It cannot indeed be denied, that there are men whom nature has endow’d with a Milonian stomach, and intestines of iron, who can bear with impunity the labour of the mind, bodily inaction, and excesses of gluttony. But are they therefore more happy? By no means; for then the vessels are overwhelm’d by the load of humours, the cellular membrane swells with fat, the viscera are press’d on every side, the whole habit grows turgid, they become heavy and indolent, the slightest motion puts them quite out of breath, and they sweat all over; at last they die before their time, either of apoplexy, a suffocating catarrh, or other diseases occasion’d by plethora: and it has been justly observ’d, that too strong a stomach has often prov’d fatal to the learned[31]. There is no part of the body which is not at last affected by inaction; for the blood being vitiated, all the parts, which it washes, catch the infection sooner or later; the lungs are overwhelm’d with a mucous substance, this gives rise to a cough, a shortness of breath, an asthma, an imposthume. This the illustrious TRIGLANDUS unhappily experienc’d, who, having contracted a bad habit of body by a studious and sedentary life, from which BOERHAAVE himself dissuaded him, wasted away with an imposthume and died, after having suffer’d the most excruciating torments[32]. By the mucous matter being harden’d the lungs of SWAMMERDAM were turn’d into a quarry, and he spit up small stones a long time before his death. That the stone, and other severer disorders of the bladder, are the fruits of too assiduous an application to learning, is prov’d by the sad experience of HEURNIUS, CASAUBON, BEVEROVICIUS, SYDENHAM, and many others, amongst whom may be reckon’d the illustrious exile of Geneva, to whom Britain now boasts of having afforded an asylum[33]. Whilst all the excretions are disturb’d, the chief of them all, namely cuticular perspiration, is not free from disease. As perspiration is greatly promoted by muscular motion, which both prepares humours for secretion, and gives strength to the exhaling vessels; so is it greatly interrupted by the want of that motion; the humour that ought to be excreted is retain’d, and pollutes the whole mass of the fluids, and gives rise to rheumatic or catarrhous disorders and a troublesome phlegm. Of this HORACE complained long since, and with this complaint almost all men of learning are afflicted; for they can scarce read or write for any time, but they are immediately troubled with a slight running of the nose, or seiz’d with a cough. From the same source are derived those irregular fevers, which often occur without any visible cause, whilst the unperspirable humours, which have been generated by the defect of the stomach, and the want of motion, are unable to pass the cutaneous vessels.