the cook their priest, the table their altar, and their belly their god. Hence likewise it is said, that meat also kills as many as the musket; the board kills more than than the sword. Gluttony is irrational, indecent, dangerous, and sinful. Ít is the cause of other sins, and often tends to poverty, distress, and ruin.

There is, however, a morbid sort of gluttony, called fames canina," dog-like appetite," which sometimes occurs, and renders the person seized with it an object of pity and of cure, as in all other diseases. But professed habitual gluttons may be reckoned amongst the monsters of nature, and deemed, in a manner, punishable, for endeavouring to bring a dearth or famine into the places where they live. For which reason, people think King James I. was in the right, when, a man being presented to him that could eat a whole sheep at one meal, he asked, "What he could do more than another man?" and being answered, "He could not do so much," said, " Hang him, then, for it is unfit a man should live that eats so much as twenty men, and cannot do so much as one.'

One of our Danish kings, named Hardikanute, was so great a glutton, that a historian calls him Bacca de Porco, "Swine's Mouth." His tables were covered four times a day with the most costly viands that either the air, sea, or land, could furnish: and as he lived he died; for, revelling and carousing at a wedding banquet at Lambeth, he fell down dead. His death was so welcome to his subjects, that they celebrated the day with sports and pastimes, calling it Hock-tide, which signifies scorn and contempt.

It is said that Heliogabulus, the Roman em

peror, when he was near the sea, would eat no fish; in the midland, no flesh. Whole meals were made of the tongues of singing birds and peacocks, or of the brains of the most costly creatures. He used to say, that "that meat was not savoury whose sauce was not costly."

It was a sordid and brutish wish of Philoxenus, who wished that he had the throat of a crane or a vulture, that the pleasure of his taste might last the longer.

Cæsar, the son of Pope Alexander, was one of those who devoted himself to all kinds of intemperance. In daily breakfasts, dinners, and banquets, he spent five hundred crowns, not reckoning feasts and extraordinary inventions; and for parasites, buffoons, and jesters, he allowed yearly two thousand suits of clothes from his wardrobe.

Antipater well said of Demadas (a glutton grown old), that nothing now were left but his belly and his tongue; that all the man beside was gone.

A counsellor at law, whose name was Mallet, well known in the reign of Charles I, eat, at one time, an ordinary provided in Westminster for several men, at one shilling a piece. His practice not being sufficient to supply him with better sort of meat, he fed generally on offals, ox livers, hearts, &c. He lived to almost sixty years of age, and for the seven last years of his life ate as moderately as other men. A narrative of his life was published.

Marriot, who was a lawyer at Gray's Inn, piqued himself upon the brutal qualification of a voracious appetite and a powerful digestive faculty; and deserves to be placed no higher in the scale of beings than a cormorant or an

ostrich. He increased his natural capacity for food by art and application; and had as much vanity in eating to excess, as any monk ever had in starving himself.

There are some who, though they cannot be called gluttons, yet seem as if they placed all their happiness in mere eating and drinking; making, as the apostle says, a god of their belly, whose glory is in their shame, who mind earthly things. The following is a just delineation of such a character. "Succus," says a spirited writer, "will undertake no business that may hurry his spirits, or break in upon his hours of eating and rest. If he read, it shall only be for half an hour, because that is sufficient to amuse the spirits; and he will read something that may make him laugh, as rendering the body fitter for its food and rest. Or if he has at any time a mind to indulge a grave thought, he always has recourse to a useful treatise upon the Antient Cookery. He talks coolly and moderately upon all subjects, and is as fearful of falling into a passion as of catching cold; being very positive that they are both equally inju rious to the stomach. If ever you see him more hot than ordinary, it is upon some provoking occasion, when the dispute about cookery runs very high, or in the defence of some beloved dish which has often made him happy. Succus is very loyal, and, as soon as ever he likes any wine, he drinks the king's health with all his heart. Nothing could put rebellious thoughts into his head, unless he should live to see a proclamation against eating of pheasants' eggs. All the hours that are not devoted either to repose or nour

ishment are looked upon by Succus as waste or spare time for this reason, he lodges near a coffee-house and a tavern, that when he rises in the morning he may be near the news, and, when he parts at night, he may not have far to go to bed. In the morning, you always see him in the same place in the coffee-room; and if he seems more attentively engaged than ordinary, it is because some criminal is broke out of Newgate, or somebody was robbed last night, but they cannot tell where. When he has learnt all that he can, he goes home to settle the matter with the barber's boy that comes to shave him.

"The next waste time that lays upon his hands is from dinner to supper; and, if ever melancholy thoughts come into his head, it is at this time, when he is often left to himself for an hour or more, and that after the greatest pleasure he knows is just over. He is afraid to sleep, because he has heard it is not healthful at that time; so that he is forced to refuse so welcome a guest.

"But he is soon relieved by a settled method of playing at cards, till it is time to think of some little nice matter for supper. After this, Succus takes his glass, talks of the excellency of the English constitution, and praises that minister most who keeps the best table.

"On Sunday night, you may sometimes hear him condemning the iniquity of the town rakes; and the bitterest thing that he says against them is this, that he verily believes some of them are so abandoned, as not to have a regular meal or a sound night's sleep in a week.

"At eleven, Succus bids all good night, and parts in great friendship. He is presently in

bed, and sleeps till it is time to go to the coffeehouse next morning.

"If you were to live with Succus for a twelvemonth, this is all that you would see in his life, except a few curses and oaths that he uses as occasion offers."-Such is the character of Succus; a character, it is to be feared, which suits too many of our modern gentlemen of pleasure.

GRATITUDE.

"EXAMPLES of ingratitude," Mr. Paley observes, "check and discourage voluntary beneficence: hence the cultivation of a grateful temper is a consideration of public importance. A second reason for cultivating in ourselves that temper is, that the same principle which is touched with the kindness of a human benefactor is capable of being affected by the Divine Goodness, and of becoming, under the influence of that affection, a source of the purest and most exalted virtue. The love of God is the sublimest gratitude. It is a mistake, therefore, to imagine that this virtue is omitted in the scriptures; for every precept which commands us to love God, because he first loved us, presupposes the principle of gratitude, and directs it to its proper object."

The following pleasing example of genuine gratitude is extracted from Hackwell's Apol., 1. 14, c. 10, p. 436.- Francis Frescobald, a Florentine merchant, descended of a noble family in Italy, had gained a plentiful fortune, of which he was liberal handed to all in necessity; which being well known to others, though concealed