CHAP. V.

Of Health.

Health is a Blessing so necessary to our Well-being in this World, that without it we cannot enjoy any thing else, no not our own selves: And therefore the common salutation among us at every meeting of Neighbour or Friends is this, How do you? that is, are you in Health or no? And the Answer Well, or Ill; that is, in health or not: As if Health were the chief or only good thing worth the enquiring after, in the presence or enjoyment whereof we could not be miserable whatever else we wanted: Nor in the absence, happy or well, whatever besides we possessed. Indeed there is no taste or relish, no comfort 17or delight in any worldly good, where health is wanting; and therefore it is by all Men highly valued and purchased at the dearest rate, as Bishop Wilkins well observes.

Health is such a just temper and constitution of all the parts of the Body, both solid and fluid, as may inable the several Members and Faculties duly to perform their natural Functions, from whence proceeds not only an indolency or freedom from Pain and Sickness, but also vigor and activity, alacrity and light heartedness, a pleasant and delicious sympathy in the Soul. To this head I refer freedom from Bodily Pain, the extremity whereof is altogether inconsistent with Happiness: St. Augustine confesses, That he was compelled to consent to Cornelius Celsus, who affirmed Bodily Pain to be the greatest Evil. Neither (saith he) did his Reason seem to me absurd, viz. That Man being compounded of two parts, Soul and Body, of which the first is the better, the latter the worser; the greatest good must be the best thing belonging to the better part; that is, Wisdom: And the greatest Evil the worst thing belonging to the worser part; that is, Pain. Whether this Reason be solid and conclusive, 18let others judge; but I fully agree with him in the Assertion, That of all Evils we are sensible of in this World, Bodily Pain is the sorest; It drowning, as I may so say, and taking away the sense of all other Evils, and wholly possessing the Soul. It is such an afflictive and tormenting Passion, such a Vultur or Tyger, tearing and gnawing upon the Soul, so abhorrent to Humane Nature, that an excessive degree of it must needs make a Man miserable and unhappy; unless we can reconcile and unite extremes, the greatest Evil that Man is capable of suffering, with the greatest good he can enjoy. Hence the Torments of Hell are every where in Scripture set forth by consuming Fire, unquenchable Fire, everlasting Burnings; and Hell it self called a Lake of Fire, a Lake which burns with Fire and Brimstone; because Fire produceth the greatest Bodily Pain; than which nothing is more terrible to Humane Nature, and more likely to affright Men from Sin. On the contrary, St. John in his Revelation considering the absolute inconsistency of Pain and Happiness, tells us, That in the New Jerusalem there shall be no sorrow, nor any more Pain.

There is indeed a degree of Bodily Pain, which may be said to be κατ᾽ ἄνθρωπον, not exceeding the measure of Man’s Patience; and there is a degree which we are not able to bear, which takes up the whole Mind, not suffering it to divert its thoughts one Minute to any other Object.

Away then with the foolish vaunts of the proud Stoicks, who boast that their Wise Man is happy in Phalaris his Bull; whom ²²   Epist. 52.St. Augustine thus smartly and ingeniously checks and confutes, If Life may be happy in extreme bodily torment, why do they advise a man afflicted with the most grievous pains to depart out of it? Why does not their Wiseman rather continue in it, that he may enjoy the happiness of it? Is a happy life to be forsaken and fled from? But if such a Life be really miserable, what else but pride hinders them from confessing it to be so.

You will say, Did not the holy Martyrs endure the greatest Bodily Torments with invincible patience, yea some of them with joy and exultation.

I answer, ’Tis true indeed they did so; but then I suppose, that as their Temptations 20and Sufferings were extraordinary, so they were extraordinarily supported under them; and that God (as the Apostle saith) did not suffer them to be tempted above what he enabled them to bear. It seems to me most likely, that he did quite take away, or very much mitigate the sense of pain; possibly by obstructing those Nerves which convey that motion to the Brain, which excites such a sense, or how else it seemed best to his Divine Wisdom.

I proceed now to prove, that this. Blessing is the portion of those who lead a godly Life, who keep God’s Commandments, and abide in his Love: And that, 1. From the Promises of God: 2. From the natural consequence of several Virtues commanded by him. Such are, 1. Temperance and Sobriety, 2. Labor and Industry. 3. A due government and moderation of our Passions.

