of an athlete and believed himself destined to live to the age of a
hundred years and upward. According to his calculations, a man did not
reach his perfect development until after completing his first century;
and, in order to do this, he took the most minute care of himself. He
studied the Chinese people, celebrated for their longevity, and he
sought for the best methods of maintaining what he called the
equilibrium of vital forces. When any event contradicted his theories,
he found no trouble in turning it to his own advantage.

"He was never," related his daughter, Mme. Laure Surville, in her
article upon Balzac, "under any circumstances at a loss for a retort.
One day, when a newspaper article relating to a centenarian was being
read aloud (an article not likely to escape notice in our family, as
may well be imagined) he interrupted the reader, contrary to his habit,
in order to say enthusiastically, 'There is a man who has lived wisely
and has never squandered his strength in all sorts of excesses, as so
many imprudent young people do!' It turned out, on the contrary, that
this wise old man frequently became drunk, and that he took a late
supper every evening, which, according to my father, was one of the
greatest enormities that one could perpetrate against one's health.
'Well,' resumed my father imperturbably, 'the man has shortened his
life, no doubt about it.'"

Francois Balzac was not to be shaken in his opinions. Furthermore, he
was not satisfied with asserting them in the course of conversation,
but in spite of his lack of confidence in the influence of books upon
prejudiced readers (for he considered that the sole exception was the
reaction against chivalry brought about by Cervantes's Don Quixote), he
wrote a number of pamphlets in which the vigour and originality of his
mind are revealed. He published successively: An Essay regarding Two