218 ROUGH WA YS MADE SMOOTH. 



malady lie lurking all that while ? And he being so far from 

 the infirmity, how could that small part of his substance carry 

 away so great an impression of its share ? And how so con- 

 cealed that, till five-and- forty years after, I did not begin to 

 be sensible of it ? being the only one to this hour, amongst 

 so many brothers and sisters, and all of one mother, that was 

 ever troubled with it. He that can satisfie me in this point, 

 I will believe him in as many other miracles as he pleases, 

 always provided that, as their manner is, he does not give me 

 a doctrine much more intricate and fantastic than the thing 

 itself, for current pay.' When we note, however, that in many 

 cases the children of persons affected like the elder Montaigne 

 are not affected like the parents, but with other infirmities, 

 as the tendency to gout, and vice versa (a circumstance of 

 which I myself have but too good reason to be cognisant, 

 a parent's tendency to gout having in my case been trans- 

 mit ed in the modified but even more troublesome form of 

 the disease which occasioned Montaigne so much anguish), 

 we perceive that it is not ' some small part of the substance ' 

 which transmits its condition to the child, but the general 

 state of the constitution. Moreover, it may be hoped in 

 many cases (which would scarcely be the case if the condition 

 or qualities of some part of the body only were transmitted) that 

 the germs of disease, or rather the predisposition to disease, 

 may be greatly diminished, or even entirely eradicated, by 

 suitable precautions. Thus persons inheriting a tendency to 

 consumption have become, in many cases, vigorous and 

 healthy by passing as much of their time as possible in the 

 open air, by avoiding crowded and over-heated rooms, taking 

 moderate but regular exercise, judicious diet, and so forth. 

 We believe that the disease which troubled the last fifteen 

 years of the life of Montaigne might readily have been pre- 

 vented, and the tendency to it eradicated, during his youth. 



Let us turn, however, from these considerations to others 

 more interesting, though less important, and on the whole 

 perhaps better suited to these pages. 



The inheritance of tricks or habits is one of the most per- 



