Welcome to a collection of ten intriguing letters that found their way into a 17th‑century advice column, offering a window into the everyday dilemmas and curiosities of Londoners in 1690.

Why These Intriguing Letters Matter

These letters reveal that many of the worries people had three centuries ago sound astonishingly familiar today. From love and hair color to mysterious dogs, the human mind has long been preoccupied with the same questions.

10 Young Men Back Then Had Similar Concerns To Those Of Today

A red‑haired gentleman confesses his hopeless crush on a lady who despises his fiery locks. He hopes to temporarily disguise his hair so she won’t reject him after marriage.

Q. It is my misfortune to be red‑haired. I love a lady who has the greatest aversion imaginable to that colored hair. I love her to distraction and have sufficient hope of obtaining her were this obstacle removed.

I don’t expect a perfect alteration of the hair. I only beg you would direct me in such a method as may make it brown for 15 or 16 days so that neither sweat nor rain will efface it, and then to repeat it again, for if she discovers it at any time after marriage, her aversion will be equally fatal to me.

A. We fancy it can’t be impossible to have your hair stained or dyed by a skillful painter with ingredients so strong as it would never out till that crop were off the ground. For the rest of the hair, since it will be every day peeping out and in a little while your head will be like a bullfinch’s, of two colors, in which case we know no remedy but to repeat the operation.

9 Cure For Hearing Voices

A gentleman claims he constantly hears disembodied voices, each threatening him, and seeks a remedy.

Q. There is a gentleman who has for a long time been possessed with a fancy that people are continually talking to him with an audible voice, sometimes one, sometimes another, who threaten to destroy him one way or another.

Now, gentlemen, your opinion is desired, whether it be possible for persons to discourse with him at a great distance and in such manner as not to be heard by some friends near him who have the sense of hearing quick enough? Whence this fancy proceeds, and what means are proper to cure and remove it?

A. We have heard a great many plausible stories of men conversing with spirits, but we neither see how it can be performed nor can positively prove the contrary.

Yet are most apt to believe the notion proceeds from some distempers in the brain and is nothing else but the effect of a melancholy fancy which is often caused by the indisposition of the body and sometimes by want for agreeable conversation. But however it comes, the best way to remove it is by taking physic (medicine), walking abroad, and frequenting agreeable company.

8 A Clairvoyant Dog

A family notices their dog’s eerie behavior—howling and pointing toward a church—just before the death of a relative, suggesting a supernatural knack.

Q. I desire your opinion of the following relation: My father had a dog which he kept a great many years, in which time I had two brothers and one sister that died, and it was observed that this dog always the day before they died, went about [90 meters (300 ft)] from the house and laid his nose toward the church where they are all buried and howled in a strange, hideous manner for an hour or more at a time, and when my father died, he did the same.

Now it seems as if this dog had some prophetic knowledge in these matters. Gentlemen, your opinion would much oblige.

A. We can’t tell what to make of hundreds of such instances as these, some of which we ourselves are assured are true. All we can say is, there must be something in it not natural since what power in nature has a dog more than any other creature to foresee (or rather foresmell) such accidents.

7 Not The Best Husband

A married man, whose wife is gravely ill, wonders whether he may pray for her soul’s release so he can seek happiness elsewhere.

Q. I’m a married man, but having a very ill wife, have been parted from her for some years, and design never to live with her more. Now I desire your advice whether I may pray to God to take her to himself, that I may endeavor to make myself happy in another.

A. Sure if she’s fit for heaven, she’s fit for you; and if she were as good while you lived with her as she is now, how came you to part? It would yet be handsomer to submit to God’s will and wait with patience, or rather pray that he’d convert her, than take her away in such a condition.

6 Or The Best Wife

A husband complains that his wife, posing as a widow, runs a tavern, drinks heavily, hurls insults, and siphons off household funds, leaving him in financial peril.

Q. I have been married (God help me) to a pretended widow who keeps a public house for five years. She drinks herself very plentifully and extremely abuses me when she’s drunk, nor can I excuse her when she’s sober, which does not often happen.

