ng I was
about to make the first dash at my work, when your letter came and
completely upset me. Do you think it possible to have artistic
inspirations after being brought suddenly face to face with such a
picture of my miseries as you have traced? Do you think that if I
did not feel them, I should work as I do? . . . Farewell, my good
mother. Try and achieve impossibilities, which is what I am doing
on my side. My life is one perpetual miracle. . . . You ask me to
write you in full detail; but, my dear mother, have you yet to be
told what my existence is? When I am able to write, I work at my
manuscripts; when I am not working at my manuscripts, I am
thinking of them; I never have any rest. How is it my friends are
not aware of this? . . . I beg of you, my dear mother, in the name
of my heavy work, never to write me that such a work is good, and
such another bad: you upset me for a fortnight."

Balzac appreciated what his mother did for him, and while he never
fully repaid her the money she had so often requested of him, she
might have felt herself partially compensated by these kind words of
affection:

"My kind and excellent mother,--After writing to you in such haste,
I felt my inmost heart melt as I read your letter again, and I
worshipped you. How shall I return to you, when shall I return to
you, and can I ever return to you, by my love and endeavors for
your happiness, all that you have done for me? I can at present
only express my deep thankfulness. . . . How deep is my gratitude
towards the kind hearts who pluck some of the thorns from my life
and smooth my path by their affection. But constrained to an
unceasing warfare against destiny, I have not always leisure to
give utterance to what I feel. I would not, however, allow a day
to pass without letting you know the tenderness your late proofs
of devotion excite in me. A mother suffers the pangs of labor more
than once with her children, does she not, my mother? Poor
mothers, are you ever enough beloved! . . . I hope, my much
beloved mother, you will not let yourself grow dejected. I work as
hard as it is possible for a man to work; a day is only twelve
hours long, I can do no more. . . . Farewell, my darling mother; I
am very tired! Coffee burns my stomach. For the last twenty days I
have taken no rest; and yet I must still work on, that I may
remove your anxieties. . . . Keep your house; I