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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from The Duchesse de Langeais by Honore de Balzac: was ready to brave society, yet she hesitated till her scruples
degenerated into artifice. With more wilfulness than real force
of character, impressionable rather than enthusiastic, gifted
with more brain than heart; she was supremely a woman, supremely
a coquette, and above all things a Parisienne, loving a brilliant
life and gaiety, reflecting never, or too late; imprudent to the
verge of poetry, and humble in the depths of her heart, in spite
of her charming insolence. Like some straight-growing reed, she
made a show of independence; yet, like the reed, she was ready to
bend to a strong hand. She talked much of religion, and had it
not at heart, though she was prepared to find in it a solution of
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