How is this commandment broken in the abuse of meat and drink? Either in regard of the _quality_ or _quantity_ thereof. How in regard of the _quantity_? By excess, and intemperance in diet: when we ... give ourselves to surfeiting and drunkenness. What be the contrary duties here commanded? 1. Temperance, in using a sober and moderate diet, according to our ability.... 2. Convenient abstinence (1 Cor. ix. 27).[144] Of Milton, Johnson says that-- His domestic habits, so far as they are known, were those of a severe student. He drank little strong drink of any kind, and fed without excess in quantity, and in his earlier years without delicacy of choice. But we should certainly infer, _pace_ the good Doctor, that in his earlier years at least he was fond of wine, from his sonnet to Mr. Lawrence, which seems redolent of Horace in his Bacchanalian moods. The sonnet is intensely classical:-- _To Mr. Lawrence._ Lawrence, of virtuous father virtuous son, Now that the fields are dank and ways are mire, Where shall we sometimes meet, and by the fire Help waste a sullen day, what may be won From the hard season gaining? Time will run On smoother, till Favonius re-inspire The frozen earth, and clothe in fresh attire The lily and rose, that neither sow’d nor spun. What neat repast shall feast us, light and choice, Of Attic taste, _with wine_, whence we may rise To hear the lute well touched, or artful voice Warble immortal notes and Tuscan air? _He who of those delights can judge, and spare_ _To interpose them oft_, is not unwise. Also in _L’Allegro_ we are rather disposed to think our poet shows that he was not altogether superior ‘to the spicy nut-brown ale.’ On the other hand, his--also Horatian--sonnet to Cyriac Skinner seems to suggest a somewhat similar idea to Cowper’s ‘cups that cheer but not inebriate,’ though they may refer to moderate drinking:-- _To Cyriac Skinner._ Cyriac, whose grandsire, on the royal bench Of British Themis, with no mean applause Pronounced and in his volumes taught our laws, Which others at their bar so often wrench; _To-day deep thoughts resolve with me to drench_ _In mirth that after no repenting draws_. On the other hand, he could be no friend to excess who in _Paradise Lost_, book i., thus speaks of Belial:-- In courts and palaces he also reigns, And in luxurious cities, where the noise Of riot ascends above their loftiest towers, And injury and outrage; and when night Darkens the streets, then wander forth the sons Of Belial, flown with insolence and wine. And again:-- Intemperance on the earth shall bring Diseases dire, of which a monstrous crew Before thee shall appear! What an advocate of _prohibition_ was he who could write,--