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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from The Marriage Contract by Honore de Balzac: accompanied by their friends, heard mass by torchlight, in presence of
a crowd of inquisitive persons. A marriage celebrated at night always
suggests to the mind an unpleasant omen. Light is the symbol of life
and pleasure, the forecasts of which are lacking to a midnight
wedding. Ask the intrepid soul why it shivers; why the chill of those
black arches enervates it; why the sound of steps startles it; why it
notices the cry of bats and the hoot of owls. Though there is
absolutely no reason to tremble, all present do tremble, and the
darkness, emblem of death, saddens them. Natalie, parted from her
mother, wept. The girl was now a prey to those doubts which grasp the
heart as it enters a new career in which, despite all assurances of
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