The art of preserving health: A poem

by John Armstrong

And how the subtle principle within 5

Inspires with health, or mines with strange decay

The passive body. Ye poetic Shades,

That know the secrets of the world unseen,

Assist my song! For, in a doubtful theme

Engag’d, I wander thro’ mysterious ways. 10

There is, they say, (and I believe there is)

A spark within us of th’ immortal fire,

That animates and moulds the grosser frame;

And when the body sinks, escapes to heaven,