She gives me very scurrilous language—rascal, cuckold—and this before all the company that comes to her house. I can’t call it mine for I must confess it is she that wears the breeches.

She takes all the money that’s spent in the house and won’t allow me one penny. She has already conveyed several hundred pounds out of the house, which she’ll give me no account of, but declares she’ll run me in debt as much as possible, on purpose, that I may rot and starve in a Gaol (O loving spouse). For charity, I beg your advice how, if possible, I may reduce her to a better mind.

A. Alas! If one-half of this be true, thou art in a very woeful pickle and require the charitable assistance of all well‑disposed husbands. We’ll be short in our advice—for mending your good spouse, we think it is impossible unless as we mend an old coat with a new one.

Your way, therefore, is to get three or four lusty, honest fellows into the house with ye, take your dearly beloved and mew her up in some garret till you have sold off house and household stuff, and retire somewhere or other into the country that she may not find ye (as you value your nose, ears, and all the rest of your movables) and there make much of yourself at a safer distance from her, since she has, it seems, feathered her nest so well already that there’s no fear of so good a creatures wanting.

5 Google Didn’t Exist Back Then

A debate over whether the River Thames freezes from the bottom up leads to a scientific explanation about heat and water density.

Q. I have maintained an argument with a certain gentleman against the vulgar opinion that the Thames first freezes at the bottom. I could not by all the arguments I brought from philosophy or right reason convince him to the contrary. Pray, gentlemen, let us hear your opinion in this case as soon as possible.

A. All experience shows that water never freezes in the bottom ’till all above it be froze, for the causes of freezing is the nitrosity [sic] of the air. Fishes retire to the deepest places in wintertime to avoid the cold, and every swimmer will tell you that water exposed to the air is always different in its temperature from that which is deeper.

4 The Simplest Things Weren’t Well Understood

A query about why some men lack facial hair, answered with a theory involving heat and bodily moisture.

Q. What’s the reason that some men have no beards?

A. A want of heat and a due disposition of nature. So where there is not heat enough to open the pores for the [growth] of hair, that humidity and moisture which is the natural cause of hair retires to other parts of the body more adapt [sic] and better prepared for expulsion.

3 A Frightening Time To Live

A servant, after being robbed, seeks a sorceress’s help; a mysterious woman shows him the thief’s shape, causing him to die of fright.

Q. I have a certain knowledge of a thing that happened not long ago—a gentleman having been robbed, suspected a servant of his, who being innocent suspected another, and to clear himself, he went to a sorceress.

As he was going, he was met by a female who addressed him thus: I know whether you are going, come along with me, and I will show you who has robbed your master of his money.

The servant went with her, and she showed him the shape of the thief, with which he was so surprised that he died of the fright in three or four days. What is your opinion of this?

A. We answer that it was either the Devil himself, who is never idle in such cases unless restrained by an overruling power, or at least some witch of the Devil who received both intelligence and power for the young man’s unhappy information. As to his death by a fright, it is ordinary.

2 Simple Pleasures Were Questioned

A 19‑year‑old wonders if dancing is sinful, fearing it stems from pagan rites and could weaken piety.

Q. I’m about 19 years old and have often been desired by my friends to learn to dance. But I somewhat question the lawfulness of it and would fain know your opinion.

For I take it to be an institution of the pagans, who upon the days of their sacrifices did dance before the altars of their gods. Besides, it weakens piety, occasions ill thoughts, and seems a breach of the Seventh Commandment. I desire a speedy answer.

A. Dancing seems in some sort natural. It is difficult not to leap for joy, and the whole body seems to follow the motion of the spirits and blood. We might as well say feeling, too, were a sin.

For the weakening piety, it must be by occasioning ill thoughts or wasting time, neither of which are necessary effects of it, any more than of courtship to one you intend to make your wife.

But if you find they are, you must forbear public dancing, and yet may still be privately instructed by a master at your own chamber, there being a time for recreation as well as study and business.

