This is one definition of the popular theory of ‘sensibility’ as offered by Dr George Cheyne, doctor to Samuel Richardson. Eighteenth-century understandings of health were heavily influenced by sensibility. Grounded in influential works by John Locke, Isaac Newton, David Hume and Adam Smith among others, the idea of sensibility was based upon a conception of the elasticity of the nervous system. The link between ‘quick-thinkers’ and those susceptible to physical pain posits a link between sensitivity of mind and sensitivity of body, a current of thought common to much writing on sensibility in the period. In the privileged classes with access to luxury goods, the excessive consumption of fine food and drink was considered a threat to the constitution, and particularly to the constitution of those with great sensibility. Equally, the sensitive feeling of mind associated with those of sensibility was thought to render them vulnerable to nervous disorders caused by acute emotional distress. Unsurprisingly, perhaps, as the eighteenth century progressed the concept of sensibility was used to delineate gender difference.