All philosophers agree that the body is a machine given to man for his use. English ideas about the method of employing this machine are very different from our own. A Frenchman, as a rule, is not anxious to make any exceptional demands upon its strength. His great desire is that the machine should work properly and without requiring too much care. If on days when he feels so inclined he can walk twelve or fifteen miles without fatigue; if at the fair at Saint Cloud he can unhook an honourable number with a blow on the Turk’s head, he is perfectly satisfied. And if any one came and said to him, “Place yourself under my directions; I will make you rise early and go to bed early, although you like to rise late and sit up late: I will make you walk quickly six or seven hours a day, after which I will exterminate you with exercises on the dumb-bells; I will prevent your eating when you are hungry and drinking when you are thirsty; but thanks to my rules you will be able to do thirty miles without noticing it; at the next fair at Saint Cloud you will when you play give such a blow to the Turk’s head that the whole machine will be reduced to matchwood, and if you will accept a pair of the running breeches which Mr. Marseille offers for the use of amateurs, you will beat all his pupils in turn, amongst the applause of the idolatrous crowd;” I would bet heavily that ninety-nine Frenchmen out of a hundred would reply to this vile tempter-- “A thousand thanks! But first of all, I have a number of more interesting and amusing things to do than any of those you propose for me. I have only one life, and should be miserable if I used it in so wearisome a fashion. And lastly, if I must tell you the whole truth, it is possible that the prospect you open out to me may be very attractive to certain people, but it leaves me quite indifferent! Allow me, then, to remain as I am!” An Englishman would probably accept the bargain at once. I was wrong to use the conditional. Two-thirds of the English, at least of those who belong to the upper classes of society, look up to this ideal from their earliest youth. Amongst our neighbours the truest happiness in reality consists in the enjoyment and exercise of physical strength. Incontestably that is the quality that they most appreciate. I have seen many Englishmen, thoroughly exasperated against Mr. Gladstone because of his Radicalism, allow their anger to melt away when they remember that although nearly eighty years old, he can still cut down trees at Hawarden.