Laudator Temporis Acti

Augustine, Sermons 385.7 (Patrologia Latina, vol. 39, cols. 1693-1694; tr. Edmund Hill):

I mean, what the doctors call health or well-being, brothers and sisters, is not the real, true kind; it is just a sort of alleviation for us, because life in this fragile flesh is a continuous sickness. You imagine, do you, that people are sick when they have a fever, and in good health when they are hungry? "He's well," they say. Do you want to set how bad it is to be hungry? Leave him without medicine for a week, he's dead; but because you set before him the appropriate medicine every day, he stays alive.

The medicine for hunger, of course, is food; the medicine for thirst, drink; the medicine for weariness, sleep. The medicine for sitting down is walking about; the medicine for walking about is sitting down; the medicine for fatigue is slumber; the medicine for slumber is being awake. And notice how feeble the human body is; the very aids I mentioned, if you take them and persist in them, your health suffers. When you were hungry, you looked for the aid of food; here's the aid of food; you eat it, you satisfy your hunger. If you do more than satisfy your hunger, your health suffers. You look for a drink to aid you in your thirst; if you drink too much, you choke, where just now you were being driven by thirst. You've got tired through walking, you want to sit down; sit down perpetually, and see if you don't get tired of that. So whatever remedy you take to eliminate some inconvenience, if you persist in it, your health suffers.

Non enim vera salus est, fratres, quam dicunt medici. Paregorizamur quodammodo: nam aegritudo perpetua est in ista fragilitate carnis. Putatis enim tunc hominem aegrotare quando febrit, et sanum esse quando esurit? Sanus est, dicitur. Vis videre, quantum malum est esurire? Dimitte illum sine medicamento septem diebus, occiditur; sed quia apponis cotidie medicamentum vivit.

Medicamentum autem famis, cibus est; medicamentum sitis, potus est; medicamentum lassitudinis, somnus est; medicamentum sessionis, deambulatio est; medicamentum deambulationis, sessio est; medicamentum fatigationis, dormitio est; medicamentum dormitionis, vigilatio est. Et vide quam imbecille sit corpus humanum: hoc ipsum adiutorium, quod dixi, qui adsumit, si in eo perseveraverit, deficit. Esuriendo cibi quaerebas adiutorium: ecce adiutorium cibi: manducas, reficeris; si plus refeceris, plus deficis. Adiutorium sitis quaerebas potum: multum bibendo offocaris, qui sitiendo urgebaris. Lassasti ambulando, sedere vis: sede perpetuo, vide si non lassabis. Quicquid ergo adsumpserit ut aliud pellat, in eo ipso si perseveraverit, deficit.

Thesaurus Linguae Latinae, s.v. paregorizo (10,1:351; click once or twice to enlarge):