| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from My Bondage and My Freedom by Frederick Douglass: favor with the slaves, by indulging a little pleasantry; but Gore
was never known to be guilty of any such weakness. He was always
the cold, distant, unapproachable _overseer_ of Col. Edward
Lloyd's plantation, and needed no higher pleasure than was
involved in a faithful discharge of the duties of his office.
When he whipped, he seemed to do so from a sense of duty, and
feared no consequences. What Hopkins did reluctantly, Gore did
with alacrity. There was a stern will, an iron-like reality,
about this Gore, which would have easily made him the chief of a
band of pirates, had his environments been favorable to such a
course of life. All the coolness, savage barbarity and freedom
My Bondage and My Freedom |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Wrong Box by Stevenson & Osbourne: proprietors of schools and the parents of his pupils. He placed
the desk on the table by the window, and taking a saucer of
Indian ink from the chimney-piece, laboriously composed the
following letter:
'My dear Mr Finsbury,' it ran, 'would it be presuming on your
kindness if I asked you to pay me a visit here this evening? It
is in no trifling matter that I invoke your valuable assistance,
for need I say more than it concerns the welfare of Mr
Semitopolis's statue of Hercules? I write you in great agitation
of mind; for I have made all enquiries, and greatly fear that
this work of ancient art has been mislaid. I labour besides under
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Animal Farm by George Orwell: had a remarkable gift for composing songs and poems, sat on the front of
the raised platform, with the nine young dogs forming a semicircle round
them, and the other pigs sitting behind. The rest of the animals sat
facing them in the main body of the barn. Napoleon read out the orders for
the week in a gruff soldierly style, and after a single singing of 'Beasts
of England', all the animals dispersed.
On the third Sunday after Snowball's expulsion, the animals were somewhat
surprised to hear Napoleon announce that the windmill was to be built
after all. He did not give any reason for having changed his mind, but
merely warned the animals that this extra task would mean very hard work,
it might even be necessary to reduce their rations. The plans, however,
Animal Farm |
