to none of
their companions in liveliness and all social qualities, either in their
own room or at the wine-party of a friend. Many young men in the army,
I believe, adopt this system, from motives both of moral and of
economical prudence. A pint, or even half a pint, of wine per day, makes
a considerable hole in the pay of a subaltern, or in the stipend of a
country curate, or in the allowance of a briefless barrister. Avoid
acquiring factitious wants. Do not by habit make wine necessary to your
comfort. It is wise, when young, not to indulge in luxuries which in any
future period of your life you probably will not be able to afford,
consistently with the claims which will then be pressing upon you. I
throw out this idea, however, for your own consideration, without urging
it as matter of positive advice. I think, however, that your intellect
will be clearer, and your mind often more cheerful, if you comply with
the suggestion.

Shall I add a word or two upon temperance in _eating_? I hope that there
are few young men who are apt to be guilty of the _porcine_ vice of
eating to excess; in plain English--of _gluttony_. Perhaps, however, the
temptations of a well-appointed dinner, prepared by an exquisite
_artiste_, may induce them occasionally to transgress. It is, perhaps,
hardly fair to quote from any thing so well known as Addison's paper on
Temperance, in the Spectator[128:1], but it is much to my purpose. "It
is said of Diogenes, that meeting a young man who was going to a feast,
he took him up in the street, and carried him home to his friends, as
one who was running into imminent danger, had not he prevented him. What
would that philosopher have said, had he been present at the luxury of a
modern meal? Would he not have thought the master of a family mad, and
have begged his servants to tie down his hands, had he seen him devour
fowl, fish, and flesh; swallow oil and vinegar, wines and spices; throw
down salads of twenty different sorts, sauces of a hundred ingredients,
confections and fruits of numberless sweets and flavours? What unnatural
motions and counter-ferments must such a medley of intemperance produce
in the body? For my part, when I behold a fashionable table, set out in
all its magnificence, I fancy that I see gouts and dropsies, fevers and
lethargies, with innumerable distempers, lying in ambuscade among the
dishes."

"Nature delights in the most plain and simple diet." He then gives some
rules fo