The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions by Edwin A. Abbot: the Circles; it must then be surely obvious to you, my dear Reader,
that the Colour Bill placed us under a great danger of confounding
a Priest with a young Woman.
How attractive this prospect must have been to the Frail Sex may
readily be imagined. They anticipated with delight the confusion that
would ensue. At home they might hear political and ecclesiastical
secrets intended not for them but for their husbands and brothers,
and might even issue commands in the name of a priestly Circle;
out of doors the striking combination of red and green,
without addition of any other colours, would be sure to lead
the common people into endless mistakes, and the Women would gain
 Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions |
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: they were pretty, they contained objects of value; everything in
the picture told of a "good house." At the end of five minutes a
servant came in with a request from the Master that he would join
him downstairs; upon which, descending, he followed his conductor
through a long passage to an apartment thrown out, in the rear of
the habitation, for the special requirements, as he guessed, of a
busy man of letters.
St. George was in his shirt-sleeves in the middle of a large high
room - a room without windows, but with a wide skylight at the top,
that of a place of exhibition. It was furnished as a library, and
the serried bookshelves rose to the ceiling, a surface of
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Salome by Oscar Wilde: Il ne faut regarder que dans les miroirs. Car les miroirs ne nous
montrent que des masques . . . Oh! Oh! du vin! j'ai soif . . .
Salome, Salome, soyons amis. Enfin, voyez . . . Qu'est-ce que je
voulais dire? Qu'est-ce que c'etait? Ah! je m'en souviens! . . .
Salome! Non, venez plus pres de moi. J'ai peur que vous ne
m'entendiez pas . . . Salome, vous connaissez mes paons blancs, mes
beaux paons blancs, qui se promenent dans le jardin entre les myrtes
et les grands cypres. Leurs becs sont dores, et les grains qu'ils
mangent sont dores aussi, et leurs pieds sont teints de pourpre. La
pluie vient quand ils crient, et quand ils se pavanent la lune se
montre au ciel. Ils vont deux e deux entre les cypres et les myrtes
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