1. Health and Long Life, (I put them together, the one for the most part being the consequent of the other) are in Scripture promised as rewards to the obedience of the Commandments of God. Exod. 23. 25. Thou shalt serve the Lord thy God—And I will take away Sickness from the 21 midst of thee. Deut. 7. 15. And the Lord will take away from thee all Sickness, and will put none of the evil Diseases of Egypt (which thou knowest) upon thee. Prov. 3. 7, 8. Fear the Lord and depart from evil: It shall be health to thy Navel, and Marrow to thy Bones. Prov. 3. 16. It is said of Wisdom, That length of days are in her right hand. Psal. 34. 12. What man is he that desireth life, and loveth many days, that he may see good? Keep thy tongue from evil, and thy lips that thou speak no guile. Depart from evil, and do good, &c. repeated 1 Pet. 3. 10. On the other side Sickness and grievous Diseases and premature Death are often threatned as Punishments of Sin and Disobedience: Deut. 28. 60, 61. If thou wilt not observe to do all the words of this Law, &c. He will bring upon thee all the evil Diseases of Egypt, &c. also every Sickness, and every Plague which is not written in this Law. Prov. 2. 22. The wicked shall be cut off from the earth, and the transgressors shall be rooted out of it. Prov. 11. 19. As righteousness tendeth to life, so he that pursueth evil, pursueth it to his own Death.

2. Health and Long Life are the natural consequents of some Virtues commanded by God: As,

1. Temperance and Sobriety in the use of Meats and Drinks: That this is a most effectual means to preserve Health, I appeal to the general consent of Physicians, who are the most competent Judges in this Cafe, all unanimously prescribing a moderate Diet, not only as a principal means to continue Health, but also to cure many Diseases, Hence Hippocrates saith, 6 Epid. Sect. 4. Aph. 10. Ἄσκησις ὑγιὴς ἀκορεσίη τροφῆς, ἀοκνίη πόνων: The exercise of preferring health is, not to eat to satiety, not to be slothful in labor.

That a very spare and ascetick Diet conduces much to Health and long Life, may be confirmed by many eminent Examples: St. Paul, the first Hermite (as St. Jerome in his Life reports) arrived to the Age of 115 Years, an hundred whereof he spent in the Wilderness, sustaining himself daily the first forty with a few Dates, and a draught of Water; and when Dates failed, with half a Loaf of Bread, which a Raven brought him. St. Anthony (as Athanasius witnesseth) lived 105 Years, of which he spent 90 in the Desert, supporting his Body with Bread and Water only, to which in his extreme old Age he added a few Sallet Herbs. Arsenius, the Emperor Arcadius his Tutor, 23lived 120 Years, fifty five whereof he spent in the Wilderness, in wonderful abstinence. Not long before our Times, Ludovicus Cornarus, a Venetian Nobleman, when he had lived unhealthfully to the 35th Year of his Age, being frequently afflicted with divers Diseases, at last by the advice of a certain Physician, he used a restrained Diet, whereby alone he gradually cured them all; by little and little diminishing the quantity of his Meat and Drink, till he descended to fourteen Ounces of Meat, reckoning Bread, Flesh, Eggs, and other Edibles, and sixteen Ounces of Drink daily; persevering in which Regimen, he produced his Life healthful, vigorous, and free from Diseases above 100 Years, as himself witnesseth in a Book he put forth, entituled, The benefits and advantages of a sober Life. Whence we may collect (saith Riverius) out of whose Institutions I borrow’d these Instances, That a spare Diet doth very much conduce, not only to the continuance of Health, but also to the curing of contumacious Diseases, and of long continuance. For though Natural Heat having suddenly concocted the small quantity of Food taken in, is afterwards employed about the superfluous Humours, digesting, dissipating, and by little and little 24expelling them through the several Emunctories of the Body, till at last the Body becomes pure and free from the Causes and Seeds of all Diseases.

Moreover, It is very remarkable, which the same Riverius adds, That if an exact Diet cannot quite take away some chronical and incurable Diseases, yet doth it much alleviate them, and render them more tolerable, so that the sick Persons may live a long time under them. So we see not a few daily, who produce their Lives many Years under an Ulcer of the Lungs, a Scirrhus of the Liver or Spleen, a Stone in the Reins or Bladder. Aristotle in his Problems witnesseth, That there was a certain Philosopher in his time, named Herodicus, who though he laboured under a Consumption, yet by a strict observation of Diet, attained to 100 Years.

