Essays on Hypochondriasis, and Other Nervous Affections

timents, and shews that the zeal of improvement may sometimes, even in the best concerns, be carried beyond the bounds of discretion, and that regulations and institutions, which we may think evil or unnecessary, may be both salutary and advisable. " The observance of fasts is a wholesome form of superstition. The omission of them in the Protestant calender, was, perhaps, as it relates to health, an unfortunate result of the reformation. Though no longer regarded by us as religious institutions, it would be desirable that some of them at least should be still kept with a kind of sacred punctuality, as salutary intervals of abstinence, which give to the stomach a periodical holiday, and afford an occasional respite from the daily drudgery of digestion." 142.