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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from Cousin Betty by Honore de Balzac: I love you, I esteem you, I am wholly yours! My cousin is tormenting
me to go and live in the house you are moving to, in the Rue Vanneau;
but I would not go, for I saw at once the reasons for this fresh piece
of kindness----"
"Yes; you would have kept an eye on me, I know!" said Madame Marneffe.
"That was, no doubt, the motive of his generosity," replied Lisbeth.
"In Paris, most beneficence is a speculation, as most acts of
ingratitude are revenge! To a poor relation you behave as you do to
rats to whom you offer a bit of bacon. Now, I will accept the Baron's
offer, for this house has grown intolerable to me. You and I have wit
enough to hold our tongues about everything that would damage us, and
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