The. Benefits of Temperance will best appear from the Mischiefs and Inconveniencies the contrary Vices of Intemperance and Excess bring upon us; especially as to the impairing and ruining of our Health, which is a natural consequent thereof. For the Stomach by immoderate repletion being overcharged or clog’d, with more than it can digest, must needs flubber over its 25work, as a Mill that is fed too fast, and instead of a well concocted and benign Chyle, transmit to the other Vessels a Crude and impure Juice, full of many heterogeneous and noxious Particles or Qualities, that breed an universal Distemper and Dyscrasie in the Body, and lay the foundation of many future diseases; an error in the first concoction (as the old Physicians well observe) being seldom or never corrected in the subsequent.

That most diseases owe their original to excess in eating and drinking, appears in that they are cured by blood-letting, purging vomiting, sweating, and other Evacuations, whereby the abundance of superfluous Humours is exhausted. It is a Proverbial Saying, Plures occidit gula quàm gladius: The Throat hath slain more than the Sword. Rioting and drunkenness offer such violence to Nature, do so inflame the Blood, the vehicle of Life, waste and dissipate the Spirits, that Men guilty of them seldom live out half their days: Insomuch that (as Bishop Wilkins well observes) no Man of ordinary prudence, who is to take a Lease for Lives, will be content (if he can well avoid it) to choose one whom he knows to be vicious and intemperate.

It may be objected, that some who daily exceed all bounds in eating and drinking, feeding themselves (as the Apostle saith) without fear, do yet live to an extreme old Age.

I answer, That there are but very few of these, and those of exceeding firm strength of Parts and temperament of Body; who yet if they live temperately, might holdout much longer, and would be more fit for all the Actions of the Mind and Understanding: For (saith Riverius) Those who live intemperately, must needs be fill’d with many noxious Humours, and often troubled with Sickness; neither can they, without prejudice to their Health, be long intent on the difficult Functions of the Mind; both because in them the whole force of Nature, and of the Spirits is spent in the concoction of Meats; from which, if by any contention of mind, they be violently withdrawn, concoction will be depraved, and many crudities ensue; and also because they have need of frequent Bodily Exercise to dissipate, or Medicaments to purge out their ill Humours they daily accumulate. So that though such men seem to live long in the Body, yet in effect they live but little to their mind, and to those 27ends for which Life was given; being but a little while fit for the Functions of the Soul, the greatest part of their time being necessarily bestowed on the Service of the Body.

And yet even in these the Body is not made of Steel or Adamant, the strength of their Natural Temper cannot always resist and hold out against the rude shocks and batteries of so many excesses and debauches, but must needs by degrees be weakened and impaired, and. at last utterly marred and subverted.

I might add further in commendation of this Grace of Temperance, that it conduces much to the preservation of the External form, and comeliness of the Body, an Endowment highly valued by all men: Whereas on the contrary, vicious Courses, but especially Intemperance, defacing the inward pulchritude of the Soul, do change even the outward Countenance into an abhorred hue; as I have else where noted out of Dr. Moor.

I should now dismiss this Particular, did not the great prevalency of this Vice of Intemperance, especially in drinking invite me to superadd something further 28of the pernicious effects and consequents of it.

1. First, Then this Vice hath a very ill influence upon the Spirit and Soul of Man, degrading it, and subjecting it to the Body. The generality of Heathen Philosophers (as Bishop Wilkins observes) agree in this, That Sin is the Natural Cause of debasing the Soul, immersing it into a state of sensuality and darkness, deriving such an impotency and deformity upon the mind, as the most loathsome Diseases do upon the Body. I shall add, but especially Intemperance, which Clouds the understanding, disabling it to any Studies of sublime and subtile Speculation; the gross fumes of strong and inebriating Liquors, having a like effect upon the Understanding, as thick Foggs and Mists upon our bodily Eyes, hindring them from seeing things at a distance, or discerning clearly Objects that are near. Neither doth it only darken the Understanding, but mightily weaken the Memory, dulling also and impairing all the Parts and Faculties of the Soul; depressing and fastning down to the earth that Particle of the divine Breath:

Atque affigit humi Divinæ particulam auræ:

Stupifying and infatuating the Man by degrees, till at last there be little left of him but the outward shape, and that too very much marred and deformed.

