| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Alkahest by Honore de Balzac: litigation between the Molinas of Douai and the branch of the family
which remained in Spain. The Molinas of Leon won the domain and
assumed the title of Comtes de Nourho, though the Claes alone had a
legal right to it. But the pride of a Belgian burgher was superior to
the haughty arrogance of Castile: after the civil rights were
instituted, Balthazar Claes cast aside the ragged robes of his Spanish
nobility for his more illustrious descent from the Ghent martyr.
The patriotic sentiment was so strongly developed in the families
exiled under Charles V. that, to the very close of the eighteenth
century, the Claes remained faithful to the manners and customs and
traditions of their ancestors. They married into none but the purest
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Weir of Hermiston by Robert Louis Stevenson: to me fast eneuch, when ye hae gotten a jo. I'm tellin' ye and it's
true; when you have a jo, Miss Kirstie, it'll be for guid and ill. I
ken: I was made that way mysel', but the deil was in my luck! Here,
gang awa wi' ye to your muirs, and let me be; I'm in an hour of
inspiraution, ye upsetting tawpie!"
But she clung to her brother's neighbourhood, she knew not why.
"Will ye no gie's a kiss, Dand?" she said. "I aye likit ye fine."
He kissed her and considered her a moment; he found something strange in
her. But he was a libertine through and through, nourished equal
contempt and suspicion of all womankind, and paid his way among them
habitually with idle compliments.
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne: A deep silence falls on all around. The lately roaring winds are
hushed into a dead calm; nature seems to breathe no more, and to be
sinking into the stillness of death. On the mast already I see the
light play of a lambent St. Elmo's fire; the outstretched sail
catches not a breath of wind, and hangs like a sheet of lead. The
rudder stands motionless in a sluggish, waveless sea. But if we have
now ceased to advance why do we yet leave that sail loose, which at
the first shock of the tempest may capsize us in a moment?
"Let us reef the sail and cut the mast down!" I cried. "That will be
safest."
"No, no! Never!" shouted my impetuous uncle. "Never! Let the wind
Journey to the Center of the Earth |
