The fathers legacy: or Counsels to his children In three parts. Containing the whole duty of man, I. To God. II. To himself. III. To man in all conditions. Vseful for families. Licensed. Roger L'Estrange. Aug. 13. 1677.

CHAP. II. Concerning the moderation of the first appetite of man, which is that of living, where Glutto∣ny is handled.

IT is most certain, that the first appetite of nature which is discovered in us when we come into the world, is the desire of living, which consists in eating and drinking: Infancy and old age are moderate enough in this desire, it is only young age that abuses it, and which only upon that account standeth in need of counsel and direction. And forasmuch that in this middle age the natural senses are in their force and vigour, and especially the taste, it is very hard to retain them in so regular a mean, but that the soul does often become complice with the body in that excess.

The exercises of body, heat of blood, and exemple are such violent counsellors for the belly, that reason which is but then imperfect cannot resist. In defect of that, the best advice, my Son, that I can give you in such occasions, is that you let the inconveniencies of gluttony be your first instruction, if you have over∣loaded yourself with meat, for a lesson of moderation consider the indisposition and heaviness of your body, your loathing and disgusting the bad digestion of your stomach, and the vapours that arise from the crudities thereof, which bemist and darken your mind.

If you have drunk too much, consider your eyes, mouth words, reelings, the obstructions of your spirit, and how many hideous and shapeless dreams and fan∣cies, the vapours of wine does lodge in your brain, un∣til that sleep and perhaps your own excrements have

buried you, then will you find all these things to be so many different documents of sobriety; and be∣cause the body is never drowned in wine without the shipwrack of the mind, you will fasting perceive better the ugliness of that vice in the debauches of other men, than in your own: follow it step by step from the beginning to the end thereof, make the ap∣plication in your self, and call to mind the giddiness, loathing and indigestion which the like will occasion in you; and having done so, you must be well hardned in your sin, if shame do not reclaim you.

Mistrust that liquor which imprints the malignity of its juice on the wood that drinks it, though it be much harder than your flesh; the stock of the vine is only knobby and crooked, to inform you that the use of wine if you glut your self therewith as it doth, may cause in you the same effects, shaking and reeling, fambling and stuttering of the tongue, ca∣tarrhs and the gout, are the tempests of its vapours. Consider this, the fuller your stomach and the larger your belly is, the narrower will the reach of your wit be, the more disburthened of flesh the body is, it is the more healthful, active, vigorous and obedient to the commands of the soul. If nature deny, let your diet procure you this constitution, begin it betimes; for if the too great quantity of victuals have once stretched your soft and pliable guts, they will give you no rest afterward until they be filled.

Though Children must be allowed sufficiency of food, yet they must not be so far indulged as to let them carve for themselves, and far less to provoke their appetite, or to solicite them to eat against their stomach; we must believe that nature which works freely in that age, during the cessation of the mouth, is elsewhere better employed in consuming of some hurtful excrement.

Besides this swinish intemperance of the Mouth, whereof I have been speaking, which is never satisfied without being glutted, there is still another more inge∣nious and artificious, and that is the luxury of the Table, it is dainty and full of ostentation, and so ex∣cessive now adays in its preparations, that the sight alone and steam of dishes, is enough to satisfie the ap∣petite without touching of them; the palate stands in suspence at the diversity of joints and dishes that are presented to it, not knowing on which to resolve. This luxury makes indeed but few drunkards, because the eyes only are there for the most part fed, but it of∣ten begets poverty, a more dangerous evil, and for an addition of misery, the derision of him that thereby ruines himself.

My Son, though my table give you twice a day a lesson of sobriety, yet you may spend at Court some part of your life as I have done, and bring from thence no more than I, but a more dainty and delicate palate: Wherefore if Fortune call you into the publick, which is my wish, I advise you to regulate betimes your diet according to your condition, make use of such things as may not always be in your power, with that mode∣ration, that you may be able to dispense with them without trouble; abstain from excess in them, and from too much care in hunting after them: my mean∣ing is also, that if you should come to want them, you might let them go without grief or anxiety; by doing so, you will in this part satisfie what you owe to your self, which is the thing that I proposed to my self to teach you.