| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Father Goriot by Honore de Balzac: do you not come to me? Your papa is going----"
"Dear Father Goriot, calm yourself. There, there, lie quietly and
rest; don't worry yourself, don't think."
"I shall not see them. Oh! the agony of it!"
"You SHALL see them."
"Really?" cried the old man, still wandering. "Oh! shall I see
them; I shall see them and hear their voices. I shall die happy.
Ah! well, after all, I do not wish to live; I cannot stand this
much longer; this pain that grows worse and worse. But, oh! to
see them, to touch their dresses--ah! nothing but their dresses,
that is very little; still, to feel something that belongs to
Father Goriot |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The War in the Air by H. G. Wells: He discovered, later, traces of an attempt to cross the gap in
the broken bridge. A rope with a bolt attached had been flung
across and had caught in a fenestration of a projecting fragment
of railing. The end of the rope trailed in the seething water
towards the fall.
But the bird-faced officer was already rubbing shoulders with
certain inert matter that had once been Lieutenant Kurt and the
Chinese aeronaut and a dead cow, and much other uncongenial
company, in the huge circle of the Whirlpool two and a quarter
miles away. Never had that great gathering place, that
incessant, aimless, unprogressive hurry of waste and battered
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Melmoth Reconciled by Honore de Balzac: lodging, the wife and family, and all the comforts that sweeten life
for mediocrity. If from among this race of dupes there should escape
some five or six men of genius who climb the highest heights, is it
not miraculous?
This is an exact statement of the relations between Talent and Probity
on the one hand and Government and Society on the other, in an age
that considers itself to be progressive. Without this prefatory
explanation a recent occurrence in Paris would seem improbable; but
preceded by this summing up of the situation, it will perhaps receive
some thoughtful attention from minds capable of recognizing the real
plague-spots of our civilization, a civilization which since 1815 as
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