The Code of Health and Longevity

ON ATHLETIC EXERCISES. II7 Horace acquaints us with the kinds of exercife and of privations requifite to fit a perfon for contending for the prize, even in the leaft violent of the gymnaftic exer- cifes; " Qui ftudetoptatam curfu contingere metam, Multa tulit, fecitque puer, fudavit et allit, Abftinuit Venere etBaccho." Epi£tetus, in alluding to the Olympic games, gives a fomewhat more detailed account of the previous train­ ing the candidates were obliged to undergo. " I Would conquer at the Olympic games," he fuppofes his pupil tb fay, and then goes on to tell him; " But then confider what precedes and follows, and then if it be for your ad­ vantage engage in the affair. You muft conform to rules ; fubmit to a diet; refrain from dainties ; exercife your body, whether you choofe it or not, at a Hated hour, in heat and cold ; you mufl drink no cold water ; nor fometimes even wine. In a word, you muft give yourfelf up to your mafter, as to a phylician. Then, in the combat, you may be thrown into a ditch, dillocate your arm, turn your ankle, fwallow abundanceof dull j and, after all, lofcthe victory Galen, the celebrated phyfician, was himfelf addicted to the exercifes of the palajlra in his youth, and has left a detailed account of the pain he fufFered in the reduc­ tion of his Ihoulder, which had been diflocated in a wreilling match. He afterwards became a gymnaiiarch, or fuperintendent of a company of gladiators, and many remarks on their diet, exercifes, health, andhabits, are to be found in his writings. The diet of the Athletes^ in the more early ages,confifl- ed of dried figs, new cheefe, and boiled grain. The an- b 3 cients * Carter's Epidetus, Book iii. chap. 15,'