Once upon a time when I was very tired, I chanced to go away to a little house by the sea. It is empty, they said, "but you can
easily furnish it.' Empty! Yes, thank Heaven!
Furnish it? Heaven forbidi Its floors were bare, its walls were bare, its tables there were only two in the house were bare. There was nothing in the closets but books: nothing in
the bureau drawers but the smell of clean, fresh wood; nothing in the kitchen but an oil stove, and a few a very few dishes; nothing in the attic but rafters and sunshine, and a
view of the sea. After I had been there an hour thore descended upon mo a great peace, a sense of freedom of Infinite leisure. In the twilight I sat before the flickering embers
of the open fire, and looked out through the open door to the sea, and asked myself, "Why?' Then the answer came: I was emancipated from things. There was nothing in the
house to demand care, to claim attention, to cumber my consciousness with its insistent, unchanging companionship. There was nothing but a shelter, and outside, the fields
and marshes, the shore and the sea. These did not have to be taken down and put up and arranged and dusted and cared for. They were not things at all, they were powers,
presences
And so I rested. While the spell was still unbroken, I came away. For broken it would have been, I know, had I not fled first. Even in this refuge the enemy would have pursued
me, found me out, encompassed me.
if we could but free ourselves once for all, how simple life might become! One of my friends, who, with six young children and only one servant, koops a spotless house and a
soul serene, told me once how she did it. "My dear, once a month I give away every single thing in the house that we do not imperatively need. It sounds wasteful, but I don't
believe it really is. Sometimes Jeremiah mourns over missing old clothes, or back numbers of the magazines, but I tell him if he doesn't want to be mated to a gibbering
maniac he will let me do as I like."
The old monks know all this very well. One wonders sometimes how they got their power, but go up to Fiosole, and sit a while in one of those little, bare, white-walled cells,
and you will begin to understand. If there were any spiritual force in one, it would have to come out there,
I have not their courage, and I win no such freedom. I allow myself to be overwhelmed by the invading host of things, making fitful resistance, but without any real steadiness
of purpose. Yet never do I wholly give up the struggle, and in my heart I cherish an ideal, remotely typified by that empty little house beside the sea.
Which three of the following lines from the excerpt directly develop the idea that things are a burden?
Choose one answer from each group. Type the LETTER ONLY for each answer in the correct blank.
Type A, B, or for Blank 1.
A Isat before the flickering embers of the open fire, and looked out through the open door to the sea
B. There was nothing in the house to demand care, to claim attention, to cumber my consciousness with its insistent, unchanging companionship
C. When I was very tired, I chanced to go away to a little house by the sea
Type D, E, or F for Blank 2.
D. And so I rested. While the spell was still unbroken, I came away. For broken it would have been, I know, had I not fled first.
E Those did not have to be taken down and put up and arranged and dusted and cared for
F. If there were any spiritual force in one, it would have to come out there.
