| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Eve and David by Honore de Balzac: brothers. He has made us poor indeed; but let him come to us, he shall
share the last crust of bread, anything indeed that he has left us.
Oh, if he had never left us, monsieur, we should not have lost our
heart's treasure."
"And the woman who took him from us brought him back on her carriage!"
exclaimed Mme. Chardon. "He went away sitting by Mme. de Bargeton's
side in her caleche, and he came back behind it."
"Can I do anything for you?" asked the good cure, seeking an
opportunity to take leave.
"A wound in the purse is not fatal, they say, monsieur," said Mme.
Chardon, "but the patient must be his own doctor."
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Firm of Nucingen by Honore de Balzac: over the stone floor.
"There are poets and romancers and writers that say many fine things
abut Parisian manners," continued Bixiou, "but that is what really
happens at a funeral. Ninety-nine out of a hundred that come to pay
their respects to some poor devil departed, get together and talk
business or pleasure in the middle of the church. To see some poor
little touch of real sorrow, you need an impossible combination of
circumstances. And, after all, is there such a thing as grief without
a thought of self in it?"
"Ugh!" said Blondet. "Nothing is less respected than death; is it that
there is nothing less respectable?"
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Washington Irving: cornfield.
His schoolhouse was a low building of one large room, rudely
constructed of logs; the windows partly glazed, and partly
patched with leaves of old copybooks. It was most ingeniously
secured at vacant hours, by a *withe twisted in the handle of the
door, and stakes set against the window shutters; so that though
a thief might get in with perfect ease, he would find some
embarrassment in getting out, --an idea most probably borrowed by
the architect, Yost Van Houten, from the mystery of an eelpot.
The schoolhouse stood in a rather lonely but pleasant situation,
just at the foot of a woody hill, with a brook running close by,
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow |
