| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Seraphita by Honore de Balzac: on the stone; he fashions it; he puts a realm of ideas into it. There
are statues which the hand of man has endowed with the faculty of
representing the noble side of humanity, or the whole evil side; most
men see in such marbles a human figure and nothing more; a few other
men, a little higher in the scale of being, perceive a fraction of the
thoughts expressed in the statue; but the Initiates in the secrets of
art are of the same intellect as the sculptor; they see in his work
the whole universe of his thought. Such persons are in themselves the
principles of art; they bear within them a mirror which reflects
nature in her slightest manifestations. Well! so it is with me; I have
within me a mirror before which the moral nature, with its causes and
Seraphita |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from A Voyage to Arcturus by David Lindsay: struggling with a nightmare. What caused it?"
"The female atmosphere of Lichstorm. Sexual passion."
"I had no passion."
"That was passion - the first stage. Nature tickles your people into
marriage, but it tortures us. Wait till you get outside. You'll
have a return of those sensations - only ten times worse. The drink
you've had will see to that.... How do you suppose it will all end?"
"If I knew, I wouldn't be asking you questions."
Haunte laughed loudly. "Sullenbode."
"You mean it will end in my seeking Sullenbode?"
"But what will come of it, Maskull? What will she give you? Sweet,
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Country of the Pointed Firs by Sarah Orne Jewett: their farm,--she didn't see how I got so used to our island; but
somehow I was always happy from the first."
"Yes, it's very dull to me up among those slow farms,"
declared Mrs. Todd. "The snow troubles 'em in winter. They're all
besieged by winter, as you may say; 'tis far better by the shore
than up among such places. I never thought I should like to live
up country."
"Why, just see the carriages ahead of us on the next rise!"
exclaimed Mrs. Blackett. "There's going to be a great gathering,
don't you believe there is, Almiry? It hasn't seemed up to now as
if anybody was going but us. An' 'tis such a beautiful day, with
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