The Consolation of Philosophy was, throughout the Middle Ages and down to the beginnings of the modern epoch in the sixteenth century, the scholar's familiar companion. Few books have exercised a wider influence in their time. It has been translated into every European tongue, and into English nearly a dozen times. The great work of Boethius, with its alternate prose and verse, skilfully fitted together like dialog and chorus in a Greek

French playwright and novelist Honore de Balzac is at his best when he is describing the chaotic tumult of big city life in nineteenth-century Europe. In The Brotherhood of Consolation, he focuses on a secret society of people bent on bringing some small measure of goodness into the lives of others by carrying out anonymous acts of charity, philanthropy and assistance.