| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Emma by Jane Austen: and if I were not an old married man.--But my dancing days are over,
Mrs. Weston. You will excuse me. Any thing else I should be most happy
to do, at your command--but my dancing days are over."
Mrs. Weston said no more; and Emma could imagine with what
surprize and mortification she must be returning to her seat.
This was Mr. Elton! the amiable, obliging, gentle Mr. Elton.--
She looked round for a moment; he had joined Mr. Knightley at a
little distance, and was arranging himself for settled conversation,
while smiles of high glee passed between him and his wife.
She would not look again. Her heart was in a glow, and she feared
her face might be as hot.
Emma |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Herbert West: Reanimator by H. P. Lovecraft: and almost simultaneously a mist appeared on the mirror inclined
above the body’s mouth. There followed a few spasmodic muscular
motions, and then an audible breathing and visible motion of the
chest. I looked at the closed eyelids, and thought I detected
a quivering. Then the lids opened, shewing eyes which were grey,
calm, and alive, but still unintelligent and not even curious.
In a moment of fantastic whim I whispered questions to the reddening
ears; questions of other worlds of which the memory might still
be present. Subsequent terror drove them from my mind, but I think
the last one, which I repeated, was: "Where have you been?" I
do not yet know whether I was answered or not, for no sound came
Herbert West: Reanimator |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Around the World in 80 Days by Jules Verne: at Davenport, and by Rock Island entered Illinois. The next day,
which was the 10th, at four o'clock in the evening, it reached Chicago,
already risen from its ruins, and more proudly seated than ever
on the borders of its beautiful Lake Michigan.
Nine hundred miles separated Chicago from New York; but trains
are not wanting at Chicago. Mr. Fogg passed at once from one
to the other, and the locomotive of the Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne,
and Chicago Railway left at full speed, as if it fully comprehended
that that gentleman had no time to lose. It traversed Indiana,
Ohio, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey like a flash, rushing through
towns with antique names, some of which had streets and car-tracks,
Around the World in 80 Days |
