SECTION X.
Before the use of Tea, the general breakfast in this country consisted of more substantial aliment[91]; milk in various shapes, ale and beer, with toast, cold meat, and other additions. The like additions, with sack, and the most generous wines, found their way amongst the higher orders of mankind. And one cannot suppose but that such a diet, and the usual exercise they took, would produce a very different state of blood and other animal juices, from that which Tea, a little milk or cream, and bread and butter, affords.
It was not the breakfast only that seems to have contributed its share towards introducing a material alteration in the animal system, but the subsequent regale likewise in the afternoon. Tea is a second time brought before company; it is drank by most people, and often in no very small quantities. Before the introduction of this exotic, it was not unusual to entertain afternoon guests in a very different manner; jellies, tarts, sweet-meats; nay, cold meat, wine, cyder, strong ale, and even spirituous liquors under the title of cordials, were often brought out on these occasions, and perhaps taken to excess, much to the injury of individuals.
This kind of repast would tend to keep up the natural inflammatory diathesis, which was the result of vigour, and a plenitude of rich blood, as well as savour diseases originating from such causes. It seems not unreasonable therefore to suppose, that, as the diet of our ancestors was more generous, their exercises more athletic, and their diseases more generally the produce of a rich blood, than are observable in the present times, these debilitating effects before-mentioned may in part be attributed to the use of Tea, as no cause appears to be so general and so probable.