| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Illustrious Gaudissart by Honore de Balzac: "You!"
"Why shouldn't I be the Baron Gaudissart, peer of France? Haven't they
twice elected Monsieur Popinot as deputy from the fourth
arrondissement? He dines with Louis Phillippe. There's Finot; he is
going to be, they say, a member of the Council. Suppose they send me
as ambassador to London? I tell you I'd nonplus those English! No man
ever got the better of Gaudissart, the illustrious Gaudissart, and
nobody ever will. Yes, I say it! no one ever outwitted me, and no one
can--in any walk of life, politics or impolitics, here or elsewhere.
But, for the time being, I must give myself wholly to the capitalists;
to the 'Globe,' the 'Movement,' the 'Children,' and my article Paris."
|
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Court Life in China by Isaac Taylor Headland: decorations consisting of large stands of cakes and fruit. I
speak of this because it was all changed at future audiences,
when the table was spread with snow-white cloths, and smiled with
its load of most gorgeous flowers. Especially was this true after
the luncheons given to the princesses and ladies of the court by
Mrs. Conger at the American legation, showing that the eyes of
these ladies were open to receive whatever suggestions might come
to them even in so small a matter as the spreading and decoration
of a table. The banquets thereafter were made up of alternating
courses of Chinese and foreign food.
"With but one exception, the Empress Dowager thereafter never
|
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Scenes from a Courtesan's Life by Honore de Balzac: " 'Gentlemen,' said the President then, very gravely, 'you must please
to understand that for the outside world Lucien de Rubempre died of an
aneurism.'
"We all looked at each other. 'Very great people are concerned in this
deplorable business,' said the President. 'God grant for your sake,
Monsieur Camusot, though you did no less than your duty, that Madame
de Serizy may not go mad from the shock she has had. She was carried
away almost dead. I have just met our public prosecutor in a painful
state of despair.'--'You have made a mess of it, my dear Camusot,' he
added in my ear.--I assure you, my dear, as I came away I could hardly
stand. My legs shook so that I dared not venture into the street. I
|