2. This Sin not only sows the Seeds of future Diseases, but very often is the occasion of many present Quarrels, and Fightings, and Wounds, and even Death it self. Prov. 23. 29. Who hath wo? Who hath sorrow? Who hath contentions? Who hath babblings? Who hath wounds without cause? Who hath redness of eyes? They that tarry long at the wine, they that go to seek mixt wine. Nothing more frequent than quarrelling and brawling at drinking Meetings, and sometimes challenging and duelling. Some also we now and then hear of, who being in Drink, by Falls from Horses, or other Casualties, have ruined or destroyed themselves; and alas, in what condition must such Men die!

3, It occasions an unaccountable expence of time, which by all Wise Men is esteemed a most precious and inestimable Jewel; Cujus 30 unius (saith Seneca) honesta est avaritia; which alone may honestly be coveted. Sometimes whole Afternoons and Nights being spent in drinking bouts, and as much time more before they can get clear of the evil effects of them. Time was not given us to waste in the service of our Lusts, but to bestow on the duties of God’s Worship, or some honest Calling, whereby in our Places and Stations we may be serviceable to our Generations, and do good in the World: No Man need want employment, and yet if he did, he were better be idle, than not well occupied, as the Proverb is. He that hath no bodily Labor or Exercise to busy himself in, may find Work enough in cultivating his mind, in advancing and improving his Faculties, in searching out the Mysteries of Nature, and Works of God; whereby he may be induced to glorifie his Creator, to admire and celebrate his infinite Wisdom, Power and Goodness, and may probably hit upon something, which may be of publick use and benefit.

When at the great day of account, the Supreme Judge of all Men shall demand of us, How we spent such an Afternoon, or such a Night, Think we, that we shall have 31the confidence to answer him, in drinking, or vain talking; or rather that we shall not stand mute, being ashamed to confess how we spent them; or that he would be satisfied with such an account should it be given him? Let us then be careful so to husband and manage, so to expend and improve our time, that we may have a good account to make thereof at that day.

4. Intemperance is a chargeable and expensive Vice, unaccountably wasting the outward Estate. Prov. 23. 20, 21. Be not among wine bibbers, among riotous eaters of flesh: For the drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty. Deerit egentibus Æs laquei pretium: They shall not have Money enough to buy them a Halter. No vice hath consumed so many Estates, and reduced so many of the meaner sort to poverty as this; which being so, men given to it would do well to consider before-hand, how unsupportable Poverty and Necessity will be to them who have lived plentifully; especially seeing instead of being pitied and relieved, they are like to be reproach’d and scorn’d by others. If Poverty makes all men ridiculous, as the Poet saith, much more then those who have brought it upon themselves 32by their own default. Men wild by riotous courses waste Estates left them by their Ancestors, I look upon as injurious to their Posterity; such Estates being not acquired by their industry, and consequently not theirs to dispose of, or make away, but only to use for term of Life, according to the intention of their Progenitors, by whom they were raised and left them. However, all are accountable to God for the expence of their Estates; Seneca could say, Tam expensorum quàm acceptorum rationem esse reddendam: We must give an account as well of what we spend, as of what we receive or get.

5. Intemperance is a Vice contrary to Charity and Justice, disabling us to relieve the Poor, or contribute to any good Work. Can we think that he hath the least spark of Charity, or indeed common Humanity in him, who will spoil and destroy that, which will serve to support and maintain the indigent and necessitous; who will rather mischief himself, than benefit others; who will rather abuse and ruine his own Body, than refresh the fainting Spirits of his Brethren. Surely God intended that all that are born into the World, should 33have a portion in the World; not that one should devour and waite more than is fit, and another starve for want of Sustenance. All came alike naked into the World, and if Providence hath divided to thee more than to another, it hath made thee but a Steward to dispense thy Estate among others; which if thou be a good Man, possibly thou mayest do more to their advantage, than they would do themselves, were they owners of it, or were it equally divided among them. And this thou art to look upon as the main reason why God hath given to thee more than to them. The Scripture saith, Withhold not good from him to whom it is due; making relief a debt to the indigent; but to discharge debts is a piece of Justice, and not of Charity.

But if he be unjust who relieves not the poor, though nothing related to him, what shall we call them of the poorer sort, who spend that at the Alehouses, which should serve to maintain their Families? who have Wives and Children at home that want Necessaries, and they consume upon their Lusts what should support them: these Men are something more than unjust, barbarous and inhumane. We find them in the black List of those whom the Apostle, Rom. 1. 34 saith, are given up to a reprobate mind; ἄστοργοι, Men without natural affection.

