ntributes his stone to the edifice of ideas,' he wrote, 'whoever
proclaims an abuse, whoever sets his mark upon an evil to be abolished,
always passes for immoral. If you are true in your portraits, if, by
dint of daily and nightly toil, you succeed in writing the most difficult
language in the world, the word immoral is thrown in your face.' The
morals of the personages of the _Comedie Humaine_ are simply the morals
of the world around us. They are part of the artist's subject-matter;
they are not part of his method. If there be any need of censure it is
to life, not to literature, that it should be given. Balzac, besides, is
essentially universal. He sees life from every point of view. He has no
preferences and no prejudices. He does not try to prove anything. He
feels that the spectacle of life contains its own secret. 'Il cree un
monde et se tait.'

And what a world it is! What a panorama of passions! What a pell-mell
of men and women! It was said of Trollope that he increased the number
of our acquaintances without adding to our visiting list; but after the
_Comedie Humaine_ one begins to believe that the only real people are the
people who never existed. Lucien de Rubempre, le Pere Goriot, Ursule
Mirouet, Marguerite Claes, the Baron Hulot, Madame Marneffe, le Cousin
Pons, De Marsay--all bring with them a kind of contagious illusion of
life. They have a fierce vitality about them: their existence is fervent
and fiery-coloured; we not merely feel for them but we see them--they
dominate our fancy and defy scepticism. A steady course of Balzac
reduces our living friends to shadows, and our acquaintances to the
shadows of shades. Who would care to go out to an evening party to meet
Tomkins, the friend of one's boyhood, when one can sit at home with
Lucien de Rubempre? It is pleasanter to have the entree to Balzac's
society than to receive cards from all the duchesses in Mayfair.

In spite of this, there are many people who have declared the _Comedie
Humaine_ to be indigestible. Perhaps it is: but then what about
truffles? Balzac's publisher refused to be disturbed by any such
criticism as that. 'Indigestible, is it?' he exclaimed with what, for a
publisher, was rare good sense. 'Well, I should hope so; who ever thinks
of a dinner that isn't?'

Balzac's Novels in English. _The Duchesse de Langeais and Other
Stories_; _Cesar Birotteau_. (Routledge and Sons.)

BEN JONSON
(_Pall Mall Gazet