| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Democracy In America, Volume 1 by Alexis de Toqueville: of the Americans in order to discover the truth of this remark,
for their manners render it sufficiently evident. As the
American participates in all that is done in his country, he
thinks himself obliged to defend whatever may be censured; for it
is not only his country which is attacked upon these occasions,
but it is himself. The consequence is, that his national pride
resorts to a thousand artifices, and to all the petty tricks of
individual vanity.
Nothing is more embarrassing in the ordinary intercourse of
life than this irritable patriotism of the Americans. A stranger
may be very well inclined to praise many of the institutions of
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from New Arabian Nights by Robert Louis Stevenson: and guided by a fifth with a lantern, passed close in front of me
as I lay, and were admitted to the pavilion by the nurse. They
returned to the beach, and passed me a second time with another
chest, larger but apparently not so heavy as the first. A third
time they made the transit; and on this occasion one of the
yachtsmen carried a leather portmanteau, and the others a lady's
trunk and carriage bag. My curiosity was sharply excited. If a
woman were among the guests of Northmour, it would show a change in
his habits and an apostasy from his pet theories of life, well
calculated to fill me with surprise. When he and I dwelt there
together, the pavilion had been a temple of misogyny. And now, one
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Within the Tides by Joseph Conrad: practical old cove. . . . Anyhow," and here the tone of the speaker
took on a tinge of respect, "he has made philosophy pay."
Renouard raised his eyes, repressed an impulse to jump up, and got
out of the arm-chair slowly. "It isn't perhaps a bad idea," he
said. "I'll have to call there in any case."
He wondered whether he had managed to keep his voice steady, its
tone unconcerned enough; for his emotion was strong though it had
nothing to do with the business aspect of this suggestion. He
moved in the room in vague preparation for departure, when he heard
a soft laugh. He spun about quickly with a frown, but the Editor
was not laughing at him. He was chuckling across the big desk at
Within the Tides |
