| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Blix by Frank Norris: "set" were in the act of going upstairs to the card-rooms, a hall-
boy gave Condy a note, at that moment brought by a messenger, who
was waiting for an answer. It was from Blix. She wrote:
"Don't you want to come up and play cards with me to-night? We
haven't had a game in over a week?"
"How did she know?" thought Condy to himself--"how could she
tell?" Aloud, he said:
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Village Rector by Honore de Balzac: gilded by the setting sun, and full of the poesy born of the contrast
between the beautiful spot and the surrounding barrenness, in which it
lay like an oasis in the desert. Madame Graslin's eyes filled suddenly
with tears. The rector called her attention to a broad white line like
a gash on the mountain side.
"See what my parishioners have done to testify their gratitude to the
lady of the manor," he said, pointing to the line, which was really a
road; "we can now drive up to the chateau. This piece of road has been
made by them without costing you a penny, and two months hence we
shall plant it with trees. Monseigneur will understand what trouble
and care and devotion were needed to accomplish such a change."
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Polity of Athenians and Lacedaemonians by Xenophon: spirit of the democracy with Spartan exclusiveness; "Our city is
thrown open to the world, and we never expel a foreigner or
prevent him from seeing or learning anything of which the secret,
if revealed to an enemy, might profit him."--Jowett, i. 118.
[4] Lit. "harmosts"; and for the taste of living abroad, see what is
said of Dercylidas, "Hell." IV. iii. 2. The harmosts were not
removed till just before Leuctra (371 B.C.), "Hell." VI. iv. 1,
and after, see Paus. VIII. lii. 4; IX. lxiv.
[5] See Plut. "Lycurg." 30 (Clough, i. 124).
[6] This passage would seem to fix the date of the chapter xiv. as
about the time of the Athenian confederacy of 378 B.C.; "Hell." V.
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