| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from A Straight Deal by Owen Wister: together, before we deal with the very large matter of our trouble with
England during the Civil War. Chronologically, of course, Venezuela and
Alaska fall after the Civil War; but they belong to the same class to
which Maine and Oregon belong. Together, all of these incidents and
controversies form a group in which the underlying permanence of British
good-will towards us is distinctly to be discerned. Sometimes, as I have
said before, British anger with us obscures the friendly sentiment. But
this was on the surface, and it always passed. As usual, it is only the
anger that has stuck in our minds. Of the outcome of these controversies
and the British temperance and restraint which brought about such outcome
the popular mind retains no impression.
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Duchesse de Langeais by Honore de Balzac: all the secret hopes by which I live. You have required promises
of such constancy in me, you have said so much of your horror of
women made up of nothing but caprice; and now do you wish me to
understand that, like other women here in Paris, you have
passions, and know nothing of love? If so, why did you ask my
life of me? why did you accept it?"
"I was wrong, my friend. Oh, it is wrong of a woman to yield to
such intoxication when she must not and cannot make any return."
"I understand. You have merely been coquetting with me,
and----"
"Coquetting?" she repeated. "I detest coquetry. A coquette
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Psychology of Revolution by Gustave le Bon: consider the illusions which they live with. Never, perhaps, in
the course of history have these illusions appeared so profound
and so numerous as during the Revolution.
One of the most prominent was the singular conception of the
nature of our first ancestors and primitive societies.
Anthropology not having as yet revealed the conditions of our
remoter forbears, men supposed, being influenced by the legends
of the Bible, that man had issued perfect from the hands of the
Creator. The first societies were models which were afterwards
ruined by civilisation, but to which mankind must return.
The return to the state of nature was very soon the general cry.
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