| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Early Short Fiction of Edith Wharton by Edith Wharton: can see the exchange of glances across the ermine collars under
the Crucifix.
Anne de Cornault, further questioned, said that her married life
had been extremely lonely: "desolate" was the word she used. It
was true that her husband seldom spoke harshly to her; but there
were days when he did not speak at all. It was true that he had
never struck or threatened her; but he kept her like a prisoner
at Kerfol, and when he rode away to Morlaix or Quimper or Rennes
he set so close a watch on her that she could not pick a flower
in the garden without having a waiting-woman at her heels. "I am
no Queen, to need such honours," she once said to him; and he had
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Massimilla Doni by Honore de Balzac: her French attire; she had Italianized it. A Frenchwoman treats her
shirt with the greatest seriousness; an Italian never thinks about it;
she does not attempt self-protection by some prim glance, for she
knows that she is safe in that of a devoted love, a passion as sacred
and serious in her eyes as in those of others.
At eleven in the forenoon, after a walk, and by the side of a table
still strewn with the remains of an elegant breakfast, the Duchess,
lounging in an easy-chair, left her lover the master of these muslin
draperies, without a frown each time he moved. Emilio, seated at her
side, held one of her hands between his, gazing at her with utter
absorption. Ask not whether they loved; they loved only too well. They
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Egmont by Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe: know it, dying and mortally wounded I may utter it; long has the proud
man envied me, long has he meditated and planned my ruin.
Even then, when still young, we played at dice together, and the heaps of
gold, one after the other, passed rapidly from his side to mine; he would
look on with affected composure, while inwardly consumed with rage,
more at my success than at his own loss. Well do I remember the fiery
glance, the treacherous pallor that overspread his features when, at a
public festival, we shot for a wager before assembled thousands. He
challenged me, and both nations stood by; Spaniards and Netherlanders
wagered on either side; I was the victor; his ball missed, mine hit the
mark, and the air was rent by acclamations from my friends. His shot now
Egmont |
