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most sombre and tragic ideal. Unknown to himself, whether he wished it or not, whether he consented or not,
the author of this immense and strange work is one of the strong race of Revolutionist writers. Balzac goes
straight to the goal.
Body to body he seizes modern society; from all he wrests something, from these an illusion, from those a
hope; from one a catch-word, from another a mask. He ransacked vice, he dissected passion. He searched out
and sounded man, soul, heart, entrails, brain,--the abyss that each one has within himself. And by grace of his
free and vigorous nature; by a privilege of the intellect of our time, which, having seen revolutions face to
face, can see more clearly the destiny of humanity and comprehend Providence better,--Balzac redeemed
himself smiling and severe from those formidable studies which produced melancholy in Moliere and
misanthropy in Rousseau.
This is what he has accomplished among us, this is the work which he has left us,--a work lofty and solid,--a
monument robustly piled in layers of granite, from the height of which hereafter his renown shall shine in
splendor. Great men make their own pedestal, the future will be answerable for the statue.
His death stupefied Paris! Only a few months ago he had come back to France. Feeling that he was dying, he
wished to see his country again, as one who would embrace his mother on the eve of a distant voyage. His life
was short, but full, more filled with deeds than days.
Alas! this powerful worker, never fatigued, this philosopher, this thinker, this poet, this genius, has lived
among us that life of storm, of strife, of quarrels and combats, common in all times to all great men. To-day
he is at peace. He escapes contention and hatred. On the same day he enters into glory and the tomb.
Thereafter beyond the clouds, which are above our heads, he will shine among the stars of his country. All
you who are here, are you not tempted to envy him?
Whatever may be our grief in presence of such a loss, let us accept these catastrophes with resignation! Let us
accept in it whatever is distressing and severe; it is good perhaps, it is necessary perhaps, in an epoch like
ours, that from time to time the great dead shall communicate to spirits devoured with skepticism and doubt, a
religious fervor. Providence knows what it does when it puts the people face to face with the supreme mystery
and when it gives them death to reflect on,--death which is supreme equality, as it is also supreme liberty.
Providence knows what it does, since it is the greatest of all instructors.
There can be but austere and serious thoughts in all hearts when a sublime spirit makes its majestic entrance
CHAPTER XXXI 267
into another life, when one of those beings who have long soared above the crowd on the visible wings of
genius, spreading all at once other wings which we did not see, plunges swiftly into the unknown.
No, it is not the unknown; no, I have said it on another sad occasion and I shall repeat it to-day, it is not night,
it is light. It is not the end, it is the beginning! It is not extinction, it is eternity! Is it not true, my hearers, such
tombs as this demonstrate immortality? In presence of the illustrious dead, we feel more distinctly the divine
destiny of that intelligence which traverses the earth to suffer and to purify itself,--which we call man.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 37: Saguntum was a city of Iberia (Spain) in alliance with Rome. Hannibal, in spite of Rome's
warnings in 219 B.C., laid siege to and captured it. This became the immediate cause of the war which Rome
declared against Carthage.]
[Footnote 38: From his speech in Washington on March 13, 1905, before the National Congress of Mothers.
Printed from a copy furnished by the president for this collection, in response to a request.]
[Footnote 39: Used by permission.]
[Footnote 40: Reported by A. Russell Smith and Harry E. Greager. Used by permission.
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