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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from Tales of Unrest by Joseph Conrad: question of more or less pain, of this joy, of that sorrow. It was a
question of truth or falsehood--it was a question of life or death.
He stood in the revealing night--in the darkness that tries the
hearts, in the night useless for the work of men, but in which their
gaze, undazzled by the sunshine of covetous days, wanders sometimes
as far as the stars. The perfect stillness around him had something
solemn in it, but he felt it was the lying solemnity of a temple
devoted to the rites of a debasing persuasion. The silence within the
discreet walls was eloquent of safety but it appeared to him exciting
and sinister, like the discretion of a profitable infamy; it was the
prudent peace of a den of coiners--of a house of ill-fame! The years
 Tales of Unrest |