| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from A Distinguished Provincial at Paris by Honore de Balzac: with daylight, my subsistence is secure, I think a great deal, and
I study. I do not see that I am open to attack at any point, now
that I have renounced a world where my vanity might suffer at any
moment. The great men of every age are obliged to lead lives
apart. What are they but birds in the forest? They sing, nature
falls under the spell of their song, and no one should see them.
That shall be my lot, always supposing that I can carry out my
ambitious plans.
"Mme. de Bargeton I do not regret. A woman who could behave as she
behaved does not deserve a thought. Nor am I sorry that I left
Angouleme. She did wisely when she flung me into the sea of Paris
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Lesson of the Master by Henry James: talking to a lady before the fireplace; but he at once looked away,
feeling unready for an encounter, and therefore couldn't be sure
the author of "Shadowmere" noticed him. At all events he didn't
come over though Miss Fancourt did as soon as she saw him - she
almost rushed at him, smiling rustling radiant beautiful. He had
forgotten what her head, what her face offered to the sight; she
was in white, there were gold figures on her dress and her hair was
a casque of gold. He saw in a single moment that she was happy,
happy with an aggressive splendour. But she wouldn't speak to him
of that, she would speak only of himself.
"I'm so delighted; my father told me. How kind of you to come!"
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Edition of The Ambassadors by Henry James: hours put on, in that belated vision--for he scarce went to bed
till morning--the aspect that is most to our purpose.
He then knew more or less how he had been affected--he but half
knew at the time. There had been plenty to affect him even after,
as has been said, they had shaken down; for his consciousness,
though muffled, had its sharpest moments during this passage, a
marked drop into innocent friendly Bohemia. They then had put
their elbows on the table, deploring the premature end of their two
or three dishes; which they had tried to make up with another
bottle while Chad joked a little spasmodically, perhaps even a
little irrelevantly, with the hostess. What it all came to had
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