The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Chouans by Honore de Balzac: monkey I taught to imitate Danton?"
"Yes, mademoiselle."
"Well, were you afraid of him?"
"He was chained."
"And Corentin is muzzled, my dear."
"We used to play with Patriot by the hour," said Francine,--"I know
that; but he always ended by serving us some bad trick." So saying,
Francine threw herself hastily back close to her mistress, whose hands
she caught and kissed in a coaxing way; saying in a tone of deep
affection: "You know what I mean, Marie, but you will not answer me.
How can you, after all that sadness which did so grieve me--oh, indeed
 The Chouans |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Walking by Henry David Thoreau: wildwood covers the virgin mould,--and the same soil is good for
men and for trees. A man's health requires as many acres of
meadow to his prospect as his farm does loads of muck. There are
the strong meats on which he feeds. A town is saved, not more by
the righteous men in it than by the woods and swamps that
surround it. A township where one primitive forest waves above
while another primitive forest rots below--such a town is fitted
to raise not only corn and potatoes, but poets and philosophers
for the coming ages. In such a soil grew Homer and Confucius and
the rest, and out of such a wilderness comes the Reformer eating
locusts and wild honey.
 Walking |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Records of a Family of Engineers by Robert Louis Stevenson: winds, that it was hardly possible to break in upon such a
confusion of sounds. In one or two instances, anxious and
repeated inquiries were made by the artificers as to the state
of things upon deck, to which the captain made the usual
answer, that it could not blow long in this way, and that we
must soon have better weather. The next berth in succession,
moving forward in the ship, was that allotted for the seamen.
Here the scene was considerably different. Having reached the
middle of this darksome berth without its inmates being aware
of any intrusion, the writer had the consolation of remarking
that, although they talked of bad weather and the cross
|