| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Facino Cane by Honore de Balzac: as many lines as an old stone wall.
The old man was playing at random, without the slightest regard for
time or tune. His fingers traveled mechanically over the worn keys of
his instrument; he did not trouble himself over a false note now and
again (a /canard/, in the language of the orchestra), neither did the
dancers, nor, for that matter, did my old Italian's acolytes; for I
had made up my mind that he must be Italian, and an Italian he was.
There was something great, something too of the despot about this old
Homer bearing within him an /Odyssey/ doomed to oblivion. The
greatness was so real that it triumphed over his abject position; the
despotism so much a part of him, that it rose above his poverty.
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Ruling Passion by Henry van Dyke: nervously. Then he spoke, in a changed, shaken voice.
"Ah'l tole you somet'ing, Ma'amselle Serene. You ma frien'. Don'
you h'ask me dat reason of it no more. Dat's somet'ing vair' bad,
bad, bad. Ah can't nevair tole dat--nevair."
There was something in the way he said it that gave a check to her
gentle curiosity and turned it into pity. A man with a secret in
his life? It was a new element in her experience; like a chapter in
a book. She was lady enough at heart to respect his silence. She
kept away from the forbidden ground. But the knowledge that it was
there gave a new interest to Jacques and his music. She embroidered
some strange romances around that secret while she sat in the
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Sanitary and Social Lectures by Charles Kingsley: bear back the ghosts of the soft air-mothers, as penitents, to
their father, the great sun.
But as they fly southwards, warm life thrills them, and they drop
their loads of sleet and snow; and meet their young live sisters
from the south, and greet them with flash and thunder-peal. And,
please God, before many weeks are over, as we run Westward-Ho, we
shall overtake the ghosts of these air-mothers, hurrying back
toward their father, the great sun. Fresh and bright under the
fresh bright heaven, they will race with us toward our home, to
gain new heat, new life, new power, and set forth about their work
once more. Men call them the south-west wind, those air-mothers;
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