The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from An Ideal Husband by Oscar Wilde: LORD GORING. I am glad you have called. I am going to give you some
good advice.
MRS. CHEVELEY. Oh! pray don't. One should never give a woman
anything that she can't wear in the evening.
LORD GORING. I see you are quite as wilful as you used to be.
MRS. CHEVELEY. Far more! I have greatly improved. I have had more
experience.
LORD GORING. Too much experience is a dangerous thing. Pray have a
cigarette. Half the pretty women in London smoke cigarettes.
Personally I prefer the other half.
MRS. CHEVELEY. Thanks. I never smoke. My dressmaker wouldn't like
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Call of the Canyon by Zane Grey: "Larry, I fear gain and loss are mere words, she said. "The thing that
counts with me is what you are."
He stared in well-bred surprise, and presently talked of a new dance which
had lately come into vogue. And from that he passed on to gossip of the
theatres. Once between courses of the dinner he asked Carley to dance, and
she complied. The music would have stimulated an Egyptian mummy, Carley
thought, and the subdued rose lights, the murmur of gay voices, the glide
and grace and distortion of the dancers, were exciting and pleasurable.
Morrison had the suppleness and skill of a dancing-master. But he held
Carley too tightly, and so she told him, and added, "I imbibed some fresh
pure air while I was out West--something you haven't here--and I don't want
 The Call of the Canyon |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Moll Flanders by Daniel Defoe: 'Ay,' said I, 'but then I must go at last.' 'Why, what?' said she;
'is the girl mad? What would you be -- a gentlewoman?'
'Yes,' says I, and cried heartily till I roard out again.
This set the old gentlewoman a-laughing at me, as you may be
sure it would. 'Well, madam, forsooth,' says she, gibing at me,
'you would be a gentlewoman; and pray how will you come to
be a gentlewoman? What! will you do it by your fingers' end?'
'Yes,' says I again, very innocently.
'Why, what can you earn?' says she; 'what can you get at your
work?'
'Threepence,' said I, 'when I spin, and fourpence when I work
 Moll Flanders |