| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Tour Through Eastern Counties of England by Daniel Defoe: this town, told me, that he reckoned upwards of six hundred country
people on horseback and on foot, with baskets and other carriage,
who had all of them brought something or other to town to sell,
besides the butchers, and what came in carts and waggons.
It happened to be my lot to be once at this town at the time when a
very fine new ship, which was built there for some merchants of
London, was to be launched; and if I may give my guess at the
numbers of people which appeared on the shore, in the houses, and
on the river, I believe I am much within compass if I say there
were 20,000 people to see it; but this is only a guess, or they
might come a great way to see the sight, or the town may be
|
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Some Reminiscences by Joseph Conrad: merely temperamental. But it is not always a sign of coldness.
It may be pride. There can be nothing more humiliating than to
see the shaft of one's emotion miss the mark either of laughter
or tears. Nothing more humiliating! And this for the reason
that should the mark be missed, should the open display of
emotion fail to move, then it must perish unavoidably in disgust
or contempt. No artist can be reproached for shrinking from a
risk which only fools run to meet and only genius dare confront
with impunity. In a task which mainly consists in laying one's
soul more or less bare to the world, a regard for decency, even
at the cost of success, is but the regard for one's own dignity
Some Reminiscences |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Selected Writings of Guy De Maupassant by Guy De Maupassant: glimmer of his light, which was shining on a tapestry on which
were two angels flying over the dead on a field of battle. It
belonged to me also. I said:
"Well, come here."
"I am at your service," he answered.
I got up and went toward him.
Standing in the center of a large room, was a little man, very
short, and very fat, phenomenally fat, a hideous phenomenon.
He had a singular straggling beard, white and yellow, and not a
hair on his head--not a hair!
As he held his candle aloft at arm's length in order to see me,
|
