| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Essays & Lectures by Oscar Wilde: condition of society, there was a wide divergence of opinion in
Hellenic society, just as there is now. For while the majority of
the orthodox public, of whom Hesiod may be taken as the
representative, looked back, as a great many of our own day still
do, to a fabulous age of innocent happiness, a BELL' ETE DELL'
AURO, where sin and death were unknown and men and women were like
Gods, the foremost men of intellect such as Aristotle and Plato,
AEschylus and many of the other poets (1) saw in primitive man 'a
few small sparks of humanity preserved on the tops of mountains
after some deluge,' 'without an idea of cities, governments or
legislation,' 'living the lives of wild beasts in sunless caves,'
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Girl with the Golden Eyes by Honore de Balzac: man is that of the small tradesman, here, too, are the same passions.
The type of this class might be either an ambitious bourgeois, who,
after a life of privation and continual scheming, passes into the
Council of State as an ant passes through a chink; or some newspaper
editor, jaded with intrigue, whom the king makes a peer of France--
perhaps to revenge himself on the nobility; or some notary become
mayor of his parish: all people crushed with business, who, if they
attain their end, are literally /killed/ in its attainment. In France
the usage is to glorify wigs. Napoleon, Louis XVI., the great rulers,
alone have always wished for young men to fulfil their projects.
Above this sphere the artist world exists. But here, too, the faces
The Girl with the Golden Eyes |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Bunner Sisters by Edith Wharton: season the business of the little shop almost ceased, and one
Saturday morning Mr. Ramy proposed that the sisters should lock up
early and go with him for a sail down the bay in one of the Coney
Island boats.
Ann Eliza saw the light in Evelina's eye and her resolve was
instantly taken.
"I guess I won't go, thank you kindly; but I'm sure my sister
will be happy to."
She was pained by the perfunctory phrase with which Evelina
urged her to accompany them; and still more by Mr. Ramy's silence.
"No, I guess I won't go," she repeated, rather in answer to
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