ely sees a sick person who is happy. Even those who are
endowed with great force of character lose, under the burden of their
sufferings, part of their firmness of soul and of their legitimate
ambition.

A very scientific force of hygiene is particularly recommended.
Excessive measures of any sort must be avoided for various reasons:

(1) They are antagonistic to the maintenance of a perfect physical
equilibrium.

(2) They will inevitably grow to dominate the mind unduly.

When we speak of excesses, we intend to include those undertaken in the
way of work no less than those which are the outcome of the search for
pleasure.

Nevertheless we will hasten to add that these last are much the more to
be feared.

What can be expected, for instance, from a man who has passed a night in
debauchery?

Morning finds him a weakling, good for nothing, and incapable of making
the slightest effort that calls for energy.

He is lucky, indeed, if his excesses have no disastrous results that
will destroy his happiness or his good name.

The fear of complications that may be the outcome of his gross pleasures
soon begins to haunt him and to usurp in his mind the place of nobler
and more useful impulses.

As to his health, it is hardly necessary for us to insist upon the
disorder that such habits must necessarily produce.

The least misfortune that he can look for is a profound lassitude and a
desire for rest which is the enemy of all virile effort.

The same thing is true of the man who indulges too freely in the
pleasures of the table. The work of digestion leaves him in an exhausted
condition and with a craving for repose that very soon results in a
complete lack of moral tone.

Even supposing that his daily routine consists of two principal meals,
and of two others of less importance, it will be easily understood that
the man who loads down his stomach with such a large amount of
continuous work will not be very apt to adapt himself readily to matters
of a wholly different kind.

To avoid pain, to sit inert, like a gorged animal, without attempting to
think, is the sole desire of the gluttons who are wearied by every
repeated excess.

The same reasoning could be applied to the lazy, who suffer in health
from indulgence in their favorite vice.

It can not be disputed that lack of exercise is the cause of ailments
that have a marked effect upon the moral character.

Since physical laziness always goes hand in hand w