to obtain royal permission to use his mother's family name instead of his father's name Chardon). This deficit is compounded by the fact that his mother had not only married a commoner far beneath her in rank, but she had also performed menial labour to support herself when her husband died. Another contrast is between Emile Blondet and Raoul Nathan. Both are multi-talented men-of-letters. Blondet is the natural son of the prefect of Alençon and is described as witty but lazy, incurably hesitant, non-partisan, a political atheist, a player of the game of political opinions (along with Rastignac), having the most judicious mind of the day. He marries Madame de Montcornet and eventually becomes a prefect. Nathan is described as half-Jewish and possessing a second-rate mind. Nathan succumbs to the flattery of unscrupulous financiers and does not see that they are prepared to bankrupt him to achieve their purposes. Blondet sees what is happening but does not enlighten Nathan. The downfall drives Nathan to attempt suicide by the method of "any poor work-girl". He then sells out to the government of the day (on Blondet's advice) to secure an income, and returns to living with the actress/courtesan Florine. In the end he accepts the cross of the Legion of Honour (which he formerly satirised) and becomes a defender of the doctrine of heredity. Paternity The Comédie humaine frequently portrays the complex emotional, social and financial relationships between fathers and their children, and between father-figures and their mentors, and these relationships are metaphorically linked as well with issues of nationhood (the king as father, regicide), nobility (bloodlines, family names), history (parental secrets), wealth (the origin of parental fortunes, dowries) and artistic creation (the writer or artist as father of the work of art). Father Goriot is perhaps the most famous — and most tragic — of these father figures, but in Le Père Goriot, Eugène de Rastignac also encounters two other paternal figures, Vautrin and Taillefer, whose aspirations and methods define different paternal paths. Other significant fathers in the series include Eugénie Grandet's abusive and money-hoarding father and César Birotteau, the doomed capitalist. Maternity At one end of the scale we have 100% maternal involvement – as depicted by the upbringing of the sisters de Granville (A Daughter of Eve) later Mesdames Felix de Vandenesse and du Tillet. At the other end of the scale we have 0% maternal involvement –