| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from La Grande Breteche by Honore de Balzac: cracks, and the blackened coping is laced with a thousand festoons of
pellitory. The stone steps are disjointed; the bell-cord is rotten;
the gutter-spouts broken. What fire from heaven could have fallen
there? By what decree has salt been sown on this dwelling? Has God
been mocked here? Or was France betrayed? These are the questions we
ask ourselves. Reptiles crawl over it, but give no reply. This empty
and deserted house is a vast enigma of which the answer is known to
none.
"It was formerly a little domain, held in fief, and is known as La
Grande Breteche. During my stay at Vendome, where Despleins had left
me in charge of a rich patient, the sight of this strange dwelling
La Grande Breteche |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Lady Baltimore by Owen Wister: the ink, noting in my search the big fireplace, simple, wooden,
unornamented, but generous, and the plain plaster walls of the lodge,
whereon hung two or three old prints of gamebirds; and all the while I
saw John out of the corner of my eye, looking at me.
He spoke first. "Your friend has given his word to a lady; he must stand
by it like a gentleman.
"Lot of difference," I returned, still looking round the room, "between
spirit and letter. If his heart has broken the word, his lips can't make
him a gentleman."
John brought his fist down on the table. "He had no business to get
engaged to her! He must take the consequences."
That blow of the fist on the table brought my thoughts wholly clear and
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen: receiving her brother and his wife, who came as usual to spend
the Christmas at Longbourn. Mr. Gardiner was a sensible,
gentlemanlike man, greatly superior to his sister, as well by
nature as education. The Netherfield ladies would have had
difficulty in believing that a man who lived by trade, and within
view of his own warehouses, could have been so well-bred and
agreeable. Mrs. Gardiner, who was several years younger than
Mrs. Bennet and Mrs. Phillips, was an amiable, intelligent,
elegant woman, and a great favourite with all her Longbourn
nieces. Between the two eldest and herself especially, there
subsisted a particular regard. They had frequently been staying
Pride and Prejudice |
