Balzac, that immense brain, that physiologist so penetrating, that observer so profound, that mind so intuitive, did not possess the literary gift: within him there opened an abyss between the thought and the form. That abyss, particularly in the early years, he despaired of crossing. He threw himself without fulfillment into volume upon volume, observation upon observation, essay upon essay; an entire library of disavowed books passed through there. A will less robust would have been discouraged a thousand times; but happily Balzac had an unshakeable confidence in his genius, unknown to all the world. He wanted to be a great man, and he was that by his unrelenting projections of that force that was more powerful than electricity, and with which he made such subtle analyses in Louis Lambert. Unlike the writers of the romantic school, who distinguished themselves by a boldness and astonishing facility of execution, and produced their fruits at nearly the same time as their flowers, in a blossoming that was in a sense involuntary, Balzac, the equal in genius of them all, did not find his means of expression, or did not find it until after infinite suffering. Hugo said in one of his prefaces, with his Castilian pride: "I do not know the art of soldering a beauty in the place of a defect, and I correct myself in another work." But Balzac would cover a tenth proof with his crossings out, and when he saw me return to the La Chronique de Paris the proof of an article written in a hurry, on the corner of a table, with only typographical corrections, he could not believe, as content as he was otherwise, that I had applied all of my talent there. "By reworking it two or three times, it would have been better," he said to me. Citing himself as an example, he preached to me a strange literary lifestyle. I must cloister myself for two or three years, drink water, eat soggy lupins like Protogène, go to bed at six o'clock in the evening, get up at midnight, and work until morning, using the day to revise, expand, shorten, perfect, polish the nocturnal work, correct the proofs, take notes, do the necessary studies, and live most importantly with absolute chastity. He insisted a great deal upon this last recommendation, which was very challenging for a young man of twenty-four or twenty-five years. According to him, true chastity develops to the highest degree the powers of the mind, and gives to those who practice it unidentified abilities. I timidly objected that the greatest geniuses did not forbid themselves love, passion, or even pleasure, and I cited some illustrious names. Balzac shook his head and responded, "They would have done better, without the women!" The only concession that he would grant me, and even then he regretted it, was to see my beloved one half hour each year. He permitted letters: "These guide the development of style."