| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Mucker by Edgar Rice Burroughs: the wall behind them.
Byrne still clung to his schooner of beer, which he had
transferred to his left hand as he sought to draw his gun.
Flannagan was close to them. Bridge opened the door and
strove to pull Billy through; but the latter hesitated just an
instant, for he saw that it would be impossible to close and
bar the door, provided it had a bar, before Flannagan would
be against it with his great shoulders.
The policeman was still struggling to disentangle his revolver
from the lining of his pocket. He was bellowing like a
bull--yelling at Billy that he was under arrest. Men at the
The Mucker |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Walden by Henry David Thoreau: made in the winter of '46-7 and estimated to contain ten thousand
tons, was finally covered with hay and boards; and though it was
unroofed the following July, and a part of it carried off, the rest
remaining exposed to the sun, it stood over that summer and the next
winter, and was not quite melted till September, 1848. Thus the
pond recovered the greater part.
Like the water, the Walden ice, seen near at hand, has a green
tint, but at a distance is beautifully blue, and you can easily tell
it from the white ice of the river, or the merely greenish ice of
some ponds, a quarter of a mile off. Sometimes one of those great
cakes slips from the ice-man's sled into the village street, and
Walden |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Alkahest by Honore de Balzac: and a future which may realize them, is an inexhaustible source of
sadness or of placid content.
Thus, it is almost impossible not to feel a certain tender sensibility
over a picture of Flemish life, if the accessories are clearly given.
Why so? Perhaps, among other forms of existence, it offers the best
conclusion to man's uncertainties. It has its social festivities, its
family ties, and the easy affluence which proves the stability of its
comfortable well-being; it does not lack repose amounting almost to
beatitude; but, above all, it expresses the calm monotony of a frankly
sensuous happiness, where enjoyment stifles desire by anticipating it.
Whatever value a passionate soul may attach to the tumultuous life of
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