" If you will particularly know
how, and by what means, consult physicians, and they will tell you, that it
is in offending in some of those six non-natural things, of which I shall
[873]dilate more at large; they are the causes of our infirmities, our
surfeiting, and drunkenness, our immoderate insatiable lust, and prodigious
riot. _Plures crapula, quam gladius_, is a true saying, the board consumes
more than the sword. Our intemperance it is, that pulls so many several
incurable diseases upon our heads, that hastens [874]old age, perverts our
temperature, and brings upon us sudden death. And last of all, that which
crucifies us most, is our own folly, madness (_quos Jupiter perdit,
dementat_; by subtraction of his assisting grace God permits it) weakness,
want of government, our facility and proneness in yielding to several
lusts, in giving way to every passion and perturbation of the mind: by
which means we metamorphose ourselves and degenerate into beasts. All which
that prince of [875]poets observed of Agamemnon, that when he was well
pleased, and could moderate his passion, he was--_os oculosque Jovi par_:
like Jupiter in feature, Mars in valour, Pallas in wisdom, another god; but
when he became angry, he was a lion, a tiger, a dog, &c., there appeared no
sign or likeness of Jupiter in him; so we, as long as we are ruled by
reason, correct our inordinate appetite, and conform ourselves to God's
word, are as so many saints: but if we give reins to lust, anger, ambition,
pride, and follow our own ways, we degenerate into beasts, transform
ourselves, overthrow our constitutions, [876]provoke God to anger, and heap
upon us this of melancholy, and all kinds of incurable diseases, as a just
and deserved punishment of our sins.

SUBSECT. II.--_The Definition, Number, Division of Diseases_.

What a disease is, almost every physician defines. [877]Fernelius calleth
it an "affection of the body contrary to nature." [878]Fuschius and Crato,
"an hindrance, hurt, or alteration of any action of the body, or part of
it." [879]Tholosanus, "a dissolution of that league which is between body
and soul, and a perturbation of it; as health the perfection, and makes to
the preservation of it." [880]Labeo in Agellius, "an ill habit of the body,
opposite to nature, hindering the use of it." Others otherwise, all to this
effect.

_Number of Diseases_.] How many diseases there are, is a question not yet
determined; [881]Pliny reckons up