DYSPEPSIA.
Ah, me! what mischiefs from the stomach rise!
What fatal ills, beyond all doubt or question!
How many a deed of high and bold emprise
Has been prevented by a bad digestion!
I ween the savory crust of filthy pies
Hath made full many a man to quake and tremble,
Filling his stomach with dyspeptic sighs,
Until a huge balloon it doth resemble.
Thus do our lower parts impede the upper,
And much the brain’s good works molest and hinder.
We gorge our cerebellum with hot supper,
And burn, with drams, our viscera to a cinder,
Choosing our arrows from Disease’s quiver,
Till man in misery lives to loathe his liver.