The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Woman and Labour by Olive Schreiner: in it, a close analysis will always show that the changed or changing
conditions of that society have made woman's acquiescence no longer
necessary or desirable.
Another point which it was attempted to deal with in this division of the
book was the probability, amounting almost to a certainty, that woman's
physical suffering and weakness in childbirth and certain other directions
was the price which woman has been compelled to pay for the passing of the
race from the quadrupedal and four-handed state to the erect; and which was
essential if humanity as we know it was to exist (this of course was dealt
with by a physiological study of woman's structure); and also, to deal with
the highly probable, though unproved and perhaps unprovable, suggestion,
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Salome by Oscar Wilde: aux chiens et aux oiseaux de l'air. Ce que laisseront les chiens,
les oiseaux de l'air le mangeront . . . Ah! Iokanaan, Iokanaan, tu
as ete le seul homme que j'ai aime. Tous les autres hommes
m'inspirent du degout. Mais, toi, tu etais beau. Ton corps etait
une colonne d'ivoire sur un socle d'argent. C'etait un jardin plein
de colombes et de lis d'argent. C'etait une tour d'argent ornee de
boucliers d'ivoire. Il n'y avait rien au monde d'aussi blanc que
ton corps. Il n'y avait rien au monde d'aussi noir que tes cheveux.
Dans le monde tout entier il n'y avait rien d'aussi rouge que ta
bouche. Ta voix etait un encensoir qui repandait d'etranges
parfums, et quand je te regardais j'entendais une musique etrange!
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from In the Cage by Henry James: Business quickened, it seemed, toward five, as if the town did wake
up; she had therefore more to do, and she went through it with
little sharp stampings and jerkings: she made the crisp postal-
orders fairly snap while she breathed to herself "It's the last
day--the last day!" The last day of what? She couldn't have told.
All she knew now was that if she WERE out of the cage she wouldn't
in the least have minded, this time, its not yet being dark. She
would have gone straight toward Park Chambers and have hung about
there till no matter when. She would have waited, stayed, rung,
asked, have gone in, sat on the stairs. What the day was the last
of was probably, to her strained inner sense, the group of golden
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