| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Pierre Grassou by Honore de Balzac: "All for me?"
"Yes--they want their portraits taken. These bourgeois--they are crazy
about art--have never dared to enter a studio. The girl has a 'dot' of
a hundred thousand francs. You can paint all three,--perhaps they'll
turn out family portraits."
And with that the old Dutch log of wood who passed for a man and who
was called Elie Magus, interrupted himself to laugh an uncanny laugh
which frightened the painter. He fancied he heard Mephistopheles
talking marriage.
"Portraits bring five hundred francs apiece," went on Elie; "so you
can very well afford to paint me three pictures."
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Lesser Bourgeoisie by Honore de Balzac: "Why can't you tell us the name of that young man of science?" Madame
Thuillier ventured to say, for she never put any diplomacy into the
expression of her thoughts.
"Because he has not, like Pere Anselme, the saintliness which would
absolve him in the eyes of monsieur here for this flagrant violation
of the Sabbath. Besides," added Madame de Godollo, in a significant
manner, "he asked me not to mention that I had met him there."
"Then you know a good many scientific young men?" said Celeste,
interrogatively; "this one and Monsieur Felix--that makes two."
"My dear love," said the countess, "you are an inquisitive little
girl, and you will not make me say what I do not choose to say,
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Passionate Pilgrim by William Shakespeare: Lost, vaded, broken, dead within an hour.
And as goods lost are seld or never found,
As vaded gloss no rubbing will refresh,
As flowers dead lie wither'd on the ground,
As broken glass no cement can redress,
So beauty blemish'd once's for ever lost,
In spite of physic, painting, pain and cost.
XIV.
Good night, good rest. Ah, neither be my share:
She bade good night that kept my rest away;
And daff'd me to a cabin hang'd with care,
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