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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from The Purse by Honore de Balzac: everything. Nothing tempts a young man more than to play the part
of a good genius to a woman. There is something inexplicably
romantic in such an enterprise which appeals to a highly-strung
soul. Is it not the utmost stretch of devotion under the loftiest
and most engaging aspect? Is there not something grand in the
thought that we love enough still to love on when the love of
others dwindles and dies?
Hippolyte sat down in his studio, gazed at his picture without
doing anything to it, seeing the figures through tears that
swelled in his eyes, holding his brush in his hand, going up to
the canvas as if to soften down an effect, but not touching it.
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