He passed his life near a window, which looked out on the street and drank from time to time a glass of ale from a huge pitcher he kept by his side.

His strange appearance used to attract the attention of passers, whom he used always to put to flight by saying in a sepulchral tone “What are you staring at like wild cats?  Go about your business, you blackguards,” etc.

Having spoken to him one day, he told me that he was not at all annoyed and that if death did not interrupt him, he would be glad to live till the day of judgment.

From the preceding, it appears that if obesity be not a disease, it is at least a very troublesome predisposition, into which we fall from our own fault.

The result is, that we should all seek to preserve ourselves from it before we are attacked, and to cure ourselves when it befalls us.  For the sake of the unfortunate we will examine what resources science presents us.

Meditation XXII.

Preservative treatment and cure of obesity. [Footnote:  About twenty years ago I began a treatise, ex professo, on obesity.  My readers must especially regret the preface which was of dramatic form.  I averred to a physician that a fever is less dangerous than a law suit; for the latter, after having made a man run, fatigue, and worry himself, strips him of pleasure, money, and life.  This is a statement which might be propagated as well as any other. ]

I will begin by a fact which proves that courage is needed not only to prevent but to cure obesity.

M. Louis Greffulhe, whom his majesty afterwards honored with the title of count, came one morning to see me, saying that he had understood that I had paid great attention to obesity, and asked me for advice.

“Monsieur,” said I, “not being a doctor with a diploma, I might refuse you, but I will not, provided you give me your word of honor that for one month you will rigorously obey my directions.”

M. Greffulhe made the promise I required and gave me his hand.  On the next day, I gave him my directions, the first article of which demanded that he should at once get himself weighed, so that the result might be made mathematically.

After a month he came to see me again, and spoke to me nearly thus: 

“Monsieur,” said he, “I followed your prescription as if my life depended on it, and during the month I am satisfied that I have lost three pounds and more; but have for that purpose to violate all my tastes and, habits so completely, that while I thank you for your advice I must decline to follow it, and await quietly the fate God ordains for me.”

I heard this resolution with pain.  M. Greffulhe became every day fatter and subject to all the inconveniences of extreme obesity, and died of suffocation when he was about forty.

Generalities.

The cure of obesity should begin with three precepts of absolute theory, discretion in eating, moderation in sleep, and exercise on foot or horseback.