| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Deserted Woman by Honore de Balzac: possesses the genius of her sex, love never comes to be a matter of
use and wont. She brings all her heart and brain to love, clothes her
tenderness in forms so varied, there is such art in her most natural
moments, or so much nature in her art, that in absence her memory is
almost as potent as her presence. All other women are as shadows
compared with her. Not until we have lost or known the dread of losing
a love so vast and glorious, do we prize it at its just worth. And if
a man who has once possessed this love shuts himself out from it by
his own act and deed, and sinks to some loveless marriage; if by some
incident, hidden in the obscurity of married life, the woman with whom
he hoped to know the same felicity makes it clear that it will never
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Barnaby Rudge by Charles Dickens: a door.
'This is my quarters, is it?' he asked facetiously.
'This is the shop, sir,' replied his friend.
He was walking in, but not with the best possible grace, when he
suddenly stopped, and started back.
'Halloa!' said the officer. 'You're nervous.'
'Nervous!' whispered Dennis in great alarm. 'Well I may be. Shut
the door.'
'I will, when you're in,' returned the man.
'But I can't go in there,' whispered Dennis. 'I can't be shut up
with that man. Do you want me to be throttled, brother?'
Barnaby Rudge |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from On Revenues by Xenophon: at liberty to take any surplus sum, whether directly traceable to the
peace itself, or to the more courteous treatment of our resident
aliens and traders, or to the growth of the imports and exports,
coincident with the collecting together of larger masses of human
beings, or to an augmentation of harbour[50] and market dues: this
surplus, I say, however derived, you should take and invest[51] so as
to bring in the greatest revenue.[52]
[40] Or, "sinking fund."
[41] {athrooi}--"in a body." It is a military phrase, I think. In
close order, as it were, not in detachments.
[42] "According to our ability," a favourite Socratic phrase.
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