| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Maitre Cornelius by Honore de Balzac: of certain cardinals, and to appear before the sovereign pontiff in
person armed with the approval of the king. Marie was firm in
maintaining her liberty to love, that she might sacrifice it to him
later. Nearly every woman in those days had sufficient power to
establish her empire over the heart of a man in a way to make that
passion the history of his whole life, the spring and principle of his
highest resolutions. Women were a power in France; they were so many
sovereigns; they had forms of noble pride; their lovers belonged to
them far more than they gave themselves to their lovers; often their
love cost blood, and to be their lover it was necessary to incur great
dangers. But the Marie of his dream made small defence against the
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Emma by Jane Austen: He was arm-in-arm with Mr. Cole."
"This is an alliance which, whoever--whatever your friends may be,
must be agreeable to them, provided at least they have common sense;
and we are not to be addressing our conduct to fools. If they
are anxious to see you happily married, here is a man whose amiable
character gives every assurance of it;--if they wish to have you
settled in the same country and circle which they have chosen
to place you in, here it will be accomplished; and if their only
object is that you should, in the common phrase, be well married,
here is the comfortable fortune, the respectable establishment,
the rise in the world which must satisfy them."
Emma |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Rasselas, Prince of Abyssinia by Samuel Johnson: "To be a poet," said Imlac, "is indeed very difficult."
"So difficult," returned the Prince, "that I will at present hear
no more of his labours. Tell me whither you went when you had seen
Persia."
"From Persia," said the poet, "I travelled through Syria, and for
three years resided in Palestine, where I conversed with great
numbers of the northern and western nations of Europe, the nations
which are now in possession of all power and all knowledge, whose
armies are irresistible, and whose fleets command the remotest
parts of the globe. When I compared these men with the natives of
our own kingdom and those that surround us, they appeared almost
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