John Armstrong's 2000-line poem The Art of Preserving Health was among the most popular works of eighteenth-century literature and medicine. It was among the first to popularize Scottish medical ideas concerning emotional and anatomical sensibility to British readers, doing so through the then-fashionable georgic style. Within three years of its publication in 1744, it was in its third edition, and by 1795 it commanded fourteen editions printed in London, Edinburgh, Dublin, and Benjamin Franklin's shop in Philadelphia. Maintaining its place amongst more famous works of the Enlightenment, this poem was read well into the nineteenth century, remaining in print in English, French, and Italian. It remained a tribute to sustained interest in eighteenth-century sensibility, long after its medical advice had become obsolete and the nervous complaints it depicted became unfashionable. Adam Budd's critical edition includes a comprehensive biographical and textual introduction, and explanatory notes highlighting the contemporary significance of Armstrong's classical, medical, and social references. Included in his introduction are discussions of Armstrong's innovative medical training in charity hospitals and his close associations with the poet James Thomson and the bookseller Andrew Millar, evidence for the poem's wide appeal, and a compelling argument for the poem's anticipation of sensibility as a dominant literary mode. Budd also offers background on the 'new physiology' taught at Edinburgh, as well as an explanation for why a Scottish-trained physician newly arrived in London was forced to write poetry to supplement his medical income. This edition also includes annotated excerpts from the key literary and medical works of the period, including poetry, medical prose, and georgic theory. Readers will come away convinced of the poem's significance as a uniquely engaging perspective on the place of poetry, medicine, the body, and the book trade in the literary history of eighteenth-century sensibility.

Of cold and hot, or moist and dry produce; They fly thy pure effulgence: they, and all The secret poisons of avenging heaven, And all the pale tribes halting in the train Of vice and heedless pleasure: or if aught30 The comet’s glare amid the burning sky, Mournful eclipse, or planets ill-combin’d, Portend disastrous to the vital world; Thy salutary power averts their rage, Averts the general bane: and but for thee35 Nature would sicken, nature soon would die. Without thy chearful active energy No rapture swells the breast, no poet sings, No more the maids of Helicon delight. Come then with me, O Goddess heavenly-gay!40 Begin the song; and let it sweetly flow, And let it wisely teach thy wholesom laws: “How best the fickle fabric to support “Of mortal man; in healthful body how “A healthful mind the longest to maintain.”45 ’Tis hard, in such a strife of rules, to chuse The best, and those of most extensive use; Harder in clear and animated song Dry philosophic precepts to convey. Yet with thy aid the secret wilds I trace50 Of nature, and with daring steps proceed Thro’ paths the muses never trod before. Nor should I wander doubtful of my way, Had I the lights of that sagacious mind Which taught to check the pestilential fire,55 And quel the dreaded Python of the Nile. O Thou belov’d by all the graceful arts...FROM THE BOOK.

This is a very old book of poems dating from 1744. The four books are four aspects of what is needed to create and maintain health: Air; Diet; Exercise; The Passions. The first three are straightforward. In 'the passions' Armstrong is really talking about mental health and describes it thus, " it now remains to trace What good what evil from ourselves proceeds: And how the subtle principle within Inspires with health, or mines with strange decay The passive body."