The official sanction to publication was to be obtained by making the authorities believe that the author was only a gay and witty philosopher, a prince of good fellows whose doctrines were not dangerous to the continuance of the nobility and the prerogatives of the aristocracy; whose ideas presented nothing subversive, neither as to the secular power nor to sacerdotal domination. Meantime, the Sorbonnists, whom Rabelais had the impudence to rail at, doubted perhaps the position reserved for them in such a satire, as for several years previous they had been secretly hostile to him, which was a serious matter, considering their influence. The condemnation to the stake of Louis Berquin, as a propagator of reform ideas; the pursuit of Desperriers, accused of Atheism; and the red danger-signals waving on every hand, determined Rabelais, before publishing his work, to quit Touraine and to go to Montpellier, where he demanded protection of the Faculty. His natural pronounced taste for the natural sciences, the avidity with which he continually extended the circle of his knowledge, and, above all, the liberty of University life, had long before attracted the former monk towards the study of medicine. It was under these conditions that Rabelais left Longey to go to Montpellier, where his reputation for erudition, keen wit and most perfect good nature had long before preceded him. The reading of all the classical Greek authors, and principally Aristotle, had initiated him in the natural sciences to that extent that he was ready to receive his degree of “Bachelor in Medicine” shortly after his arrival at the University, under the following circumstances: He had followed the crowd of students who read theses in the public halls, and thus mingled with the auditors at the meeting; the discussion was on the subject of botany. The arguments of the orators appeared so weak to Rabelais that he soon manifested signs of impatience by a very sarcastic remark that drew the attention of the Dean to the newcomer. He was invited to enter the enclosure reserved for doctors who debated, but excused himself on the grounds that his opinions would not be proper to enunciate before such a gathering of _savants_, and that he was, besides, only a Bachelor; but, being pressed by the crowd, who seemed pleased by his appearance and manner, he treated the question under discussion in such a masterly manner, and with an eloquence so unequalled, that rounds of applause greeted him on every side; his knowledge of the subject seemed unbounded. The Faculty was so pleased that he was immediately honored with the Baccalaureat. This was in November, 1530. Rabelais had not taken his doctor’s bonnet when his great medical talent was fully known and appreciated by the professors of the Medical Department of Montpellier, where his winning grace, good humor, and communicative gayety made him friends everywhere.