When the mind touches the body through the appetites, we acknowledge the responsibility of the one to the other.

There is a tendency in us which says 'Drink.' There is another which says, 'Do not drink; it is not good for you.' And we all of us know which is the rightful superior.

We are also responsible for our health, although into this sphere there enter some elements of necessity which may be beyond our control.

Still even in the management of health, care and thought, continued over many years, may make us almost free agents, if we do not exact too much of ourselves, and if we acknowledge that all human freedom is limited by the laws of nature and of mind.
We are disappointed to find that Plato, in the general condemnation which he passes on the practice of medicine prevailing in his own day, depreciates the effects of diet.

He would like to have diseases of a definite character and capable of receiving a definite treatment.