The economy of health; or, The stream of human life, from the cradle to the grave

Front matter

Qh(i Henr^ h »

THE GIFT Or HIS DAUGHTER.

Edith Agnes Salter.

Preface

The following essay, though small in size, is the result of long experience and observation. It consists of the deductions which have been drawn from facts and reflections, rather than the processes through which these deductions had been arrived at. After all, it is but an outline of the subject, the details of which would fill many volumes.

The author will not be accused of having followed or borrowed much from his predecessors in this walk. The various " arts of prolonging life," and the ponderous " codes of health and longevity," though read by many, have been remembered by few — and practised by still fewer. Even where the precepts have been put in execution, they have often done more harm than good. The reason is not difficult to divine. From the cradle to the grave, man is perpetually changing, both in mind and

IV PREFACE.

body. He is not to-day what he was yesterday, and will be to-morrow. Though these changes are not perceptible to the eye, at very short intervals, yet, if an individual is only seen every four or five years, the alterations will appear very remarkable. In tracing the successive phases of human existence, it was necessary to adopt some arbitrary division of time — and, after long observation and reflection, the septennial periods appeared to the author the most natural epochs into which the journey of life could be divided.

In respect to the execution of the work, whether good or bad, the author can safely aver that the great object aimed at was utility. Pecuniary emolument was out of the question — the race of competition is abandoned — and the goal of ambition has dropped the mask, and assumed its real character — the scoffing ter minus of man's vain hopes — the withering finger-post pointing to the tomb !

In a survey of human life, there was much temptation to moral reflection, and even some

PREFACE. V

excuse for metaphysical speculation. Into the latter the author has seldom ventured, and then with great brevity. In fine, he has endeavoured to simplify the leading principles of preserving health and attaining happiness, rather than to multiply details and amplify precepts that can only be applied by each individual to himself.

Suffolk Place, November, 1836.

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