1 A Timeless Question

The ultimate query: what is love? The answer blends friendship, desire, and honor into a balanced definition.

Q. What’s love?

A. Love, and you’ll know. We’ll give you the best description we can of that passion, which we have some reason to know. ‘Tis a mixture of friendship and desire, bounded by the rules of honor and virtue.

There must be friendship in it, which may be called the spirit or soul of love, as desire the material part, and honor, if you please, that which binds both together and makes the vital union. Love being a medium between pure friendship and perfect desire; ’tis warm enough to keep friendship from an ague, but not so furiously hot as to set all on fire.

To discover the secret to a longer life, the best people to ask must surely be those who have lived the longest. Some of the oldest people in the world were born before the turn of the 20th century, and have lived well past 100 without, well erm, dying.

This certainly isn’t medically sound advice for the most part, more like an insight into what it is that the world’s super centenarians believe has kept them going all these years. So what is it that makes these people special? What’s their secret? As we’ll discover, its not always what you might imagine…

10. “Mind your own business”

In 2011 the Guinness World Records handed the title of ‘world’s oldest living person’ to Georgia resident, Besse Cooper who retained the record until she passed away in 2012 at the age of 116. Of the two pieces of advice that she offered, one is perhaps more likely to be in line with your doctor’s recommendations than the other.

Her secret to longevity? “I mind my own business, and I don’t eat junk food.”

So maybe cutting down on the unhealthy stuff would be a good start. Beyond that, maybe you should stop being such a busybody!

9. “Sushi and sleep”

Misao Okawa is a Japanese super centeniarian at 116 years old, and is currently the world’s oldest living person. Born on 5th of March 1898 in Tenma, Osaka, Misao says the key to a long life is eating sushi and getting at least eight hours sleep a night. She said in 2014 “Eat and sleep and you will live a long time. You have to learn to relax.”.

Who would have thought that one of the secrets to a longer life could involve getting enough sleep? So next time we’re feeling guilty for sleeping in passed what others might call a ‘reasonable time,’ we can be reassured that we’re simply investing in our longevity. Sushi for breakfast!

8. “Never get bored”

“I’ve only ever had one wrinkle, and I’m sitting on it”.

Quoted on her 110th birthday, there was really no doubt that Jeanne Calment still had her sense of humor. Calment was born in France 14 years before the construction of the Eiffel Tower, and at 122 was the oldest person ever when she died in August 1997.

Every birthday during her last decade was celebrated in France. She delighted in amusing reporters with her many secrets of longevity. The list was different every year and included (among others) laughter, activity and “a stomach like an ostrich.” Calment also attributes her many years to her faith, stating “(God) has forgotten me. He can’t be in such a hurry to see me. He already knows me very well.”

At her party a year before her death, Calment gave some insight into what it takes to stay interested and engaged during a life as long as hers. “I dream, I think, I go over my life… I never get bored.“.

7. “Hard work and a glass of wine”

Well, it was inevitable that ‘hard work’ would come up eventually, but the wine is a silver lining.

Marie-Louise Meilleur lived in Corbeil, Ontario and was 117 years old when she died in 1998. She cited hard work as the major factor in contributing to her impressive age, but she likely extended her life by some years when she stopped smoking at 90 years old. As well as hard work, Meilleur was known to enjoy a glass of wine, which she also cited as a contirbuing factor in her longevity.

At least after all that hard work you’ll feel like you’ve earned your glass of wine, right?

6. “Be nice, worship God and eat pigs’ feet”

Jeralean Talley is an American super centenarian who is, at the age of 115 years, the oldest living person in the United States and third verified oldest living person in the world. Talley still lives very much as she always has done, often staying up until midnight feasting on some of her favorite foods: potato salad, honey buns, McDonald’s chicken nuggets and Wendy’s chili.

Staying active at her age isn’t a problem either. Talley sews dresses, makes quilts and enjoys playing the slot machines at casinos. At 104 years old she had to give up bowling though, as she no longer had the strength in her legs.

