| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Secret Agent by Joseph Conrad: where he's gone to?"
Mrs Verloc shook her head.
"Can't say."
She turned away to range some boxes on the shelves behind the
counter. Chief Inspector Heat looked at her thoughtfully for a
time.
"I suppose you know who I am?" he said.
Mrs Verloc glanced over her shoulder. Chief Inspector Heat was
amazed at her coolness.
"Come! You know I am in the police," he said sharply.
"I don't trouble my head much about it," Mrs Verloc remarked,
The Secret Agent |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Forged Coupon by Leo Tolstoy: rouse his foes to combat, rather than wait for
their attack, to put on the defensive every false-
hood and every wrong of which he was cognisant.
Truth in himself and in others was what he most
desired, and that to which he strove at all costs
to attain. He was his own severest critic, weigh-
ing his own actions, analysing his own thoughts,
and baring himself to the eyes of the world with
unflinching candour. Greatest of autobiogra-
phers, he extenuates nothing: you see the whole
man with his worst faults and best qualities; weak-
The Forged Coupon |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Alcibiades II by Platonic Imitator: refrained from making his petition. The mass of mankind would not decline
to accept a tyranny, or the command of an army, or any of the numerous
things which cause more harm than good: but rather, if they had them not,
would have prayed to obtain them. And often in a short space of time they
change their tone, and wish their old prayers unsaid. Wherefore also I
suspect that men are entirely wrong when they blame the gods as the authors
of the ills which befall them (compare Republic): 'their own presumption,'
or folly (whichever is the right word)--
'Has brought these unmeasured woes upon them.' (Homer. Odyss.)
He must have been a wise poet, Alcibiades, who, seeing as I believe, his
friends foolishly praying for and doing things which would not really
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