My lord, (said I to the Prefect) you have shewn me the columns, the globe, the mirrour, the pictures; I have admired the mechanism of these masterpieces, and the wonderful skill of the elementary spirits; but now, my admiration is turned to desire. Is a mortal allowed to enter into the physical mysteries of the spirits? May I learn from you, this invaluable secret of your saline powders. Now-a-days more than ever, (added I) men (especially the Babylonians) seek with eagerness whatever can please the senses; and one of the things which raises the greatest emulation, is to have a table covered with exquisite dainties. Their fore-fathers did not look upon a good cook as a _person divine_. The most simple preparations sufficed for their food: they thought no wines excelled those of their own country; and sometimes those good men made a little too free with them. The modern Babylonians disgusted at this simplicity, and hating hard drinking, have taken a different method. They are become sober, but of a sensual and ambitious sobriety, which, by unheard of extracts and mixtures, perpetually creates new tastes. They search in the smallest fibres of the animals for the purest substance, and, under the name of essences, they inclose in a little phial the produce of what would suffice for the nourishment of the most numerous families. The most exquisite wines cannot satisfy their palate; they esteem nothing but what is owing to a violence done to the order of nature’s productions. They extract the most active spirit of wine, and thereto add all the spices of India: And, with such liquors, seeds of fire, collected from all the countries of the world, flow in their veins. You see (continued I) that with the secret of your savoury crystalizations, I should be able to satisfy the nicest palates, and please the most curious lovers of variety. But what is much more important, these saline extracts, which are not prepared by the pernicious arts of the distiller and cook, these extracts, I say, would not spoil the stomach in pleasing the taste; high health would revive among us; the primitive constitutions would be restored by degrees; and mankind would resume a new youthful vigour; in all respects, a man might be a glutton without danger, and, that is saying a great deal of a vice, which is become incorrigible.