SO GOOD QUOTES

And concerning this matter the learning of physicians also testifieth, and they, that is to say their learning, or art, which hath been discovered for the stablishing of the body, know better than all other arts, that the health and sickness of the body arise from the food, [p. 377] and if they be asked, they will always advise sparingness in the use of meat, and in |360 addition to this also they will advise that the food of a man should be meagre, and that he should guard against drinking wine freely. And if they allow a man to drink wine for need’s sake they break the strength thereof with much water, and then give it to him to drink. And they command a man very fully to beware of idleness, and to love fatigue, and to seek work, and with exercises of all kinds which are akin to work they preserve the health of the bodies of the children of men. And these they advise “That the ducts of the body may not be filled with the living liquid which ariseth from the over-eating of meat, and that they may not be blocked up and prevent the passage through them of the living power of the food, which is the strengthener of the body.” And this [passage] also is written in their works: “Meat is the cause of all the diseases of the body, and though by chance they may be produced from other causes, if thou increasest [the use of] meat it becometh a nurse unto them, and preventeth wholly the benefits of the art of the physician.”

—Philoxenus, Ascetic Discourses (1894) pp.337-402. Discourse 10 — On Gluttony