The Elixir of Life

by Honore de Balzac
Translated by Clara Bell and James Waring

TO THE READER
At the very outset of the writer's literarycareer, a friend,

long since dead, gave him the subject of this Study. Later on he
found the same story in a collection published about the

beginning of the present century. To the best of his belief, it
is some stray fancy of the brain of Hoffmann of Berlin; probably

it appeared in some German almanac, and was omitted in the
published editions of his collected works. The Comedie Humaine is

sufficiently rich in original creations for the author to own to
this innocent piece of plagiarism; when, like the worthy La

Fontaine, he has told unwittingly, and after his own fashion, a
tale already related by another. This is not one of the hoaxes in

vogue in the year 1830, when every author wrote his "tale of
horror" for the amusement of young ladies. When you have read the

account of Don Juan's decorous parricide, try to picture to
yourself the part which would be played under very similar

circumstances by honest folk who, in this nineteenth century,
will take a man's money and undertake to pay him a life annuity

on the faith of a chill, or let a house to an ancient lady for
the term of her natural life! Would they be for resuscitating

their clients? I should dearly like a connoisseur in consciences
to consider how far there is a resemblance between a Don Juan and

fathers who marry their children to great expectations. Does
humanity, which, according to certain philosophers, is making

progress, look on the art of waiting for dead men's shoes as a
step in the right direction? To this art we owe several honorable

professions, which open up ways of living on death. There are
people who rely entirely on an expected demise; who brood over

it, crouching each morning upon a corpse, that serves again for
their pillow at night. To this class belong bishops' coadjutors,

cardinals' supernumeraries, tontiniers, and the like. Add to the
list many delicately scrupulous persons eager to buy landed

property beyond their means, who calculate with dry logic and in
cold blood the probableduration of the life of a father or of a

step-mother, some old man or woman of eighty or ninety, saying to
themselves, "I shall be sure to come in for it in three years'

time, and then----" A murderer is less loathsome to us than a
spy. The murderer may have acted on a sudden mad impulse; he may

be penitent and amend; but a spy is always a spy, night and day,
in bed, at table, as he walks abroad; his vileness pervades every

moment of his life. Then what must it be to live when every
moment of your life is tainted with murder? And have we not just

admitted that a host of human creatures in our midst are led by
our laws, customs, and usages to dwell without ceasing on a

fellow-creature's death? There are men who put the weight of a
coffin into their deliberations as they bargain for Cashmere

shawls for their wives, as they go up the staircase of a theatre,
or think of going to the Bouffons, or of setting up a carriage;

who are murderers in thought when dear ones, with the
irresistible charm of innocence, hold up childish foreheads to be

kissed with a "Good-night, father!" Hourly they meet the gaze of
eyes that they would fain close for ever, eyes that still open

each morning to the light, like Belvidero's in this Study. God
alone knows the number of those who are parricides in thought.

Picture to yourself the state of mind of a man who must pay a
life annuity to some old woman whom he scarcely knows; both live

in the country with a brook between them, both sides are free to
hate cordially, without offending against the social conventions

that require two brothers to wear a mask if the older will
succeed to the entail, and the other to the fortune of a younger

son. The whole civilization of Europe turns upon the principle of
hereditary succession as upon a pivot; it would be madness to

subvert the principle; but could we not, in an age that prides
itself upon its mechanical inventions, perfect this essential

portion of the social machinery?
If the author has preserved the old-fashioned style of address To

the Reader before a work wherein he endeavors to represent all
literary forms, it is for the purpose of making a remark that

applies to several of the Studies, and very specially to this.
Every one of his compositions has been based upon ideas more or

less novel, which, as it seemed to him, needed literary
expression; he can claim priority for certain forms and for

certain ideas which have since passed into the domain of
literature, and have there, in some instances, become common

property; so that the date of the first publication of each Study
cannot be a matter of indifference to those of his readers who

would fain do him justice.
Reading brings us unknown friends, and what friend is like a

reader? We have friends in our own circle who read nothing of
ours. The author hopes to pay his debt, by dedicating this work

Diis ignotis.
THE ELIXIR OF LIFE

One winter evening, in a princely" target="_blank" title="a.王候般的；高贵的">princely palace at Ferrara, Don Juan
Belvidero was giving a banquet to a prince of the house of Este.

A banquet in those times was a marvelousspectacle which only
royal wealth or the power of a mightly [sic] lord could furnish

forth. Seated about a table lit up with perfumed tapers, seven
laughter-loving women were interchanging sweet talk. The white

marble of the noble works of art about them stood out against the
red stucco walls, and made strong contrasts with the rich Turkey

carpets. Clad in satin, glittering with gold, and covered with
gems less brilliant than their eyes, each told a tale of

energetic passions as diverse as their styles of beauty. They
differed neither in their ideas nor in their language; but the

expression of their eyes, their glances, occasionalgestures, or
the tones of their voices supplied a commentary, dissolute,

wanton, melancholy, or satirical, to their words.
One seemed to be saying--"The frozen heart of age might kindle at

my beauty."
Another--"I love to lounge upon cushions, and think with rapture

of my adorers."
A third, a neophyte at these banquets, was inclined to blush. "I

feel remorse in the depths of my heart! I am a Catholic, and
afraid of hell. But I love you, I love you so that I can

sacrifice my hereafter to you."
The fourth drained a cup of Chian wine. "Give me a joyous life!"

she cried; "I begin life afresh each day with the dawn. Forgetful
of the past, with the intoxication of yesterday's rapture still

upon me, I drink deep of life--a whole lifetime of pleasure and
of love!"

The woman who sat next to Juan Belvidero looked at him with a
feverish glitter in her eyes. She was silent. Then--"I should

need no hired bravo to kill my lover if he forsook me!" she cried
at last, and laughed, but the marvelously wrought gold comfit box

in her fingers was crushed by her convulsive clutch.
"When are you to be Grand Duke?" asked the sixth. There was the

frenzy of a Bacchante in her eyes, and her teeth gleamed between
the lips parted with a smile of cruel glee.

"Yes, when is that father of yours going to die?" asked the
seventh, throwing her bouquet at Don Juan with bewitching

playfulness. It was a childish girl who spoke, and the speaker
was wont to make sport of sacred things.

"Oh! don't talk about it," cried Don Juan, the young and handsome
giver of the banquet. "There is but one eternal father, and, as

ill luck will have it, he is mine."
The seven Ferrarese, Don Juan's friends, the Prince himself, gave

a cry of horror. Two hundred years later, in the days of Louis
XV., people of taste would have laughed at this witticism. Or was

it, perhaps, that at the outset of an orgy there is a certain
unwonted lucidity of mind? Despite the taper light, the clamor of