| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Country of the Pointed Firs by Sarah Orne Jewett: the course of a yachting cruise, a lover of Dunnet Landing returned
to find the unchanged shores of the pointed firs, the same
quaintness of the village with its elaborate conventionalities; all
that mixture of remoteness, and childish certainty of being the
centre of civilization of which her affectionate dreams had told.
One evening in June, a single passenger landed upon the steamboat
wharf. The tide was high, there was a fine crowd of spectators,
and the younger portion of the company followed her with subdued
excitement up the narrow street of the salt-aired, white-
clapboarded little town.
II
|
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from La Grande Breteche by Honore de Balzac: sometimes go to walk in the garden of la Grande Breteche.'
" 'Yes, monsieur.'
" 'One moment!' said he, repeating his gesture. 'That constitutes a
misdemeanor. Monsieur, as executor under the will of the late Comtesse
de Merret, I come in her name to beg you to discontinue the practice.
One moment! I am not a Turk, and do not wish to make a crime of it.
And besides, you are free to be ignorant of the circumstances which
compel me to leave the finest mansion in Vendome to fall into ruin.
Nevertheless, monsieur, you must be a man of education, and you should
know that the laws forbid, under heavy penalties, any trespass on
enclosed property. A hedge is the same as a wall. But, the state in
La Grande Breteche |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Girl with the Golden Eyes by Honore de Balzac: salon, as in the street, there is no one /de trop/, there is no one
absolutely useful, or absolutely harmful--knaves or fools, men of wit
or integrity. There everything is tolerated: the government and the
guillotine, religion and the cholera. You are always acceptable to
this world, you will never be missed by it. What, then, is the
dominating impulse in this country without morals, without faith,
without any sentiment, wherein, however, every sentiment, belief, and
moral has its origin and end? It is gold and pleasure. Take those two
words for a lantern, and explore that great stucco cage, that hive
with its black gutters, and follow the windings of that thought which
agitates, sustains, and occupies it! Consider! And, in the first
The Girl with the Golden Eyes |
