One should avoid all acids, except salads. As much sugar as possible should be put on fruits and all should avoid cold baths. One should seek as long as possible, to breathe the pure country air, eat many grapes when they are in season, and never go to the ball for the mere pleasure of dancing. Ordinarily one should go to bed about eleven, P. M., and never, under any circumstances, sit up more than an hour later. Following this regime resolutely, all the distractions of nature will soon be repaired. Health and beauty will both be advanced, and accents of gratitude will ring in the ears of the professor. Sheep are fattened, as are oxen, lobsters and oysters. Hence, I deduce the general maxim; viz: "He that eats may be made fat, provided that the food be chosen correctly, and according to the physiology of the animal to be fattened." MEDITATION XXIV. FASTING. DEFINITION. FASTING is a moral abstinence from food, from some religious or moral influence. Though contrary to our tastes and habits, it is yet of the greatest antiquity. ORIGIN. Authors explain the matter thus: In individual troubles, when a father, mother, or beloved child have died, all the household is in mourning. The body is washed, perfumed, enbalmed, and buried as it should be--none then think of eating, but all fast. In public calamites, when a general drought appears, and cruel wars, or contagious maladies come, we humble ourselves before the power that sent them, and mortify ourselves by abstinence. Misfortune ceases. We become satisfied that the reason was that we fasted, and we continue to have reference to such conjectures. Thus it is, men afflicted with public calamities or private ones, always yield to sadness, fail to take food, and in the end, make a voluntary act, a religious one. They fancied they should macerate their body when their soul was oppressed, that they could excite the pity of the gods. This idea seized on all nations and filled them with the idea of mourning, prayers, sacrifice, abstinence, mortification, etc. Christ came and sanctified fasting. All Christian sects since then have adopted fasting more or less, as an obligation. HOW PEOPLE USED TO FAST. The practice of fasting, I am sorry to say, has become very rare; and whether for the education of the wicked, or for their conversion, I am glad to tell how we fast now in the XVIII. century. Ordinarily we breakfast before nine o'clock, on bread, cheese, fruit and cold meats. Between one and two P. M., we take soup or pot au feu according to our positions. About four, there is a little lunch kept up for the benefit of those people who belong to other ages, and for children. About eight there was a regular supper, with entrees roti entremets dessert: all shared in it, and then went to bed.