| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Cousin Betty by Honore de Balzac: understand that everything is final between us? that I look upon you
with horror? that you have crushed a mother's last hopes----"
"But if I were to restore them," asked he.
Madame Hulot looked at Crevel with a frenzied expression that really
touched him. But he drove pity back to the depths of his heart; she
had said, "I look upon you with horror."
Virtue is always a little too rigid; it overlooks the shades and
instincts by help of which we are able to tack when in a false
position.
"So handsome a girl as Mademoiselle Hortense does not find a husband
nowadays if she is penniless," Crevel remarked, resuming his
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Duchesse de Langeais by Honore de Balzac: are a gentleman, and after the adventures of your youth you must
feel some indulgence for women."
"None whatever," said he.
"Indeed!"
"Everything is in their favour."
"Ah! Well, you are one of the inner family circle; possibly you
will be the last relative, the last friend whose hand I shall
press, so I can ask your good offices. Will you, dear Vidame, do
me a service which I could not ask of my own father, nor of my
uncle Grandlieu, nor of any woman? You cannot fail to
understand. I beg of you to do my bidding, and then to forget
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The King of the Golden River by John Ruskin: to meet a challenge set him by a young girl.
The circumstance is interesting. After taking his degree at
Oxford, Ruskin was threatened with consumption and hurried away
from the chill and damp of England to the south of Europe. After
two years of fruitful travel and study he came back improved in
health but not strong, and often depressed in spirit. It was at
this time that the Guys, Scotch friends of his father and mother,
came for a visit to his home near London, and with them their
little daughter Euphemia. The coming of this beautiful,
vivacious, light-hearted child opened a new chapter in Ruskin's
life. Though but twelve years old, she sought to enliven the
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