The castell of health, corrected, and in some places augmented by the first author thereof, Sir Thomas Elyot Knight

The dominion of sundrie com∣plexions. CAP. 13.

IT seemeth to me not inconuenient, that I doe declare as well the counsailes of ancient and approued authors, as also mine owne opinion, gathered by diligent marking in daily experience, concerning as well the necessary diet of euery complexion, age, and declination of health, as al∣so the meane to resist the discralies of the body, before sick∣nes be therein cōfirmed, leauing the residue vnto the sub∣stantiall learning, and circumspect practise of good Phi••i∣tions, which shall the more easily cure their patients, if their patients doe not disdaine to beare away and followe my counsaile.

And first it ought to be considered, that none of the foure complexions; haue solely such dominion in any mā or wo∣mans body, that no part of any other complexion is there∣with mixt. For when we call a man sanguine, cholerike, fleumatike, or melancholike, we doe not meane y^t he hath bloud onely without any of the other humours, or choler without bloud, or fleume without bloud or melancholy or melancholy without bloud or choler. And therefore the man which is sanguine, the more that he draweth vnto

age, whereby naturall moysture decayeth, the more is he cholerike, by reason that heate surmounting moysture, néedes must remaine heat and drith. Semblably y^e chole∣rike man, the more that he waxeth into age, the more na∣turall heate in him is abated, and drith surmounting natu∣rall moysture, he becommeth melancholike: but some san∣guine man hath in the proportiō of temperatures, a grea∣ter mixture with choler then another hath. Likewise the cholerike or fleumatike man, with the humour of sanguin or melancholy. And therfore late practisers of Phisick are wont to call men, according to the mixture of their com∣plexions, as sanguine cholerike, fleumatike sanguine, &c. Moreouer, beside the natural complexions which man re∣ceiueth in his generation, the humours whereof the same complexions do consist, being augmented superfluously in the bodie or members by any of the sayd things, called not naturall, euery of them doe semblably augment the com∣plexion which is proper vnto him, and bringeth vnequall temperature vnto the body. And for these causes the san∣guine or fleumatike man or woman, feeling any discrasie by choler happened to them, by the said things called not naturall, they shall vse the diet described hereafter to him which is naturally cholerike. Semblably, the cholerike or melancholike man or woman hauing any discrasie by fleume, to vse the diet of him which is naturally fleuma∣tike, alway remembring, that sanguine and fleumatike mē haue more respect vnto drith, cholerike and melancho∣ly vnto moysture, and that alway as the accidentall com∣plexion decaye••••, to resort by little and little to the diet pertaining to his naturall complexion.