| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen: to be acquired without constant practice. I have told Miss
Bennet several times, that she will never play really well unless
she practises more; and though Mrs. Collins has no instrument,
she is very welcome, as I have often told her, to come to
Rosings every day, and play on the pianoforte in Mrs.
Jenkinson's room. She would be in nobody's way, you know, in
that part of the house."
Mr. Darcy looked a little ashamed of his aunt's ill-breeding, and
made no answer.
When coffee was over, Colonel Fitzwilliam reminded Elizabeth
of having promised to play to him; and she sat down directly to
 Pride and Prejudice |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Hated Son by Honore de Balzac: smiling.
The Marquise de Noirmoutier, who accompanied her sister, laughed
significantly. That laugh stabbed Etienne to the heart; already the
sight of the tall lady had terrified him.
"Well, Monsieur le duc," said the duke in a low voice and assuming a
lively air, "have I not found you a handsome wife? What do you say to
that slip of a girl, my cherub?"
The old duke never doubted his son's obedience; Etienne, to him, was
the son of his mother, of the same dough, docile to his kneading.
"Let him have a child and die," thought the old man; "little I care."
"Father," said the young man, in a gentle voice, "I do not understand
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Poems of Goethe, Bowring, Tr. by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe: Not over stumps and stones, indeed,
But over meads and cornfields sweet,
Trampling down all with clumsy feet.
A farmer met him by-and-by,
And didn't ask him: how? or why?
But with his fist saluted him.
"I feel new life in every limb!"
Our traveller cried in ecstasy.
"Who art thou who thus gladden'st me?
May Heaven such blessings ever send!
Ne'er may I want a jovial friend!"
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