These facts show the necessity of gouty people subjecting their minds, with all their operations, to the government of reason and religion. The understanding should be exercised only upon light and pleasant subjects. No study should ever be pursued till it brings on fatigue; and, above all things, midnight, and even late studies should be strictly avoided. A gouty man should always be in bed at an early hour. This advice has the sanction of Dr. Sydenham's name, and experience proves its efficacy in all chronic diseases. 5. The venereal appetite should be indulged with moderation. And, 6. Costiveness should be prevented by all persons who wish to escape a return of violent fits of the gout. Sulphur is an excellent remedy for this purpose. Dr. Cheyne commends it in high terms. His words are, "Sulphur is one of the best remedies in the intervals of the gout. In the whole extent of the materia medica, I know not a more safe and active medicine[70]." Two cases have come within my knowledge, in which it has kept off fits of the gout for several years, in persons who had been accustomed to have them once or twice a year. Rhubarb in small quantities chewed, or in the form of pills, may be taken to obviate costiveness, by persons who object to the habitual use of sulphur. Dr. Cheyne, who is lavish in his praises of that medicine as a gentle laxative, says, he "knew a noble lord of great worth and much gout, who, by taking from the hands of a quack a drachm of rhubarb, tinged with cochineal to disguise it, every morning for six weeks, lived in health, for four years after, without any symptom of it[71]." [70] Essay on the Nature and True Method of Treating the Gout, p. 36. [71] Page 30.