| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from A Tramp Abroad by Mark Twain: THE LOWER IT ACTUALLY IS. Our ascent itself was a
great achievement, but this contribution to science was
an inconceivably greater matter.
Cavilers object that water boils at a lower and lower
temperature the higher and higher you go, and hence the
apparent anomaly. I answer that I do not base my theory
upon what the boiling water does, but upon what a boiled
thermometer says. You can't go behind the thermometer.
I had a magnificent view of Monte Rosa, and apparently
all the rest of the Alpine world, from that high place.
All the circling horizon was piled high with a mighty
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Turn of the Screw by Henry James: Then it came over me that, in spite of Flora's presumable
sequestration from the instant of her return from the pool,
it might already be too late. "Do you mean," I anxiously asked,
"that they HAVE met?"
At this she quite flushed. "Ah, miss, I'm not such a fool as that!
If I've been obliged to leave her three or four times,
it has been each time with one of the maids, and at present,
though she's alone, she's locked in safe. And yet--and yet!"
There were too many things.
"And yet what?"
"Well, are you so sure of the little gentleman?"
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Shadow Line by Joseph Conrad: suddenly, in a peculiar wistful tone, that he hoped
I would find what I was so anxious to go and look
for. A soft, cryptic utterance which seemed to
reach deeper than any diamond-hard tool could
have done. I do believe he understood my case.
But the second engineer attacked me differently.
He was a sturdy young Scot, with a smooth face and
light eyes. His honest red countenance emerged
out of the engine-room companion and then the
whole robust man, with shirt sleeves turned up,
wiping slowly the massive fore-arms with a lump
The Shadow Line |