Staying active isn’t Jeralean’s secret to a long life though. “Do unto others as you desire them to do unto you,” is her mantra, and she insists that’s the secret to living a long life. It should also be said though, that eating plenty of pork is on her list too. Every Christmas, she bakes pigs’ ears and feet in a jelly stock for herself and her family.

5. “Two eggs a day – one raw and one cooked”

When it comes to Emma Morano’s secret to longevity, its all about the diet. She was born in 1899 and is the last living European person to have been born in the 1800s.

The 115 year old lives in Verbania, Italy, is in pretty good shape for someone who has seen 11 popes come and go. She still spends her days doing housework and cooking. Morano says her diet – including a raw egg every day – has helped her outlive most born in her time. “For breakfast I eat biscuits with milk or water,” she said. “Then during the day I eat two eggs – one raw and one cooked – just like the doctor recommended when I was 20 years old. For lunch I’ll eat pasta and minced meat then for dinner, I’ll have just a glass of milk.”

Not exactly an exciting diet, but it’s certainly working for Ms. Morano.

4. “Don’t get married”

Scotland’s oldest resident Jessie Gallan celebrated her 109th birthday in January 2015. Being Scottish, it’s rather predictable that one of the reasons she cites for her impressive age is eating plenty of porridge. But that’s not her strangest explanation for her place in the centenarian club.

“My secret to a long life has been staying away from men. They’re just more trouble than they’re worth,” she said in an interview this year. “I also made sure that I got plenty of exercise, eat a nice warm bowl of porridge every morning and have never gotten married.”

Now we all know some people who could do with being single for a while, but a full 109 years is probably a bit much! After all, can life really be appreciated to it’s fullest without someone there to enjoy it with you?

3. “Staying positive and lots of singing”

Christian Mortensen lived in Marin County, CA until the grand age of 115 years old. He was born on Aug. 16 1882, in Skarrup, Denmark and came to the United States when he was 21. On his 115th birthday in 1998 he was asked about the key to his impressive longevity. His answer reads a bit like a ‘good news, bad news’ rollercoaster. He revealed his secrets as…

“Friends, a good cigar, drinking lots of good water, no alcohol, staying positive and lots of singing will keep you alive for a long time.”.

Mortensen loved cigars and smoked a few per week from around 20 years old until his death. But it seems that staying positive had a great effect on his life, and he kept singing all through until his death in 1998.

2. “Funche”

Don’t tell me you don’t know what ‘Funche’ is!

Emiliano Mercado del Toro was born in Puerto Rico in 1891, and became the world’s oldest living person on December 11, 2006. Although there have been many super centenarians awarded this title at some point in their lives, del Toro was one of the few men to do so.

Emiliano credited his long life to Funche, which is a traditional Peurto Rican dish that he ate every day. Consisting of a blend of corn, milk and fish, Funche doesn’t sound that appealing to the uninitiated. But if the oldest man in the world consumed the dish daily, then maybe we should be giving it a try. Can we add bacon?

1. “Smoke cigars, drink beer and eat greasy food”

Now then, I would suggest this advice be taken with a pinch of salt (pun definitely intended), as all medical advice would suggest you really shouldn’t be doing any of these things if your intention is to live beyond 70, never mind 100. But this is the philosophy behind the remarkable John McMorran, who at 113 was America’s oldest man before his death in 2003.

As well as cigars, beer and greasy foods, McMorran also stresses the importance of staying away from cheap whisky in staying healthy. “He was never sick,” 35-year-old great-granddaughter Lisa Saxton remarked in 2003. “He lived a great life. Obviously, he was well put together. He smoked cigars, drank beer and ate greasy food. He was an amazing man.”

An amazing man indeed, living life on his terms right until the end. Advice from our super centenarians varies a lot, and can even be quite contradictory! One thing that most have in common though, is a tendency to avoid stress. Nearly all who were asked reported that being positive or avoiding anxiety in their lives had a positive impact. We really can’t know for sure what it is that kept these folks going well beyond 100, but you can bet that for the most part they didn’t really worry too much about it.