| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Lily of the Valley by Honore de Balzac: I am so crippled with fatigue I really cannot walk farther."
"You must not doubt the hospitality of our beautiful Touraine," she
said; then, turning to my companion, she added: "You will give us the
pleasure of your dining at Clochegourde?"
I threw such a look of entreaty at Monsieur de Chessel that he began
the preliminaries of accepting the invitation, though it was given in
a manner that seemed to expect a refusal. As a man of the world, he
recognized these shades of meaning; but I, a young man without
experience, believed so implicitly in the sincerity between word and
thought of this beautiful woman that I was wholly astonished when my
host said to me, after we reached home that evening, "I stayed because
The Lily of the Valley |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Droll Stories, V. 1 by Honore de Balzac: hate of good constitution--a cardinal hate--a hate of a wasp or an old
maid. It was all known hates moulded into one single hate, which
boiled itself, concocted itself, and resolved self into an elixir of
wicked and diabolical sentiments, warmed at the fire of the most
flaming furnaces of hell--it was, in fact, a master hate.
Now one fine day, the said Carandas came back into Touraine with much
wealth, that he brought from the country of Flanders, where he had
sold his mechanical secrets. He bought a splendid house in Rue St.
Montfumier, which is still to be seen, and is the astonishment of the
passers-by, because it has certain very queer round humps fashioned
upon the stones of the wall. Carandas, the hater, found many notable
Droll Stories, V. 1 |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Daisy Miller by Henry James: said her mother.
"Yes, or in the boat," said Winterbourne.
"Well, of course, I don't know," Mrs. Miller rejoined.
"I have never been to that castle."
"It is a pity you shouldn't go," said Winterbourne,
beginning to feel reassured as to her opposition.
And yet he was quite prepared to find that, as a matter of course,
she meant to accompany her daughter.
"We've been thinking ever so much about going," she pursued;
"but it seems as if we couldn't. Of course Daisy--she wants
to go round. But there's a lady here--I don't know her name--
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