Rodin, for his part, to whom such ideas, which degrade his art to the lowest level, are revolting, believes that composition and expression should be so arranged as to make the spectator forget the _plastique_ of the body. In his busts he neglects the inevitable linen collar, coat-collar, and necktie. The graceful dress of _Claude Lorraine_, the shirt and rope of _The Burghers of Calais,_ had served his purpose well, and in the statues of _General Lynch_ and _Bastien-Lepage_ he had reduced the modern dress to large bronze reliefs without precise details. Especially in the image of a thinker he seeks to annul the costume. The Olympian character of Hugo allowed of the nude; for the massive deformity of Balzac the dressing-gown was appropriate. The majority of those who mocked did not even know that this careless costume was habitual to the author, and that Rodin chose to surprise him in his home and in the fever of work, instead of showing him in the street with a hat and stick, as they would no doubt have expected. The _Balzac_, then, presents the aspect of a sheath of stone pushed out by a few twisting folds, which give it the appearance from behind of an upright sarcophagus. The size of the head, the abnormal largeness of the chest and neck, which have aroused mockery, are historic. Apart from these points, one honestly wonders what it is that can have shocked people in this bold and sincere work. The face is admirable in its pride, its strength of will, its haughty irony, and penetrating power of thought. The modelling and the leading lines are masterly. The rather ghostly look of the clay disappears in the bronze, as may be seen from the little head in that material, of which the monument was to be made. It is the freedom, the spontaneity, the life of the statue, which, as in the case of the _Burghers,_ gave a shock to the conventions of the official world and disturbed the ideas of the public at large.