| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Madam How and Lady Why by Charles Kingsley: and I jumped out of bed quicker than I ever did in my life, and
heard the roaring sound die away as it rolled up the valley
towards the peaks of snow. Still I had in my head this notion of
the Englishmen fighting in the room below. But then I recollected
that no Englishmen had come in the night before, and that I had
been in the room below, and that there was no bed in it. Then I
opened my window--a woman screamed, a dog barked, some cocks and
hens cackled in a very disturbed humour, and then I could hear
nothing but the roaring of the torrent a hundred feet below. And
then it flashed across me what all the noise was about; and I
burst out laughing and said "It is only an earthquake," and went
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Lesser Bourgeoisie by Honore de Balzac: of his toes at the receptions in the Tuileries, and did all that he
could to put himself forward, even eyeing the citizen-king perpetually
when he dined at his table. In short, he intrigued in a dumb sort of
way; but had never yet obtained a look in return from the king of his
choice. The worthy man had more than once thought, but was not yet
decided, to beg Monsieur Minard to assist him in obtaining his secret
desire.
Phellion, a man of passive obedience, was stoical in the matter of
duty, and iron in all that touched his conscience. To complete this
picture by a sketch of his person, we must add that at fifty-nine
years of age Phellion had "thickened," to use a term of the bourgeois
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Melmoth Reconciled by Honore de Balzac: Though every one of these young plants represents vast productive
power, they are made, as one may say, into cashiers. They receive
appointments; the rank and file of engineers is made up of them; they
are employed as captains of artillery; there is no (subaltern) grade
to which they may not aspire. Finally, when these men, the pick of the
youth of the nation, fattened on mathematics and stuffed with
knowledge, have attained the age of fifty years, they have their
reward, and receive as the price of their services the third-floor
lodging, the wife and family, and all the comforts that sweeten life
for mediocrity. If from among this race of dupes there should escape
some five or six men of genius who climb the highest heights, is it
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