Laudator Temporis Acti

Augustine, Expositions of the Psalms 102.6 (Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum, vol. 95/1, p. 77; tr. Maria Boulding):

And who in this life is not sick? Is there anyone who does not have to drag his way through a long illness? Even to be born here, in a mortal body, is the onset of our maladies. Our needy condition is supported by daily doses of medicine, for the means we use to relieve our wants are like remedies applied every day. Would hunger not kill you if you did not treat it with the appropriate medicine? Would thirst not destroy you if you neglected to drink? Yet your drinking only keeps thirst at bay; it does not quench it entirely, for after that temporary relief thirst will return. With remedies like these we alleviate the distress of our sickness. You were wearied with standing; you are rested by sitting down. Sitting is a remedy for your fatigue, but the remedy itself tires you, for you cannot continue to sit for very long. Wherever our fatigue is relieved, another form of fatigue makes its entrance.

Quis enim non aegrotat in hac vita? Quis non languorem longum trahit? Nasci hic in corpore mortali incipere aegrotare est. Quotidianis medicamentis fulciuntur indigentiae nostrae, quotidiana medicamenta sunt refectiones omnium indigentiarum. Fames nonne te occideret, nisi medicamentum eius apponeres? Sitis non te perimeret, nisi eam tu bibendo, non penitus exstingueres, sed differres? Reditura est enim sitis paululum temperata. Temperamus ergo istis fomentis aerumnam aegritudinis nostrae. Stando lassatus eras, sedendo reficeris; ipsum sedere medicina est lassitudinis; in ipsa medicina rursus lassaris: diu sedere non poteris. Quidquid est, ubi fatigato succurritur, alia fatigatio inchoatur.