| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Father Goriot by Honore de Balzac: Eugene's astonishment.
Indeed, Mme. de Beauseant seemed to be engaged in making a survey
of the house, and to be unconscious of Mme. Nucingen's existence;
but no movement made by the latter was lost upon the Vicomtesse.
The house was full of the loveliest women in Paris, so that
Delphine de Nucingen was not a little flattered to receive the
undivided attention of Mme. de Beauseant's young, handsome, and
well-dressed cousin, who seemed to have no eyes for any one else.
"If you look at her so persistently, you will make people talk,
M. de Rastignac. You will never succeed if you fling yourself at
any one's head like that."
Father Goriot |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Prufrock/Other Observations by T. S. Eliot: After the cups, the marmalade, the tea,
Among the porcelain, among some talk of you and me,
Would it have been worth while,
To have bitten off the matter with a smile,
To have squeezed the universe into a ball
To roll it toward some overwhelming question,
To say: "I am Lazarus, come from the dead,
Come back to tell you all, I shall tell you all"--
If one, settling a pillow by her head,
Should say: "That is not what I meant at all;
That is not it, at all."
Prufrock/Other Observations |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Aspern Papers by Henry James: "What I want of you is a general promise to help me."
"Oh, how can I--how can I?" she asked, wondering and troubled.
She was half-surprised, half-frightened at my wishing to make
her play an active part.
"This is the main thing: to watch her carefully and warn me in time,
before she commits that horrible sacrilege."
"I can't watch her when she makes me go out."
"That's very true."
"And when you do, too."
"Mercy on us; do you think she will have done anything tonight?"
"I don't know; she is very cunning."
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