We study health and we deliberate upon our meats and drink and air and exercises, and we hew and we polish every stone that goes to that building, and so our health is a long and regular work.
I was astonished when I first read those words. I had naievely thought that lifestyle was only a modern medical preoccupation
They come from Donnes Devotions. I had been looking for a copy since discovering in the late 60s that the 2 Donne quotes which everybody knows - the ones about tolling bells & islands, do not come from any of his poems. Not all that easy to find, without access to an academic library, until finally Penguin Classics came to the rescue
But in a minute a cannon batters all, overthrows all, demolishes all; a sickness unprevented for all our diligence, unsuspected for all our curiosity, nay undeserved if we consider only disorder, summons us, seizes us, possesses us, destroys us in an instant
I think it would be a very good idea if the wisdom he goes on to express, in such beautiful language, formed a compulsory part of the curriculum of every medical school. He has such insight into the fears of both doctors and patients
