Emotions, Sincerity, and Calculation Theme Analysis

‘You can understand that under the Empire the two sons-in-law did not make too much fuss about receiving in their homes the old revolutionary of '93; it was still all right under Buonaparte. But when the Bourbons came back, the old chap was an embarrassment to Monsieur de Restaud, and still more so to the banker. The daughters, who may perhaps still have been fond of their father, tried to play a double game, keeping their father and their husbands sweet at the same time. […] Personally, my dear, I believe that genuine feelings are neither blind nor stupid, so the poor old 93er's heart must have bled.’

‘The more coldly calculating you are, the further you will go. Strike without pity and people will fear you. Accept men and women as mere post horses to be left worn out at every stage and you will reach the summit of your ambitions. Don't forget that you will be nothing here unless you have a woman to take an interest in you. You need one who is young, rich, elegant. But if you have any genuine feelings, hide them like a treasure; never let anyone suspect them, or you will be lost.’

‘All right, let Père Goriot win you admission to Madame Delphine de Nucingen's house. The beautiful Madame de Nucingen will be the standard you bear. Enjoy the marks of her favour and women will dote on you. […] You will be very successful. In Paris success is everything, it is the key to power. If women believe you to have wit and talent, so will men, unless you disillusion them. Then you can set your heart on anything, every door will be open to you. Then you will learn what the world is really like: an assembly of dupes and knaves. Don't be counted with either.’

He was ashamed of what he had written. How intense would be their heartfelt wishes for him, how pure their fervent prayers to heaven! How they would delight in their self-sacrifices! How his mother would grieve if she could not send the whole sum! He would use such fine sentiments, such fearful sacrifices as rungs in a ladder to reach Delphine de Nucingen. Tears, a last few grains of incense cast on the sacred altar of the family, fell from his eyes.

The student walked back from the Théâtre-Italien to the rue Neuve-Sainte-Geneviève, his head full of the most alluring plans. He had not failed to notice how closely Madame de Restaud had observed him, both in the vicomtesse's box and in that of Madame de Nucingen, and he presumed that he would no longer find the comtesse's door closed to him. He could already count on four major contacts in the most select Parisian society […]

'If Madame de Nucingen takes an interest in me, I will teach her how to manipulate her husband. Her husband is a very successful businessman, and he'll be able to help me make my fortune in less than no time.'

‘My word,’ he said with seeming indifference, ‘what good would it do me to live in greater comfort? I really can’t explain that sort of thing; I can’t put two words together properly. That's what it's all about,’ he added, striking his heart. ‘My life, my own life, is all in my two daughters. If they enjoy themselves, if they are happy and finely dressed, if they have carpets to walk on, what does it matter what clothes I wear or what sort of bedroom I have? I don't feel cold if they are warm. I never feel sad if they are laughing. My only sorrows are theirs.’

Rastignac was indeed in a state of perplexity which must be familiar to many young men. Whether she really loved him or was just leading him on, Madame de Nucingen had inflicted on Rastignac all the pains of a genuine passion […] For the past few months she had so inflamed Eugène's senses that she finally affected his inward heart. If in the initial stages of his liaison the student had believed himself to be the master, Madame de Nucingen had now gained the upper hand[.]

‘Try and be philosophical, Ma,’ Collin went on. ‘Did it do you any harm being in my box at the Gaîté last night?' he exclaimed. ‘Are you any better than us? The brand we bear on our shoulders is not as shameful as what you have in your hearts, flabby members of a putrid society. The best among you could not stand up to me!’

Today I have only one fear, I can imagine only one disaster, and that would be to lose the love which has made me glad to be alive. Apart from that love, nothing matters, nothing else in the world means anything to me. You are everything to me. If I enjoy being rich, it is to enable me to give you more pleasure. I am, to my shame, more lover than daughter. Why? I don't know. My whole life is in you. My father gave me a heart, but you made it beat. The whole world may condemn me, what do I care?

He saw society as an ocean of mire into which one had only to dip a toe to be buried in it up to the neck. 'The only crimes committed there are petty ones!' he said to himself. 'Vautrin was a bigger man than that.' […] In his thoughts he returned to the bosom of his family. He remembered the pure emotions of that tranquil life, he recalled days spent among those who held him dear. By following the natural laws of hearth and home, those dear creatures found complete, unbroken, untroubled happiness. Despite such worthy thoughts, he did not feel bold enough to go to Delphine and confess the faith of pure souls by bidding her follow Virtue in the name of Love.

Rastignac left at about five o'clock, after seeing Madame de Beauséant into her travelling-coach and receiving her tearful farewell […] It was cold and damp as Eugène walked back to the Maison Vauquer. His education was almost complete.

‘I shan't be able to save poor Père Goriot,’ Bianchon said to him as Rastignac came into his neighbour's room.

‘My friend,’ said Eugène, after a look at the sleeping old man, ‘stay on the path that leads to the modest goal you have been content to set yourself. As for me, I am in hell, and must stay there.’