| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Scenes from a Courtesan's Life by Honore de Balzac: and threw them on the flames. But Camusot saved them; the Countess
rushed on him and snatched back the burning papers. A struggle ensued,
Camusot calling out: "Madame, but madame! This is contempt--madame!"
A man hurried into the room, and the Countess could not repress a
scream as she beheld the Comte de Serizy, followed by Monsieur de
Granville and the Comte de Bauvan. Leontine, however, determined to
save Lucien at any cost, would not let go of the terrible stamped
documents, which she clutched with the tenacity of a vise, though the
flame had already burnt her delicate skin like a moxa.
At last Camusot, whose fingers also were smarting from the fire,
seemed to be ashamed of the position; he let the papers go; there was
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from A Treatise on Parents and Children by George Bernard Shaw: abomination. But when its viciousness made it customary, it was
practised and tolerated on all hands by people who were innocent of
anything worse than stupidity, ill temper, and inability to discover
other methods of maintaining order than those they had always seen
practised and approved of. From children and animals it extended to
slaves and criminals. In the days of Moses it was limited to 39
lashes. In the early nineteenth century it had become an open
madness: soldiers were sentenced to a thousand lashes for trifling
offences, with the result (among others less mentionable) that the
Iron Duke of Wellington complained that it was impossible to get an
order obeyed in the British army except in two or three crack
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Copy-Cat & Other Stories by Mary E. Wilkins Freeman: Christopher spoke. "I am going back to the very
beginning of things," said he, "and maybe you will
think it blasphemy, but I don't mean it for that.
I mean it for the truth, and the truth which is too
much for my comprehension."
"I have heard men swear when it did not seem
blasphemy to me," said Stephen.
"Thank the Lord, you ain't so deep in your rut
you can't see the stars!" said Christopher. "But
I guess you see them in a pretty black sky sometimes.
In the beginning, why did I have to come into the
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