: Honoré de Balzac by Balzac Honor De Bruneti Re Ferdinand Author Of Introduction Etc Jessup Alexander Editor Ives George Burnham Translator - Short stories French Translations into English; French fiction Translations into English

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F. Bruneti?re

The Unknown Masterpiece

TO A LORD:

GILLETTE

There exists in all human sentiments a primitive flower, engendered by a noble enthusiasm which grows constantly weaker and weaker, until happiness ceases to be more than a memory and glory more than a lie. Among these transitory sentiments, nothing bears so close a resemblance to love as the youthful passion of an artist just beginning to experience the delicious torture of his destiny of renown and of misfortune, a passion full of audacity and shyness, of vague beliefs and of certain discouragement. The youthful genius, with empty pockets, whose heart has not throbbed upon appearing before a master, will always lack one chord in his heart, some indefinable touch of the brush, some feeling in his work, some shade of poetical expression. If some boasters, puffed out with conceit, believe too early in the future, they are considered people of intellect by fools alone. In this regard, the young stranger seemed to possess real merit, if talent is to be measured by that early timidity, that indescribable modesty which people destined to glory gradually lose in the exercise of their art, as pretty women lose theirs in the manoeuvring of coquetry. The habitude of triumph lessens doubt, and modesty perhaps is a form of doubt.

"Good morning, master."

"I like your saint," the old man said to Porbus, "and I would give you ten golden crowns above the price that the queen is to pay; but meddle in her preserves! the deuce!"

"You think it is well done, do you?"

"Hum!" said the old man, "well done? Yes and no. Your saint is not badly put together, but she is not alive. You fellows think that you have done everything when you have drawn a figure correctly and put everything in its place according to the laws of anatomy. You colour this feature with a flesh-tint prepared beforehand on your palette, taking care to keep one side darker than the other; and because you glance from time to time at a nude woman standing on a table, you think that you have copied nature, you imagine that you are painters, and that you have discovered God's secret! Bah! To be a great poet, it is not enough to know syntax, and to avoid errors in grammar.

"Look at your saint, Porbus. At first glance she seems admirable; but at the second, one sees that she is glued to the canvas, and that it is impossible to walk about her body. She is a silhouette with but a single face, a figure cut out of canvas, an image that can neither turn nor change its position. I am not conscious of the air between that arm and the background of the picture; space and depth are lacking. However, everything is right so far as perspective is concerned, and the gradation of light and shade is scrupulously observed; but, despite such praise-worthy efforts, I am unable to believe that that beautiful body is animated with the warm breath of life. It seems to me that, if I should put my hand upon that firm, round breast, I should find it as cold as marble. No, my friend, the blood does not flow beneath that ivory skin; life does not swell with its purple dew the veins and fibres which intertwine like network beneath the transparent, amber-hued temples and breast. This place throbs with life, but that other place is motionless; life and death contend in every detail; here it is a woman, there a statue, and there a corpse. Your creation is incomplete. You have been able to breathe only a portion of your soul into your cherished work. The torch of Prometheus has gone out more than once in your hands, and many parts of your picture have not been touched by the celestial flame."

"But why, my dear master?" Porbus respectfully asked the old man, while the young man had difficulty in repressing a savage desire to strike him.

"Ah! it is this way," replied the little old man. "You have wavered irresolutely between the two systems, between drawing and colour, between the phlegmatic minuteness, the stiff precision of the old German masters, and the dazzling ardour and happy plenitude of the Italian painters. You have tried to imitate at the same time Hans Holbein and Titian, Albert D?rer and Paul Veronese. Assuredly that was a noble ambition! But what has happened? You have achieved neither the severe charm of precision, nor the deceitful magic of the chiaroscuro. In this spot, like melted bronze which bursts its too fragile mould, the rich, light colouring of Titian brings out too prominently the meagre outlines of Albert D?rer in which you moulded it. Elsewhere, the features have resisted and held in check the superb polish of the Venetian palette. Your face is neither perfectly drawn nor perfectly painted, and bears everywhere the traces of that unfortunate indecision. If you did not feel strong enough to melt together in the flame of your genius the two rival systems, you should have chosen frankly one or the other, in order to obtain the unity which represents one of the conditions of life. You are accurate only in the surroundings, your outlines are false, do not envelop each other, and give no promise of anything behind.

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