| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Droll Stories, V. 1 by Honore de Balzac: spread their ecstasy around. They remained always ready to begin
eating, seeing that they only thought of gazing into each other's
eyes, and never touched a dish. Just as they were beginning to feel
comfortable and at their ease, there came a great noise at Madame's
door, as if people were beating against it, and crying out.
"Madame," cried the little servant hastily, "here's another of them."
"Who is it?" cried she in a haughty manner, like a tyrant, savage at
being interrupted.
"The Bishop of Coire wishes to speak with you."
"May the devil take him!" said she, looking at Philippe gently.
"Madame he has seen the light through the chinks, and is making a
Droll Stories, V. 1 |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from La Grenadiere by Honore de Balzac: eyes from the invalid. It was the deeply tragical hour that comes in
all our lives, the hour of listening in terror to every deep breath
lest it should be the last, a dark hour protracted over many days. On
the fifth day of that fatal week the doctor interdicted flowers in the
room. The illusions of life were going one by one.
Then Marie and his brother felt their mother's lips hot as fire
beneath their kisses; and at last, on the Saturday evening, Mme.
Willemsens was too ill to bear the slightest sound, and her room was
left in disorder. This neglect for a woman of refined taste, who clung
so persistently to the graces of life, meant the beginning of the
death-agony. After this, Louis refused to leave his mother. On Sunday
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Illustrious Gaudissart by Honore de Balzac: shape of weddings and suppers. When he was in the provinces, the
correspondents in the smaller towns made much of him; in Paris, the
great houses feted and caressed him. Welcomed, flattered, and fed
wherever he went, it came to pass that to breakfast or to dine alone
was a novelty, an event. He lived the life of a sovereign, or, better
still, of a journalist; in fact, he was the perambulating "feuilleton"
of Parisian commerce.
His name was Gaudissart; and his renown, his vogue, the flatteries
showered upon him, were such as to win for him the surname of
Illustrious. Wherever the fellow went,--behind a counter or before a
bar, into a salon or to the top of a stage-coach, up to a garret or to
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