| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Madame Firmiani by Honore de Balzac: It is very difficult to get admitted; therefore, of course, one meets
only the best society in her salons." Here the Lounger takes a pinch
of snuff; he inhales it slowly and seems to say: "I go there, but
don't expect me to present YOU."
Evidently the Lounger considers that Madame Firmiani keeps a sort of
inn, without a sign.
"Why do you want to know Madame Firmiani? Her parties are as dull as
the Court itself. What is the good of possessing a mind unless to
avoid such salons, where stupid talk and foolish little ballads are
the order of the day." You have questioned a being classed Egotist, a
species who would like to keep the universe under lock and key, and
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from First Inaugural Address by Abraham Lincoln: Think, if you can, of a single instance in which a plainly written provision
of the Constitution has ever been denied. If by the mere force of numbers a
majority should deprive a minority of any clearly written Constitutional right,
it might, in a moral point of view, justify revolution--certainly would if such
a right were a vital one. But such is not our case. All the vital rights of
minorities and of individuals are so plainly assured to them by affirmations
and negations, guaranties and prohibitions, in the Constitution, that
controversies never arise concerning them. But no organic law can ever be
framed with a provision specifically applicable to every question which may
occur in practical administration. No foresight can anticipate,
nor any document of reasonable length contain, express provisions
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Art of Writing by Robert Louis Stevenson: novel of adventure, or a fairy tale. The scene may be
pitched in London, on the sea-coast of Bohemia, or away on
the mountains of Beulah. And by an odd and luminous
accident, if there is any page of literature calculated to
awake the envy of M. Zola, it must be that TROILUS AND
CRESSIDA which Shakespeare, in a spasm of unmanly anger with
the world, grafted on the heroic story of the siege of Troy.
This question of realism, let it then be clearly understood,
regards not in the least degree the fundamental truth, but
only the technical method, of a work of art. Be as ideal or
as abstract as you please, you will be none the less
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