| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Eve and David by Honore de Balzac: called society. Napoleon called this 'washing dirty linen at home.'
The corollary follows naturally on this second precept--Form is
everything. Be careful to grasp the meaning of that word 'form.' There
are people who, for want of knowing better, will help themselves to
money under pressure of want, and take it by force. These people are
called criminals; and, perforce, they square accounts with Justice. A
poor man of genius discovers some secret, some invention as good as a
treasure; you lend him three thousand francs (for that, practically,
the Cointets have done; they hold your bills, and they are about to
rob your brother-in-law); you torment him until he reveals or partly
reveals his secret; you settle your accounts with your own conscience,
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Main Street by Sinclair Lewis: In New York I wouldn't know more than forty or fifty people,
and I know that many here. Go on! Say what you're
thinking."
"Well, my dear, if I DID take all your notions seriously,
it would be pretty discouraging. Imagine how a person
would feel, after working hard for years and helping to build
up a nice town, to have you airily flit in and simply say
`Rotten!' Think that's fair?"
"Why not? It must be just as discouraging for the Gopher
Prairieite to see Venice and make comparisons."
"It would not! I imagine gondolas are kind of nice to
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Secret Adversary by Agatha Christie: the gentleman at the inn near Astley Priors. He will give you
ten shillings."
The handwriting was Tuppence's. Tommy appreciated her
quick-wittedness in realizing that he might be staying at the inn
under an assumed name. He snatched at it.
"That's all right."
The man withheld it.
"What about my ten shillings?"
Tommy hastily produced a ten-shilling note, and the man
relinquished his find. Tommy unfastened it.
"DEAR TOMMY,
Secret Adversary |
