The human race, as far as I can make out, is divided into two sorts of people; those who say “yes” unto life and those who say “no.” The former accept it and courageously they endeavor to make the best of whatever bargain fate has handed out to them. The latter accept it too (how could they help themselves?) but they hold the gift in great contempt and fret about it like children who have been given a new little brother when they really wanted a puppy or a railroad train. But whereas the cheerful brethren of “yes” are willing to accept their morose neighbors at their own valuation and tolerate them, and do not hinder them when they fill the landscape with their lamentations and the hideous monuments to their own despair, the fraternity of “no” rarely extends this same courtesy to the parties of the first part. Indeed if they had their own way, the “nays” would immediately purge this planet of the “yeas.” As this cannot very well be done, they satisfy the demands of their jealous souls by the incessant persecution of those who claim that the world belongs to the living and not to the dead. Dr. Rabelais belonged to the former class. Few of his patients or his thoughts ever went out to the cemetery. This, no doubt, was very regrettable, but we cannot all be grave-diggers. There have to be a few Poloniuses and a world composed exclusively of Hamlets would be a terrible place of abode. As for the story of Rabelais’ life, there was nothing very mysterious about it. The few details which are omitted in the books written by his friends are found in the works of his enemies and as a result we can follow his career with a fair degree of accuracy. Rabelais belonged to the generation which followed immediately upon Erasmus but he was born into a world still largely dominated by monks, nuns, deacons, and a thousand and one varieties of mendicant friars. He was born in Chinon. His father was either an apothecary or a dealer in spirits (which were different professions in the fifteenth century) and the old man was sufficiently well-to-do to send his son to a good school. There young François was thrown into the company of the scions of a famous local family called du Bellay-Langey. These boys, like their father, had a streak of genius. They wrote well. Upon occasion they could fight well. They were men of the world in the good sense of that oft misunderstood expression. They were faithful servitors of their master the king, held endless public offices, became bishops and cardinals and ambassadors, translated the classics, edited manuals of infantry drill and ballistics and brilliantly performed all the many useful services that were expected of the aristocracy in a day when a title condemned a man to a life of few pleasures and many duties and responsibilities.