Page:Letters on the Human Body (John Clowes).djvu/87

Rh I cannot conclude my letter in a way more satisfactory to myself, or more explanatory of the subject under discussion, than by presenting you with the portraits of two of mine acquaintance; one of whom has never been accustomed to reflect on his sense of bodily taste, either as to its uses or its origin, but devours his dally food like the inferior animals which have no understanding; whilst the other has been early taught, in the school of piety and wisdom, to regard the organ of bodily taste not only as subservient to natural and temporal enjoyment, but as an ultimate basis for the support of higher orders and degrees of taste,—and thus as connected with that highest order and degree, by which man is admitted to the sublime and eternal bliss of tasting how good the is, and how sweet His words are.—The first of these characters I shall introduce to you under the name of Epicurus, and the second under the name of Eusebius.

Epicurus, then, is a young man of considerable talents, and has had the advantage of what is commonly called a good education; but this advantage was confined, in a great degree, to the knowledge of Greek and Latin authors, to the utter exclusion of that higher and more important branch of instruction which relates to the regulation of the mind and temper, and to the daily conduct of life. Epicurus, therefore, was never