| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton: while the spectators interrupted their talk to watch
the result.
Newland Archer, standing on the verandah of the
house, looked curiously down upon this scene. On each
side of the shiny painted steps was a large blue china
flower-pot on a bright yellow china stand. A spiky
green plant filled each pot, and below the verandah ran
a wide border of blue hydrangeas edged with more red
geraniums. Behind him, the French windows of the
drawing-rooms through which he had passed gave
glimpses, between swaying lace curtains, of glassy parquet
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Tragedy of Pudd'nhead Wilson by Mark Twain: I saved my own life, you see."
"Yes, that is your way of talking," said Angelo, "but I know you--
I don't believe you thought of yourself at all. I keep that weapon
yet that Luigi killed the man with, and I'll show it to you sometime.
That incident makes it interesting, and it had a history before it
came into Luigi's hands which adds to its interest. It was given to
Luigi by a great Indian prince, the Gaikowar of Baroda, and it had been
in his family two or three centuries. It killed a good many disagreeable
people who troubled the hearthstone at one time or another. It isn't much
too look at, except it isn't shaped like other knives, or dirks,
or whatever it may be called--here, I'll draw it for you." He took a
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Modeste Mignon by Honore de Balzac: father and mother? Can there be any reason why you should reject
these pages full of you, written for you, seen by no eye but
yours? Send me their counterpart. I am so little of a woman yet
that your confidences--provided they are full and true--will
suffice for the happiness of your
O. d'Este M.
"Good heavens! can I be in love already?" cried the young secretary,
when he perceived that he had held the above letter in his hands more
than an hour after reading it. "What shall I do? She thinks she is
writing to the great poet! Can I continue the deception? Is she a
woman of forty, or a girl of twenty?"
 Modeste Mignon |