6ly. I might add, That this Vice is injurious to posterity, entailing Diseases upon them: Children do very often inherit the Distempers and Infirmities of their Parents, as well as the Shape and Lineaments of their Bodies. And therefore let men, as they love their Children, and tender their ease and well-being in this World, have a care lest by their debauches and excesses they contract diseases and ill habits of body on themselves, and derive them to their Issue; which if of the more painful sort, as Gout or Stone, may give their Children (I will not say just) cause to curse the day wherein they were born, and the Parents which begat and brought them forth.

Lastly, This Vice blasts a Man’s Reputation, Honour and Esteem in the World. As Virtue is honourable in the sight of all Men, there being scarce any Nation so salvage and barbarous, but pays some respect and veneration to it: So is Vice reproachful, and vicious Persons despicable; and among other Vices, especially Drunkenness, which makes a man a laughing-stock, a 35scorn and derision to the very vulgar, nay, to his own Companions; none being more apt to deride him than they: It turns Reason out of doors, and transforms a Man into a Beast, or something worse. Thus Seneca in his 84 Epistle: Dic quàm turpe sit, plus sibi ingerere quàm capiat, & stomachi sui non nôsse mensuram; quàm multa ebrii faciant, quibus sobrii erubescant; nihil aliud esse ebrietatem quàm voluntariam infantam, &c. Tell, saith he, a Drunkard, what a filthy thing it is to pour down more than he can keep, and not to know the measure of his Stomach: How many things Men do when they are drunk, of which they are ashamed when they are sober: That Drunkenness is nothing else but a voluntary Madness. Extend this Habit or Condition of the Drunken Man to many days, and you will not doubt of his Madness; so that it is no less a Phrenzy than any other, only a shorter. Relate to him the Example of Alexander the Great, who in a drunken fit killed Clitus, his most dear and faithful Friend; and afterward when he came to understand the Fact, he would have died: to be sure he deserved it.

Drunkenness doth both inflame and discover other Vices, removing that Modesty 36which prevents and gives a check to evil Endeavours, and which God hath engrafted in our natures to be a powerful curb to restrain us from sin. For more abstain from Vice for fear of shame, than out of a good will and love to Virtue. When the strength of Wine hath got possession of the Soul, those Evils which before lay hid, shew themselves, and come abroad; for Drunkenness doth not make Vices, but manifest them, and bring them to light. Then the Adulterer doth not wait for the Twilight, or Bed-Chamber, but without delay gives full swinge to his Sensual Appetites. The unchaste person confesses and publishes his Disease: The Petulant and Quarrelsome cannot contain Tongue or Hand: The Insolent becomes more proud; the cruel more fierce and inhumane; the spightful more malignant and mischievous. Much more he hath worth the reading, for which I refer to the Book.

Here some may possibly demand, What measures of eating and drinking are we to observe? I answer, What are most agreeable to the ends of eating and drinking; those are the support of our Bodies, and preserving them in the most perfect state of Health, I need give no more severe Rules 37than Physicians prescribe, and therefore I shall borrow two or three out of Riverius his Institutions.

1. Ἀκορεσίη τροφῆς before mentioned out of Hippocrates; Never eat to satiety, but always rise from the Table with an Appetite; because in those who are in perfect health, the Appetite is strong, and lasts till the Stomach be too much filled; which repletion is very hurtful and prejudicial to Health.

2. If you ordinarily take so much Meat and Drink, that afterward you feel a certain Torpor, heaviness and sluggishness of body, when as before you were active, brisk, and cheerful, it is a sign that you have exceeded the convenient measure of eating; and the quantity of Food is so long to be diminished, till the foresaid inconveniencies appear no more.

3. If after Meat you find your self unfit for Study, Meditation, Contemplation, and other Functions as well of the Mind, as of the Body, it is clear that you exceed the just measures of eating and drinking.

These Rules are to be observed chiefly by Scholars and Gentlemen, who are not exercised in continual bodily Labor.

Secondly,

Moderate Labour and Exercise conduces much to the maintenance and preservation of Health, ἀοκνίη πόνων as Hippocrates calls it not being slothful in labor: And Galen for that purpose prefers it before a spare Diet. It puts the Blood in motion thereby, increasing the natural heat, facilitating concoction and rendring it more thin and fluid, less apt to stagnate or coagulate, and more, easy to pass the capillary extremes of the Veins and Arteries, and so to irrigate and enliven all the Muscles and Members of the Body; by which means the Body becomes more robust, less obnoxious to external Injuries, and fit for any Action.

