| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Moby Dick by Herman Melville: called his "flurry," the monster horribly wallowed in his blood,
overwrapped himself in impenetrable, mad, boiling spray, so that the
imperilled craft, instantly dropping astern, had much ado blindly to
struggle out from that phrensied twilight into the clear air of the
day.
And now abating in his flurry, the whale once more rolled out into
view; surging from side to side; spasmodically dilating and
contracting his spout-hole, with sharp, cracking, agonized
respirations. At last, gush after gush of clotted red gore, as if it
had been the purple lees of red wine, shot into the frighted air; and
falling back again, ran dripping down his motionless flanks into
Moby Dick |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from A Treatise on Parents and Children by George Bernard Shaw: inconsiderate. Also, perhaps, that Mamma, who made the child learn
the Sermon on the Mount, is not really a Christian.
The Sin of Nadab and Abihu
But there is another sort of answer in wide use which is neither
straightforward, instructive, nor harmless. In its simplest form it
substitutes for "Stop that noise," "Dont be naughty," which means that
the child, instead of annoying you by a perfectly healthy and natural
infantile procedure, is offending God. This is a blasphemous lie; and
the fact that it is on the lips of every nurserymaid does not excuse
it in the least. Dickens tells us of a nurserymaid who elaborated it
into "If you do that, angels wont never love you." I remember a
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from My Aunt Margaret's Mirror by Walter Scott: numerous party, which appeared to be a bridal one, as a lady and
gentleman walked first, hand in hand, followed by a large
concourse of persons of both sexes, gaily, nay richly, attired.
The bride, whose features they could distinctly see, seemed not
more than sixteen years old, and extremely beautiful. The
bridegroom, for some seconds, moved rather with his shoulder
towards them, and his face averted; but his elegance of form and
step struck the sisters at once with the same apprehension. As
he turned his face suddenly, it was frightfully realized, and
they saw, in the gay bridegroom before them, Sir Philip Forester.
His wife uttered an imperfect exclamation, at the sound of which
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