| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from At the Sign of the Cat & Racket by Honore de Balzac: of the sash window. The icy air of the courtyard came in to cool the
hot atmosphere of the little room, full of the odor peculiar to
offices.
The merchant remained standing, his hand resting on the greasy arm of
a large cane chair lined with morocco, of which the original hue had
disappeared; he seemed to hesitate as to seating himself. He looked
with affection at the double desk, where his wife's seat, opposite his
own, was fitted into a little niche in the wall. He contemplated the
numbered boxes, the files, the implements, the cash box--objects all
of immemorial origin, and fancied himself in the room with the shade
of Master Chevrel. He even pulled out the high stool on which he had
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Taras Bulba and Other Tales by Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol: fly foolishly up and down in it with flapping wings, never recognising
each other, the dove seeing not the vulture, nor the vulture the dove,
and no one knowing how far he may be flying from destruction.
Ostap had long since attended to his duties and gone to the kuren.
Andrii, without knowing why, felt a kind of oppression at his heart.
The Cossacks had finished their evening meal; the wonderful July night
had completely fallen; still he did not go to the kuren, nor lie down
to sleep, but gazed unconsciously at the whole scene before him. In
the sky innumerable stars twinkled brightly. The plain was covered far
and wide with scattered waggons with swinging tar-buckets, smeared
with tar, and loaded with every description of goods and provisions
Taras Bulba and Other Tales |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Mansion by Henry van Dyke: was a tiny hut, hardly big enough for a shepherd's shelter.
It looked as if it had been built of discarded things, scraps and
fragments of other buildings, put together with care and pains,
by some one who had tried to make the most of cast-off material.
There was something pitiful and shamefaced about the hut.
It shrank and drooped and faded in its barren field, and seemed
to
cling only by sufferance to the edge of the splendid city.
"This," said the Keeper of the Gate, standing still and speaking
with
a low, distinct voice--"this is your mansion, John Weightman."
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