Page:Of the Gout - Stukeley - 1734.djvu/102

Rh and regimen of the World is committed, attributed darts and arrows to him, as well as the art of healing.

To observe a true measure of temperance, exactly to hold the golden medium is the prerogative of a few. Therefore I shall set down some useful rules to be observed in eating and drink, which may answer the indication' propos'd. From the whole of what we have already written, 'tis very obvious, that there is a necessity of avoiding as much as possible, all very savory, saline and spiced foods, rich soups and sauces, French compositions. These things must accumulate noxious salts, they acuate the appetite unnecessarily and provoke us to eat what is prejudicial, both in quantity and quality. I look upon it to be a vulgar error, when we order podagrics to white meats and things of easiest digestion: rather their stomachs require the coarsest, hardest food. Their juices are corrosive like aqua-fortis and ought to be dampt with fat and oyly things, and with what affords less nourisment. And for this purpose, I believe, testaceous powders taken now and then in milk, Bath waters &c. and the Diacorallion which Trallian so much commends in the gout, may prove useful. Both in food and drink we must have a particular regard to those things that afford least of the salts, that dilute and disunite those salts, already in the blood.