any way denote them, much more sum them up. Yet the five words quoted
above, which come from an early letter to his sister when as yet he
had not "found his way," characterize him, I think, better than at
least some of the volumes I have read about him, and supply, when they
are properly understood, the most valuable of all keys and companions
for his comprehension.

"If I have not genius, it is all up with me!" A very matter-of-fact
person may say: "Why! there is nothing wonderful in this. Everybody
knows what genius is wanted to make a name in literature, and most
people think they have it." But this would be a little short-sighted,
and only excusable because of the way in which the word "genius" is
too commonly bandied about. As a matter of fact, there is not so very
much genius in the world; and a great deal of more than fair
performance is attainable and attained by more or less decent
allowances or exhibitions of talent. In prose, more especially, it is
possible to gain a very high place, and to deserve it, without any
genius at all: though it is difficult, if not impossible, to do so in
verse. But what Balzac felt (whether he was conscious in detail of the
feeling or not) when he used these words to his sister Laure, what his
critical readers must feel when they have read only a very little of
his work, what they must feel still more strongly when they have read
that work as a whole--is that for him there is no such door of escape
and no such compromise. He had the choice, by his nature, his aims,
his capacities, of being a genius or nothing. He had no little gifts,
and he was even destitute of some of the separate and indivisible
great ones. In mere writing, mere style, he was not supreme; one
seldom or never derives from anything of his the merely artistic
satisfaction given by perfect prose. His humor, except of the grim and
gigantic kind, was not remarkable; his wit, for a Frenchman, curiously