| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Gentle Grafter by O. Henry: the remittance men that the magazines send out to write up Goldfields.
But there's little sport in New York city for rod, reel or gun. They
hunt here with either one of two things--a slungshot or a letter of
introduction. The town has been stocked so full of carp that the game
fish are all gone. If you spread a net here, do you catch legitimate
suckers in it, such as the Lord intended to be caught--fresh guys who
know it all, sports with a little coin and the nerve to play another
man's game, street crowds out for the fun of dropping a dollar or two
and village smarties who know just where the little pea is? No, sir,'
says I. 'What the grafters live on here is widows and orphans, and
foreigners who save up a bag of money and hand it out over the first
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Several Works by Edgar Allan Poe: Merely this and nothing more.
Back into the chamber turning, all my sour within me burning,
Soon again I heard a tapping something louder than before.
"Surely," said I, "surely that is something at my window lattice;
Let me see, then, what thereat is and this mystery explore--
Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery explore;--
'Tis the wind and nothing more.
Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter,
In there stepped a stately Raven of the saintly days of yore.
Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute stopped or stayed he,
But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door--
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Captain Stormfield by Mark Twain: on earth?"
"No."
"Well, a prince of the blood don't belong to the royal family
exactly, and he don't belong to the mere nobility of the kingdom;
he is lower than the one, and higher than t'other. That's about
the position of the patriarchs and prophets here. There's some
mighty high nobility here - people that you and I ain't worthy to
polish sandals for - and THEY ain't worthy to polish sandals for
the patriarchs and prophets. That gives you a kind of an idea of
their rank, don't it? You begin to see how high up they are, don't
you? just to get a two-minute glimpse of one of them is a thing for
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