| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Persuasion by Jane Austen: he was perfectly collected and serious, and almost instantly afterwards
coming up to the sofa, on which she and Mrs Musgrove were sitting,
took a place by the latter, and entered into conversation with her,
in a low voice, about her son, doing it with so much sympathy
and natural grace, as shewed the kindest consideration for all
that was real and unabsurd in the parent's feelings.
They were actually on the same sofa, for Mrs Musgrove had
most readily made room for him; they were divided only by Mrs Musgrove.
It was no insignificant barrier, indeed. Mrs Musgrove was of
a comfortable, substantial size, infinitely more fitted by nature
to express good cheer and good humour, than tenderness and sentiment;
Persuasion |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from A Sentimental Journey by Laurence Sterne: 'Tis thou, thrice sweet and gracious goddess, addressing myself to
Liberty, whom all in public or in private worship, whose taste is
grateful, and ever will be so, till Nature herself shall change. -
No TINT of words can spot thy snowy mantle, or chymic power turn
thy sceptre into iron: - with thee to smile upon him as he eats his
crust, the swain is happier than his monarch, from whose court thou
art exiled! - Gracious Heaven! cried I, kneeling down upon the last
step but one in my ascent, grant me but health, thou great Bestower
of it, and give me but this fair goddess as my companion, - and
shower down thy mitres, if it seems good unto thy divine
providence, upon those heads which are aching for them!
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from A Passion in the Desert by Honore de Balzac: upon. He cried aloud, to measure the solitude. His voice, lost in the
hollows of the hill, sounded faintly, and aroused no echo--the echo
was in his own heart. The Provencal was twenty-two years old:--he
loaded his carbine.
"There'll be time enough," he said to himself, laying on the ground
the weapon which alone could bring him deliverance.
Viewing alternately the dark expanse of the desert and the blue
expanse of the sky, the soldier dreamed of France--he smelled with
delight the gutters of Paris--he remembered the towns through which he
had passed, the faces of his comrades, the most minute details of his
life. His Southern fancy soon showed him the stones of his beloved
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