You are very indulgent in excusing yourself, and very liberal in assigning to me all the wrong that is done; but it would not be difficult to prove that you concur with me in every transgression, and are very often the first instigator. Let us take as an example the vices of luxury, in which I seem to be the most active; I have no doubt you will deny that you are instrumental in my debaucheries.
MIND.
Certainly I do; you alone are guilty of every kind of intemperance, thus inflicting upon me innumerable disorders and miseries, which I have never deserved, and undermining all my vigour and enjoyment. For such is the unjust alliance which I have been forced into, that when you practise a vice the pains of it fall equally upon me. You drink to intoxication, and the next morning require me to sustain the head-ache. You by a long course of intemperance bring on the gout, and I must partake of it. You eat and drink alone, but we must ache in conjunction; and I, who do nothing towards the acquisition of gout, am involved in every pang that you have caused. My share, too, is much the most severe, since all the requisite patience is exacted from me, and whatever may be the pain, I am expected to supply fortitude. Have you the confidence to deny that you ought to bear your own gout?
BODY.
So far from owning myself only in fault, I maintain that the guilt of our luxury is to be imputed entirely to you.
MIND.
According to you, then, it is the immortal soul which dines sumptuously, while the body remains perfectly abstemious; the reasoning faculty drinks, and the mouth is not concerned in the debauch.
BODY.
This you represent with your usual want of candour; but I can easily prove that you only are to blame for every vicious banquet.