| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne: strangest construction.
Basalt is a brownish rock of igneous origin. It assumes regular
forms, the arrangement of which is often very surprising. Here nature
had done her work geometrically, with square and compass and plummet.
Everywhere else her art consists alone in throwing down huge masses
together in disorder. You see cones imperfectly formed, irregular
pyramids, with a fantastic disarrangement of lines; but here, as if
to exhibit an example of regularity, though in advance of the very
earliest architects, she has created a severely simple order of
architecture, never surpassed either by the splendours of Babylon or
the wonders of Greece.
Journey to the Center of the Earth |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Falk by Joseph Conrad: name was Tottersen, or something like that. His
practice was to wear on his head, in that tropical
climate, a mangy fur cap. He was, without excep-
tion, the stupidest man I had ever seen on board
ship. And he looked it too. He looked so con-
foundedly stupid that it was a matter of surprise
for me when he answered to his name.
I drew no great comfort from their company, to
say the least of it; while the prospect of making a
long sea passage with those two fellows was depress-
ing. And my other thoughts in solitude could not
Falk |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad: no idea how effective such a . . . a. . . . faculty can be.
He had no genius for organizing, for initiative, or for order even.
That was evident in such things as the deplorable state
of the station. He had no learning, and no intelligence.
His position had come to him--why? Perhaps because he was never
ill . . . He had served three terms of three years out there . .
. Because triumphant health in the general rout of constitutions
is a kind of power in itself. When he went home on leave he rioted
on a large scale--pompously. Jack ashore--with a difference--
in externals only. This one could gather from his casual talk.
He originated nothing, he could keep the routine going--that's all.
Heart of Darkness |
