And in the midst of this hell of conflicting interests, of days without bread, of friends who betrayed me, of jealousies that tried to injure me, I had to write ceaselessly, to think, to toil; to have droll ideas when I wept, to write of love with a heart bleeding from inward wounds, with scarce a hope on the horizon—and that hope reproachful, and asking from a knight brought back from the battle, where and why he was wounded.
Cara, do not condemn in the midst of this long torture the poor struggler who seeks a corner where to sit down and recover breath, where to breathe the sweet air of the shore and not the dusty air of the arena; do not blame me for having spent a few miserable thousand francs in going to Neufchâtel, Geneva, Vienna, and twice to Italy. (You do not comprehend Italy; in that you are dull, and I will tell you why.) Do not blame me for going to spend two or three months near you; for without these halts I should be dead.
Imprint this very succinct explanation in your beautiful and noble, pure, sublime head, and never return to these ideas that I gamble, etc.; for I have never gambled, never had any other disasters than those into which my own kindness dragged me.
Alas! I thought my pious offering for the new year had reached your hands; for allow me the intoxicating pleasure of thinking that what I give you caused me a little privation. It is in that way that poverty can equal riches. If that poor man has sold it he must have been much in need. But I shall never console myself for knowing that the chain you gave me in Geneva is not in your hands. The misfortune I can repair. What is irreparable is that the mails arrive without bringing me any letters from you. You make to yourself false ideas about me, and you do not know to what black dragons I fall a victim when a fortnight passes without manna from the Ukraine.
What! you did not receive that letter from Sion? In future, when I travel I shall prepay my letters myself. Oh! the honour of Swiss innkeepers! The rascal in whom I trusted must have burned the letter and kept the francs I gave him to prepay it.
You and I are not of the same opinion on religious questions, but I should be in despair if you adopted my ideas; I like better to see you keep your own; and I shall never do anything, even though I think I am right, to destroy them. Only, knowing you to be a good and true Catholic, I prefer the pages in which you disappoint me to those in which you preach to me Catholicism; and yet, they all give me the greatest pleasure. That is only telling you that I want both. I conceive of Catholicism as poesy, and I am preparing a work in which two lovers are led by love to the religious life; then that bag of nails whom you call your aunt will like me much and declare that I make a good use of my talents!
Addio. You have very cruelly proved to me that you have a prudent friendship for me; you judge very sternly the poor strivings of a stormy life which, from its youth up, has never had the satisfaction of saying to itself, "This is really mine."
I send you a letter I received yesterday from my sister; you will see that the poor child cannot help weeping when I weep, and laughing when I laugh. But then, it is true, she is near me, and you are in the Ukraine. And besides, those who are truly beloved are always sure of not wounding, for from them all is dear—even unjust blame.
A thousand friendly compliments to M. Hanski and remembrances to all. A kiss on the hair of your dear Anna. Thanks for the heart's-ease.
[1] For a fuller understanding of this, I refer the reader to his sister's account of his pecuniary trials, and to a brief statement of the then existing system of literary payments, which will be found in my "Memoir of Balzac," pp. 70, 71, 81, 89, 90, 158-160. It is possible that had Balzac been another man he might have rid himself of his incubus of debt—though it is difficult to say how a young man owing 100,000 francs and 6 per cent interest on them, without one penny to pay either debt or interest, could have done so. But the question here is: Could the man whose business it was to know men live apart from their lives, a beggar in a garret? Can the genius whose mission it was to grasp the whole of human society be judged in his business methods like a city banker? Edmond Werdet, the publisher, who said he suffered through his publication of Balzac's works, and who, nine years after his death, wrote a book upon him partly for revenge ("Portrait intime de Balzac, sa vie, son humeur, et son caractère." 1 vol., Paris, 1859), brought no charge against him of want of probity, or of failure to keep his money engagements. On the contrary, he says in one place: "He was an honest man; an honest man in debt, not a business man in debt, as M. Taine has said of him." In another place he says: "Balzac had his absurdities if you will, but he was exempt from vices."—TR.