| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Rise and Fall of Cesar Birotteau by Honore de Balzac: word; he has given us the means of annihilating Macassar oil. Yes!
nothing can make the hair grow; Macassar, you lie! Popinot, our
fortune is made. We'll go to the manufactory to-morrow morning at
seven o'clock; the nuts will be there, and we will press out some oil.
It is all very well for him to say that any oil is good; if the public
knew that, we should be lost. If we didn't put some scent and the name
of nuts into the oil, how could we sell it for three or four francs
the four ounces?"
"You are about to be decorated, monsieur?" said Popinot, "what glory
for--"
"Commerce; that is true, my boy."
Rise and Fall of Cesar Birotteau |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Merry Men by Robert Louis Stevenson: monstrous value - priceless, we may say; exquisitely worked, of
exquisite material. And now, mark me, they have never been found.
In the reign of Louis Quatorze some fellows were digging hard by
the ruins. Suddenly - tock! - the spade hit upon an obstacle.
Imagine the men fooling one to another; imagine how their hearts
bounded, how their colour came and went. It was a coffer, and in
Franchard the place of buried treasure! They tore it open like
famished beasts. Alas! it was not the treasure; only some priestly
robes, which, at the touch of the eating air, fell upon themselves
and instantly wasted into dust. The perspiration of these good
fellows turned cold upon them, Jean-Marie. I will pledge my
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Moral Emblems by Robert Louis Stevenson: Vainly soliciting from pride.
Mark how the Beau with easy air
Contemns the anxious rustic's prayer,
And, casting a disdainful eye,
Goes gaily gallivanting by.
He from the poor averts his head . . .
He will regret it when he's dead.
Poem: III - A PEAK IN DARIEN
Broad-gazing on untrodden lands,
See where adventurous Cortez stands;
While in the heavens above his head
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