SPECTATOR 115.
Page 45.
26. the spleen. Melancholy disposition, not the organ of that name. Cf. Shakespeare, As You Like It, iv. i. 217, 'Begot of thought, conceived of spleen.'
27. the vapours. Moods of depression. Cf. Fielding, Amelia, iii. 7, 'Some call it the fever on the spirits, some a nervous fever, some the vapours, some the hysterics.'
29 et seq. The argument runs: nature has adapted the body to exercise, therefore exercise is necessary to our well-being. This is sound only on the assumptions that everything which nature performs is based on necessity, and that the body has been made in such a way as to secure our well-being.
30. proper. Fit. Cf. Shakespeare, Hamlet, II. i. 114:
It is as proper to our age
To cast beyond ourselves in our opinions.
Page 46.
8. laboured. Worked, tilled. The verb is no longer used transitively.
14. condition. State of prosperity, material circumstances. Cf. Shakespeare, 2 Henry VI, v. i. 64, 'One so rude and of so mean condition.'
22. chace. The substantive was distinguished from the verb by its spelling. Cf. modern practice, practise.
34. patched. Perhaps with reference to the black patches worn on the face to enhance its beauty; perhaps merely covered here and there, studded.
Page 47.
1. distinction sake. The 's of the possessive is omitted before the initial s of sake.
6. The perverse widow, v. Spectator 113.
8. amours. Used of a single love-affair.
12. sits. Couches in her form or seat.
18. Doctor Sydenham, the celebrated physician, who died in 1689.
22. Medicina Gymnastica, by Francis Fuller, was printed in 1705.
24. dumb bell. An apparatus resembling that used for ringing a church bell, but wanting the bell itself. The use of the modern form of dumb-bell was introduced into England in Elizabeth's reign. It is described in the next paragraph under the name of skiomachia.
33. a Latin treatise. Artis Gymnastica apud Antiquos, by Hieronymus Mercurialis, 1569.
Page 48.
2. loaden. The verb has now become weak; loaded.
9. uneasy. Troublesome.