| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Ruling Passion by Henry van Dyke: if they were painted; and across the circle of smooth lawn in front
of the piazza the name of the hotel was printed in alleged
ornamental plants letters two feet long, immensely ugly. Hose had
been elevated to the office of postmaster, and lived in a Queen
Antic cottage on the main street. Little Billy Ransom had grown up
into a very interesting young man, with a decided musical genius,
and a tenor voice, which being discovered by an enterprising patron
of genius, from Boston, Billy was sent away to Paris to learn to
sing. Some day you will hear of his debut in grand opera, as
Monsieur Guillaume Rancon.
But Fiddlin' Jack lived on in the little house with the curved roof,
|
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from In a German Pension by Katherine Mansfield: talks. How could one play Delilah to so shorn a Samson?
"Herr Hoffmann from Berlin arrived yesterday," said the Herr Rat.
"That young man I refuse to converse with. He told me last year that he
had stayed in France in an hotel where they did not have serviettes; what a
place it must have been! In Austria even the cabmen have serviettes. Also
I have heard that he discussed 'free love' with Bertha as she was sweeping
his room. I am not accustomed to such company. I had suspected him for a
long time."
"Young blood," answered the Herr Rat genially. "I have had several
disputes with him--you have heard them--is it not so?" turning to me.
"A great many," I said, smiling.
|
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Blue Flower by Henry van Dyke: unnatural thing that he should be tired of living before he
has fairly begun to live.
Hermas had fallen into the very depths of this strange
self-pity. He was out of tune with everything around him. He
had been thinking, through the dead night, of all that he had
given up when he left the house of his father, the wealthy
pagan Demetrius, to join the company of the Christians. Only
two years ago he had been one of the richest young men in
Antioch. Now he was one of the poorest. The worst of it was
that, though he had made the choice willingly and with a kind of
enthusiasm, he was already dissatisfied with it.
|
