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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from A Daughter of Eve by Honore de Balzac: its upward flight by a sordid vulgar obstacle,--all these things
rushed into her memory and stimulated her love. She went over and over
her emotions, and felt her love to be deeper in these days of misery
than in those of Nathan's fame and grandeur. She felt the nobility of
his last words said to her in Lady Dudley's boudoir. What sacredness
in that farewell! What grandeur in the immolation of a selfish
happiness which would have been her torture! The countess had longed
for emotions, and now she had them,--terrible, cruel, and yet most
precious. She lived a deeper life in pain than in pleasure. With what
delight she said to herself: "I have saved him once, and I will save
him again." She heard him cry out when he felt her lips upon his
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