Moreover, keeping the Blood in a due temper and degree of heat, it inables it by insensible perspiration, to cast off any noxious Particles, which might spoil its crasis, and put it into irregular motions, and breed divers diseases: Want of perspiration being the cause of almost all diseases. But of labor and diligence in our Callings, I shall have occasion to speak further under another Head.

I might add something concerning rest or sleep, the moderation whereof hath 39some influence upon bodily Health; Physicians telling us, That the excess relaxes the tone of all the Members, oppresses the Head, and fills it with many Vapours and ill Humours, dulls the Wits, mars the Complexion and Habit of the Body, diminishes the native heat, and renders all the Parts and Members more sluggish and inept to motion. Neither is it less prejudicial to Wealth than to Health, bringing want and poverty upon those that give themselves up to it, Prov. 20. 13. Love not sleep, lest thou come to poverty: Open thine eyes, and thou shalt be satisfied with Bread. Prov. 6. 9, 10, 11. How long wilt thou sleep, O sluggard? when wilt then arise out of thy sleep? Yet a little slumber, yet a little sleep, yet a little folding of the hands to sleep: So shall thy poverty come as one that travelleth, and thy want as an armed man; which is repeated Prov. 24. 33.

Thirdly,

A Third thing requisite to the preservation and continuance of Health, is a due government and moderation of our Passions, the excess of which hath great force in altering the temper of the Body, and in bringing on grievous diseases, and some times death it self. I shall instance in three.

1. Anger, Which if not supprest at first but suffered to kindle in the Breast, breaks out suddainly into a violent flame, bearing down all before it, dethrones Reason, and turns the man into a Phrenetick: Ira furor brevis est: Anger is a short Madness, and if it be indulged and becomes unbridled, it may by the violent commotion of the Spirits, so alter and pervert the very crasis and temper of the Brain, as to introduce a lading and perpetual one. The like happens sometimes also in other passions; as grief, fear and love.

2. Fear: What paleness and trembling doth it often cause? subverting the whole Oeconomy of the Body: Fear of poverty or disgrace hath driven many men to that extremity, as to lay violent hands upon themselves. Fear of death hath sometimes brought upon men that they feared. But above all, fear hath a very bad influence upon the Body in infectious diseases, especially in the Plague; in which a Reverend and Learned Person faith upon experience, It is a mortal Companion: And a late famous Physician in his Treatise upon that Disease: Pestis non est Pestis nisi adsit terror: The Pestilence is no Pestilence unless it be attended with terror.

3. Sorrow and Sadness, the excess whereof is no less injurious to the health of the body than the forementioned Passions, abating the natural heat, and by degrees introducing a general languor and wasting; or by incrassating the humors for want of a due motion of the Blood, bringing on Melancholick and delirous effects.

These and the like Passions the Scripture commands us either wholly to extirpate, or at least to moderate and subdue. 1 Anger, Coloss. 3. 8. But now you also put off all these, Anger, Wrath, Strife. Prov. 16. 32. He that is slow to anger is better than the mighty; and he that ruleth his own spirit, than he that taketh a City: Suitably whereto the Poet saith,

Fortior est qui se quàm qui fortissima vincit.

And doubtless whosoever shall subdue and matter this Passion, shall experience much joy and delight in the victory.

As for Fear, if of Poverty or Want, we have God’s promise for our security, That provision shall be made for us of all things necessary: Our Saviour tells us. That if we seek the Kingdom of God, and his righteousness, these outward things shall be added to us. 42Death we need not fear, as being to the godly but a passage into a better Life; and consequently are forbidden by our Saviour, to fear men, the word they can do to us being to kill the body.

Immoderate Sorrow even for our dearest Relations and Friends is forbidden us by the Apostle, and yet this is an Affliction that wounds as deep as any. The uselesness of sorrow for any worldly loss, setting aside the ill influence it hath upon our health, is a sufficient argument against giving way to this Passion; Sorrow being so far from helping us, that it doth but add to our burthen. For what we bring upon our selves by our own default or negligence, so much trouble may be useful as to make us more careful for the future, and no more,

A Man’s Grief ought not to be immoderate, not to exceed the cause of it.