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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from Modeste Mignon by Honore de Balzac: Canalis passed the letter to La Briere. The little poem, with all its
hidden enthusiasms, in short, poor Modeste's heart, was disdainfully
handed over, with the gesture of a spoiled dandy.
"It is a fine thing," said the lawyer, "to have the power to attract
such feelings; to force a poor woman to step out of the habits which
nature, education, and the world dictate to her, to break through
conventions. What privileges genius wins! A letter such as this,
written by a young girl--a genuine young girl--without hidden
meanings, with real enthusiasm--"
"Well, what?" said Canalis.
"Why, a man might suffer as much as Tasso and yet feel recompensed,"
Modeste Mignon |
