| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from A Drama on the Seashore by Honore de Balzac: an electrical shudder, something resembling the shock of a sudden
noise awaking us in the dead of night.
We saw, sitting on a vast granite boulder, a man who looked at us. His
glance, like that of the flash of a cannon, came from two bloodshot
eyes, and his stoical immobility could be compared only to the
immutable granite masses that surrounded him. His eyes moved slowly,
his body remaining rigid as though he were petrified. Then, having
cast upon us that look which struck us like a blow, he turned his eyes
once more to the limitless ocean, and gazed upon it, in spite of its
dazzling light, as eagles gaze at the sun, without lowering his
eyelids. Try to remember, dear uncle, one of those old oaks, whose
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from A Horse's Tale by Mark Twain: the summer sun - just a garden, a gaudy, gorgeous flower-garden!
Children munching oranges, six thousand fans fluttering and
glimmering, everybody happy, everybody chatting gayly with their
intimates, lovely girl-faces smiling recognition and salutation to
other lovely girl-faces, gray old ladies and gentlemen dealing in
the like exchanges with each other - ah, such a picture of cheery
contentment and glad anticipation! not a mean spirit, nor a sordid
soul, nor a sad heart there - ah, Thorndike, I wish I could see it
again.
"Suddenly, the martial note of a bugle cleaves the hum and murmur -
clear the ring!
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Gettysburg Address by Abraham Lincoln: for those who here gave their lives that this nation might live.
It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate. . .we cannot consecrate. . .
we cannot hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead,
who struggled here have consecrated it, far above our poor power
to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember,
what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here.
It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished
work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced.
It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining
before us. . .that from these honored dead we take increased devotion
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