But this idea of evolution was itself due to the evolution of his genius, to which many various elements contributed:  his friendships and enmities with contemporary authors, his intimacies with women of refinement and fashion, his business struggles with creditors and publishers, his frequent journeys to the provinces and foreign countries; and finally his grandiose schemes to surround himself with luxury and the paraphernalia of power, not so much for his own sake as for the sake of her whose least smile was a delight and an inspiration.  About each of these topics an interesting chapter might be written, but here a few words must suffice.

After his position as an author was more or less assured, Balzac’s relations with the leaders of his craft—­such as Victor Hugo, Theophile Gautier, and George Sand—­were on the whole cordial.  He had trouble with Sainte-Beuve, however, and often felt that his brother-writers begrudged his success.  His constant attacks on contemporary journalists, and his egotistic and erratic manners naturally prejudiced the critics, so that even the marvelous romance entitled ‘La Peau de chagrin’ (The Magic Skin:  1831),—­a work of superb genius,—­speedily followed as it was by ‘Eugenie Grandet’ and ‘Le Pere Goriot,’ did not win him cordial recognition.  One or two of his friendships, however, gave him a knowledge of higher social circles than he was by birth entitled to, a fact which should be remembered in face of the charge that he did not know high life, although it is of course true that a writer like Balzac, possessing the intuition of genius, need not frequent salons or live in hovels in order to describe them with absolute verisimilitude.

With regard to Balzac’s debts, the fact should be noted that he might have paid them off more easily and speedily had he been more prudent.  He cut into the profits of his books by the costly changes he was always making in his proof-sheets,—­changes which the artist felt to be necessary, but against which the publishers naturally protested.  In reality he wrote his books on his proof-sheets, for he would cut and hack the original version and make new insertions until he drove his printers wild.  Indeed, composition never became easy to him, although under a sudden inspiration he could sometimes dash off page after page while other men slept.  He had, too, his affectations; he must even have a special and peculiar garb in which to write.  All these eccentricities and his outside distractions and ambitions, as well as his noble and pathetic love affair, entered into the warp and woof of his work with effects that can easily be detected by the careful student, who should remember, however, that the master’s foibles and peculiarities never for one moment set him outside the small circle of the men of supreme genius.  He belongs to them by virtue of his tremendous grasp of life in its totality, his superhuman force of execution and the inevitableness of his art at its best.