| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Lesson of the Master by Henry James: sack's empty, you're still appealed to, you still get touches and
thrills, the idea springs up - out of the lap of the actual - and
shows you there's always something to be done. But I shan't do it
- she's not for me!"
"How do you mean, not for you?"
"Oh it's all over - she's for you, if you like."
"Ah much less!" said Paul. "She's not for a dingy little man of
letters; she's for the world, the bright rich world of bribes and
rewards. And the world will take hold of her - it will carry her
away."
"It will try - but it's just a case in which there may be a fight.
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Secrets of the Princesse de Cadignan by Honore de Balzac: ruin she had caused by her own extravagance. The prince left France
with the royal family, and never returned to it, leaving the princess
in Paris, protected by the fact of his absence; for their debts, which
the sale of all their salable property had not been able to
extinguish, could only be recovered through him. The revenues of the
entailed estates had been seized. In short, the affairs of this great
family were in as bad a state as those of the elder branch of the
Bourbons.
This woman, so celebrated under her first name of Duchesse de
Maufrigneuse, very wisely decided to live in retirement, and to make
herself, if possible, forgotten. Paris was then so carried away by the
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Message by Honore de Balzac: dropped down upon her from the skies and innumerable doubts,
certainly warranted by the state of my clothes, by my youth and
my expression, all singularly at variance; there was all the
disdain of the adored mistress, in whose eyes all men save one
are as nothing; there were involuntary tremors and alarms; and,
above all, the thought that it was tiresome to have an unexpected
guest just now, when, no doubt, she had been scheming to enjoy
full solitude for her love. This mute eloquence I understood in
her eyes, and all the pity and compassion in me made answer in a
sad smile. I thought of her, as I had seen her for one moment, in
the pride of her beauty; standing in the sunny afternoon in the
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