| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from On the Origin of Species by Charles Darwin: sloth, armadillo, and anteater, as their degenerate descendants. This
cannot for an instant be admitted. These huge animals have become wholly
extinct, and have left no progeny. But in the caves of Brazil, there are
many extinct species which are closely allied in size and in other
characters to the species still living in South America; and some of these
fossils may be the actual progenitors of living species. It must not be
forgotten that, on my theory, all the species of the same genus have
descended from some one species; so that if six genera, each having eight
species, be found in one geological formation, and in the next succeeding
formation there be six other allied or representative genera with the same
number of species, then we may conclude that only one species of each of
On the Origin of Species |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The People That Time Forgot by Edgar Rice Burroughs: and dimpling with evident happiness--the most adorable picture
that I had ever seen. I recall that it was then I first
regretted that she was only a little untutored savage and
so far beneath me in the scale of evolution.
Her first act was to beckon me to follow her outside, and there
she pointed to the explanation of our rescue from the bear--a
huge saber-tooth tiger, its fine coat and its flesh torn to
ribbons, lying dead a few paces from our cave, and beside it,
equally mangled, and disemboweled, was the carcass of a huge
cave-bear. To have had one's life saved by a saber-tooth
tiger, and in the twentieth century into the bargain, was an
The People That Time Forgot |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Country of the Pointed Firs by Sarah Orne Jewett: how we enjoy 'em Sunday nights in winter: we have a real company
tea 'stead o' livin' right along just the same, an' I make
somethin' good for a s'prise an' put on some o' my preserves, an'
we get a'talkin' together an' have real pleasant times."
Mrs. Todd laughed indulgently, and looked to see what I
thought of such childishness.
"I wish I could be here some Sunday evening," said I.
"William an' me'll be talkin' about you an' thinkin' o' this
nice day," said Mrs. Blackett affectionately, and she glanced at
William, and he looked up bravely and nodded. I began to discover
that he and his sister could not speak their deeper feelings before
|
