the Mufe's laurel juftly (hares,
A poet he, and touch'd with Heaven's own fire ;
Who, with bold rage or folemn pomp of fouads,
Inflames, exalts, and ravifhes the foul;
Now tender, plaintive, fweet almod to pain,
In love diffolves you ; now in fprightly drains
Breathes a gay rapture thro' your thrilling bread ;
Or melts the heart with airs divinely fad ;
Or wakes to horror the tremendous drings.
Such  was the bard,  whofe heavenly  drains of old
Appeaf'd the fiend of melancholy Saul.
Such was, if old and heathen fame fay true,
Tho man who bade the Thebar. domos afcend, 
   102         THE  ART OF, &c.

   And tam'd the favage nations with his fong ;
   And fuch the Thracian, whofe melodious lyre,
   Tun'd to foft woe, made all the mountains weep j
^'•r'Seipth'd e'en th' inexorable powers of hell,
   Asd half redeem'd his lod Eurydice.
   Mufic exalts each joy,  allays each grief,
   Expels difeafes, foftens every pain,
   Subdues the rage of poifon, and the plague ;
   And hence the wife of ancient days ador'd
  •One  power of phyfic, melody, and fong.
• 
© 
 
X
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