| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Droll Stories, V. 1 by Honore de Balzac: exchange for this great obloquy and dishonour, I will be forever your
friend, your hostess, and your lady-love--more than that, your
servant. My determination is to devote myself to you and efface the
traces of this shame; to cure you by a watch and ward; and if the
learned in these matters declare that the disease has such a hold of
you that it will kill you like our defunct sovereign, I must still
have your company in order to die gloriously in dying of your
complaint. Even then," said she, weeping, "that will not be penance
enough to atone for the wrong I have done you."
These words were accompanied with big tears; her virtuous heart waxed
faint, she fell to the ground exhausted. Lavalliere, terrified, caught
Droll Stories, V. 1 |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Ball at Sceaux by Honore de Balzac: melancholy. It was clear that Maximilien Longueville still reigned
over that inexorable heart. Sometimes she would be as gentle as she
had been during the brief summer that had seen the birth of her love;
sometimes, again, she was unendurable. Every one made excuses for her
inequality of temper, which had its source in sufferings at once
secret and known to all. The Comte de Kergarouet had some influence
over her, thanks to his increased prodigality, a kind of consolation
which rarely fails of its effect on a Parisian girl.
The first ball at which Mademoiselle de Fontaine appeared was at the
Neapolitan ambassador's. As she took her place in the first quadrille
she saw, a few yards away from her, Maximilien Longueville, who nodded
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe: come up to his character by a great deal; for though this friar had
no appearance of a criminal levity in him, yet he had not that fund
of Christian zeal, strict piety, and sincere affection to religion
that my other good ecclesiastic had.
But to leave him a little, though he never left us, nor solicited
us to go with him; we had something else before us at first, for we
had all this while our ship and our merchandise to dispose of, and
we began to be very doubtful what we should do, for we were now in
a place of very little business. Once I was about to venture to
sail for the river of Kilam, and the city of Nankin; but Providence
seemed now more visibly, as I thought, than ever to concern itself
Robinson Crusoe |
