| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Enchanted Island of Yew by L. Frank Baum: Seseley's hand respectfully, waved an adieu to the others, and then
mounted his charger and galloped away over the plains.
The drawbridge was let down to permit the three children to enter, and
the great Baron Merd came himself to question his daughter.
"Who was the little knight?" he asked.
"His name is Prince Marvel," answered Seseley, demurely.
"Prince Marvel?" exclaimed the Baron. "I have never heard of him.
Does he come from the Kingdom of Dawna, or that of Auriel, or Plenta?"
"That I do not know," said Seseley, with truth.
"Where did you meet him?" continued the baron.
"In the forest, my father, and he kindly escorted us home."
The Enchanted Island of Yew |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad: The up-river stations had to be relieved. There had been so many
delays already that he did not know who was dead and who was alive,
and how they got on--and so on, and so on. He paid no attention
to my explanations, and, playing with a stick of sealing-wax, repeated
several times that the situation was `very grave, very grave.'
There were rumours that a very important station was in jeopardy,
and its chief, Mr. Kurtz, was ill. Hoped it was not true.
Mr. Kurtz was . . . I felt weary and irritable. Hang Kurtz, I thought.
I interrupted him by saying I had heard of Mr. Kurtz on the coast.
`Ah! So they talk of him down there,' he murmured to himself.
Then he began again, assuring me Mr. Kurtz was the best agent he had,
Heart of Darkness |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Sophist by Plato: forms, in alternation or continuance, share the same fate. Most ridiculous
is the discomfiture which attends the opponents of predication, who, like
the ventriloquist Eurycles, have the voice that answers them in their own
breast. For they cannot help using the words 'is,' 'apart,' 'from others,'
and the like; and their adversaries are thus saved the trouble of refuting
them. But (2) if all things have communion with all things, motion will
rest, and rest will move; here is a reductio ad absurdum. Two out of the
three hypotheses are thus seen to be false. The third (3) remains, which
affirms that only certain things communicate with certain other things. In
the alphabet and the scale there are some letters and notes which combine
with others, and some which do not; and the laws according to which they
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