Gluttony

Ivory and gold and riches of all kinds are certainly blessings of divine providence, not only permitted, but expressly designed for the use of men; nor are we anywhere prohibited to laugh, or to be satiated with food, or to annex new possessions to those already enjoyed by ourselves or by our ancestors, or to be delighted with musical harmony, or to drink wine. This indeed is true; but amidst an abundance of all things, to be immersed in sensual delights, to inebriate the heart and mind with present pleasures, and perpetually to grasp at new ones, these things are very remote from a legitimate use of the divine blessings.

When other men sin, do you find fault with God’s gifts? And what great madness is this? What? Did the wine produce this evil? Not the wine, but the intemperance of those who take an evil delight in it. Say then, “Would there were no drunkenness, no luxury.” But if you say, “Would there were no wine,” you will say, going on by degrees, “Would there were no steel,” because of the murderers; “no night,” because of the thieves; “no light,” because of the informers; “no women,” because of adulteries. And, in a word, you will destroy all.

The hiccupping of those who are loaded with wine, and the snortings of those who are stuffed with food, and the snoring rolled in the bed-clothes, and the rumblings of pained stomachs, cover over the clear-seeing eye of the soul, by filling the mind with ten thousand fantasies. And the cause is too much food, which drags the rational part of man down to a condition of stupidity. For much sleep brings advantage neither to our bodies nor our souls; nor is it suitable at all to those processes which have truth for their object, although agreeable to nature.