| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Maitre Cornelius by Honore de Balzac: feudality. For some time past he had found no opportunity to "make
himself populace" and espouse the domestic interests of some man
"engarrie" (an old word still used in Tours, meaning engaged) in
litigious affairs, so that he shouldered the anxieties of Maitre
Cornelius eagerly, and also the secret sorrows of the Comtesse de
Saint-Vallier. Several times during dinner he said to his daughter:--
"Who, think you, could have robbed my silversmith? The robberies now
amount to over twelve hundred thousand crowns in eight years. Twelve
hundred thousand crowns, messieurs!" he continued, looking at the
seigneurs who were serving him. "Notre Dame! with a sum like that what
absolutions could be bought in Rome! And I might, Pasques-Dieu! bank
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Astoria by Washington Irving: intrusted the land expedition, and who were to make their way to
the mouth of the Columbia, up vast rivers, across trackless
plains, and over the rugged barriers of the Rocky Mountains.
The conduct of this expedition, as has been already mentioned,
was assigned to Mr. Wilson Price Hunt, of Trenton, New Jersey,
one of the partners of the company, who was ultimately to be at
the head of the establishment at the mouth of the Columbia. He is
represented as a man scrupulously upright and faithful his
dealings, amicable in his disposition, and of most accommodating
manners; and his whole conduct will be found in unison with such
a character. He was not practically experienced in the Indian
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Complete Angler by Izaak Walton: for these be the usual months that Salmon come out of the sea to spawn
in most fresh rivers. And their fry would, about a certain time, return
back to the salt water, if they were not hindered by weirs and unlawful
gins, which the greedy fishermen set, and so destroy them by thousands;
as they would, being so taught by nature, change the fresh for salt
water. He that shall view the wise Statutes made in the 13th of Edward
the First, and the like in Richard the Second, may see several provisions
made against the destruction of fish: and though I profess no knowledge
of the law, yet I am sure the regulation of these defects might be easily
mended. But I remember that a wise friend of mine did usually say, "
that which is everybody's business is nobody's business ": if it were
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