| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Koran: semblance of a well-made man. Said she, 'Verily, I take refuge in
the Merciful One from thee, if thou art pious.' Said he, 'I am only
a messenger of thy Lord to bestow on thee a pure boy.'
Said she, 'How can I have a boy when no man has touched me, and when
I am no harlot?' He said, 'Thus says thy Lord, It is easy for Me!
and we will make him a sign unto man, and a mercy from us; for it is a
decided matter.'
So she conceived him, and she retired with him into a remote
place. And the labour pains came upon her at the trunk of a palm tree,
and she said, 'O that I had died before this, and been forgotten out
of mind!' and he called to her from beneath her 'Grieve not, for thy
The Koran |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Snow Image by Nathaniel Hawthorne: might have been in the commercial world, the young Shaker had
never heard of among the Canterbury hills.
"Not heard of my failure!" exclaimed the merchant, considerably
piqued. "Why, it was spoken of on 'Change in London, and from
Boston to New Orleans men trembled in their shoes. At all events,
I did fail, and you see me here on my road to the Shaker village,
where, doubtless (for the Shakers are a shrewd sect), they will
have a due respect for my experience, and give me the management
of the trading part of the concern, in which case I think I can
pledge myself to double their capital in four or five years. Turn
back with me, young man; for though you will never meet with my
The Snow Image |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Frankenstein by Mary Shelley: Day dawned; and I directed my steps towards the town. The gates
were open, and I hastened to my father's house. My first thought
was to discover what I knew of the murderer, and cause instant
pursuit to be made. But I paused when I reflected on the story
that I had to tell. A being whom I myself had formed, and endued
with life, had met me at midnight among the precipices of an
inaccessible mountain. I remembered also the nervous fever with
which I had been seized just at the time that I dated my creation,
and which would give an air of delirium to a tale otherwise so
utterly improbable. I well knew that if any other had communicated such
a relation to me, I should have looked upon it as the ravings of insanity.
Frankenstein |
