| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Mansfield Park by Jane Austen: long letter, instead of having it to spread over the largest
part of a page of her own. For though Lady Bertram rather
shone in the epistolary line, having early in her marriage,
from the want of other employment, and the circumstance
of Sir Thomas's being in Parliament, got into the way
of making and keeping correspondents, and formed for
herself a very creditable, common-place, amplifying style,
so that a very little matter was enough for her: she could
not do entirely without any; she must have something
to write about, even to her niece; and being so soon
to lose all the benefit of Dr. Grant's gouty symptoms
Mansfield Park |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from When the Sleeper Wakes by H. G. Wells: great fronts of buildings coloured pale blue. Do you
really mean--?"
"Yes. How can I explain it to you? Of course
the blue uniform struck you. Nearly a third of our
people wear it--more assume it now every day. This
Labour Company has grown imperceptibly."
"What is this Labour Company?" asked Graham.
"In the old times, how did you manage with staning
people?"
"There was the workhouse--which the parishes
maintained."
When the Sleeper Wakes |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Red Inn by Honore de Balzac: heedlessly, being less sophisticated than the others.
"There's no longer a father-in-law," I replied. "Hitherto, my
conscience has spoken plainly enough to make your verdict superfluous.
If to-day its voice is weakened, here is the cause of my cowardice. I
received, about two months ago, this all-seducing letter."
And I showed them the following invitation, which I took from my
pocket-book:--
"You are invited to be present at the funeral procession, burial
services, and interment of Monsieur Jean-Frederic Taillefer, of
the house of Taillefer and Company, formerly Purveyor of
Commissary-meats, in his lifetime chevalier of the Legion of
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