APPLICATION.
Temperance and exercise may be regarded as the constituents of natural luxury. It is not in the power of the whole art of cookery, to give such an exquisite relish and seasoning to a dish, as these two will confer on the plainest fare. Indolent epicures have no true taste: they subsist entirely by whets and provocatives of appetite; but he whose stomach is braced and strengthened by exercise, has a whet within himself, which adds a poignancy to every morsel that he eats. Providence seems to have carved out its blessings with an equal hand, and what it has denied to the poor in one way, it has amply supplied them with in another: if it have withheld riches, it has given them a greater store of health; and if it have refused them the means of luxury, it has at least formed them with the capacity of living as happily without it. And it may further be observed, that if we except hereditary diseases, almost every other ailment may be laid to the account of indolence, intemperance, or anxiety of mind.
