| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from La Grenadiere by Honore de Balzac: time, sending provisions across in the morning, and scarcely ever
spent the night there except during the grape harvest; but the English
settled down on Touraine like a cloud of locusts, and La Grenadiere
must, of course, be completed if it was to find tenants. Luckily,
however, this recent appendage is hidden from sight by the first two
trees of a lime-tree avenue planted in a gully below the vineyards.
There are only two acres of vineyard at most, the ground rising at the
back of the house so steeply that it is no very easy matter to
scramble up among the vines. The slope, covered with green trailing
shoots, ends within about five feet of the house wall in a ditch-like
passage always damp and cold and full of strong growing green things,
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Ursula by Honore de Balzac: which therefore must be popular in the little town.
Bongrand is chief-justice of the court of appeals at Melun. His son is
in the way of becoming an honest attorney-general.
Madame Cremiere continues to make her delightful speeches. On the
occasion of her daughter's marriage, she exhorted her to be the
working caterpillar of the household, and to look into everything with
the eyes of a sphinx. Goupil is making a collection of her "slapsus-
linquies," which he calls a Cremiereana.
"We have had the great sorrow of losing our good Abbe Chaperon," said
the Vicomtesse de Portenduere this winter--having nursed him herself
during his illness. "The whole canton came to his funeral. Nemours is
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Maggie: A Girl of the Streets by Stephen Crane: attention to them.
"What deh hell, Jimmie?" he asked of the small champion.
Jimmie wiped his blood-wet features with his sleeve.
"Well, it was dis way, Pete, see! I was goin' teh lick dat
Riley kid and dey all pitched on me."
Some Rum Alley children now came forward. The party stood for
a moment exchanging vainglorious remarks with Devil's Row. A few
stones were thrown at long distances, and words of challenge passed
between small warriors. Then the Rum Alley contingent turned
slowly in the direction of their home street. They began to give,
each to each, distorted versions of the fight. Causes of retreat
 Maggie: A Girl of the Streets |