| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Eugenie Grandet by Honore de Balzac: Charles.
The Abbe Cruchot had guessed the conversation between Charles and
Madame des Grassins without seeming to pay attention to it.
"Monsieur," said Adolphe to Charles with an air which he tried to make
free and easy, "I don't know whether you remember me, but I had the
honor of dancing as your /vis-a-vis/ at a ball given by the Baron de
Nucingen, and--"
"Perfectly; I remember perfectly, monsieur," answered Charles, pleased
to find himself the object of general attention.
"Monsieur is your son?" he said to Madame des Grassins.
The abbe looked at her maliciously.
Eugenie Grandet |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Eugenie Grandet by Honore de Balzac: "Plague take him! I am no longer Monsieur de Bonfons," thought the
magistrate ruefully, his face assuming the expression of a judge bored
by an argument.
The heads of the two factions walked off together. Neither gave any
further thought to the treachery Grandet had been guilty of in the
morning against the whole wine-growing community; each tried to fathom
what the other was thinking about the real intentions of the wily old
man in this new affair, but in vain.
"Will you go with us to Madame Dorsonval's?" said des Grassins to the
notary.
"We will go there later," answered the president. "I have promised to
Eugenie Grandet |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Reminiscences of Tolstoy by Leo Tolstoy: bits of it have been preserved by some of us in copies or in
memory. I cannot recall everything interesting that there was in
it, but here are a few of the more interesting things from the
period of the eighties.
THE LETTER-BOX
THE old fogy continues his questions. Why, when women or old men
enter the room, does every well-bred person not only offer them a
seat, but give them up his own?
Why do they make Ushakóf or some Servian officer who
comes to pay a visit necessarily stay to tea or dinner?
Why is it considered wrong to let an older person or a woman
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