“Have you ever met, for your happiness, some woman whose harmonious tones give to her speech the charm that is no less conspicuous in her manners, who knows how to talk and to be silent, who cares for you with delicate feeling, whose words are happily chosen and her language pure?  Her banter caresses you, her criticism does not sting; she neither preaches or disputes, but is interested in leading a discussion, and stops at the right moment.  Her manner is friendly and gay, her politeness is unforced, her earnestness is not servile; she reduces respect to a mere gentle shade; she never tires you, and leaves you satisfied with her and yourself.  You will see her gracious presence stamped on the things she collects about her.  In her home everything charms the eye, and you breathe, as it seems, your native air.  This woman is quite natural.  You never feel an effort, she flaunts nothing, her feelings are expressed with simplicity because they are genuine.  Though candid, she never wounds the most sensitive pride; she accepts men as God made them, pitying the victims, forgiving defects and absurdities, sympathizing with every age, and vexed with nothing because she has the tact of foreseeing everything.  At once tender and gay, she first constrains and then consoles you.  You love her so truly that if this angel does wrong, you are ready to justify her.  Such was Madame Firmiani.”

It was to Madame de Berny’s son, Alexandre, that Balzac dedicated Madame Firmiani, and he no doubt recognized the portrait.

Balzac often portrayed his own life and his association with women in his works.  In commenting on La Peau de Chagrin, he writes: 

 “Pauline is a real personage for me, only more lovely than I could
  describe her.  If I have made her a dream it is because I did not
  wish my secret to be discovered.”

And again, in writing of Louis Lambert: 

 “You know when you work in tapestry, each stitch is a thought. 
  Well, each line in this new work has been for me an abyss.  It
  contains things that are secrets between it and me.”

In portraying the yearnings and sufferings of Louis Lambert (Louis Lambert), of Felix de Vandenesse (Le Lys dans la Vallee) and of Raphael (La Peau de Chagrin_), Balzac is picturing his own life.  Pauline de Villenoix (Louis Lambert) and Pauline Gaudin (Le Peau de Chagrin) are possibly drawn from the same woman and have many characteristics of Madame de Berny.  Madame de Mortsauf (Le Lys dans la Vallee) is Pauline, though not so outspoken.  Then, is it not La Dilecta whom the novelist had in mind when Louis Lambert writes: 

 “When I lay my head on your knees, I could wish to attract to you
  the eyes of the whole world, just as I long to concentrate in my
  love every idea, every power within me”;

and near the end of life, could not Madame de Berny say as did Pauline in the closing lines of Louis Lambert: