| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from A Daughter of Eve by Honore de Balzac: the embers to see if a spark were yet alive, Madame Felix de
Vandenesse was undergoing those violent palpitations which a woman
feels at the certainty of doing wrong, and stepping on forbidden
ground,--emotions that are not without charm, and which awaken various
dormant faculties. Women are fond of using Bluebeard's bloody key,
that fine mythological idea for which we are indebted to Perrault.
The dramatist--who knew his Shakespeare--displayed his wretchedness,
related his struggle with men and things, made his hearer aware of his
baseless grandeur, his unrecognized political genius, his life without
noble affections. Without saying a single definite word, he contrived
to suggest to this charming woman that she should play the noble part
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Polly of the Circus by Margaret Mayo: beneath his eyes were deeper, the look in their depths more
grave.
"We were such close neighbours to-day, I--I rather thought you'd
call," he stammered. He was uncertain what he was saying--it did
not matter--he was there with her.
"When you're in a circus there isn't much time for calling."
"That's why I've come to call on you." They might have been
sheppherd and sheppherdess on a May-day wooing, for the halting
way in which their words came.
"You're all right?" he went on. "You're happy?"
"Yes, very," she said. Her eyes were downcast.
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Before Adam by Jack London: but they were too cautious to come out of their caves
and descend to the ground. Finally one did come. He
was destined to play a large part in my life, and for
that matter he already played a large part in the lives
of all the members of the horde. He it was whom I
shall call Red-Eye in the pages of this history--so
called because of his inflamed eyes, the lids being
always red, and, by the peculiar effect they produced,
seeming to advertise the terrible savagery of him. The
color of his soul was red.
He was a monster in all ways. Physically he was a
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