| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Lair of the White Worm by Bram Stoker: draught from the open door swayed the thin silk towards her, and in
her fright, she tore down the curtain, which enveloped her from head
to foot. Then she ran through the still open door, heedless of the
fact that she could not see where she was going. Adam, followed by
Sir Nathaniel, rushed forward and joined her--Adam catching his wife
by the arm and holding her tight. It was well that he did so, for
just before her lay the black orifice of the well-hole, which, of
course, she could not see with the silk curtain round her head. The
floor was extremely slippery; something like thick oil had been
spilled where she had to pass; and close to the edge of the hole her
feet shot from under her, and she stumbled forward towards the well-
 Lair of the White Worm |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Massimilla Doni by Honore de Balzac: is to be seen on the surface which mirrors the chaise as you drive
past. The postboy smacks his whip; you turn past a crag; you cross a
bridge: suddenly there is a terrific uproar of cascades tumbling
together one upon another. The water, taking a mighty leap, is broken
into a hundred falls, dashed to spray on the boulders; it sparkles in
a myriad jets against a mass that has fallen from the heights that
tower over the ravine exactly in the middle of the road that has been
so irresistibly cut by the most formidable of active forces.
If you have formed a clear idea of this landscape, you will see in
those sleeping waters the image of Emilio's love for the Duchess, and
in the cascades leaping like a flock of sheep, an idea of his passion
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Talisman by Walter Scott: and amongst those princes bound by oath to the Crusade, were many
who would have sacrificed all hope of victory over the Saracens
to the pleasure of ruining, or at least of humbling, Richard of
England.
"Wherefore," said the baron to himself, "it is in no sense
impossible that this El Hakim, with this his cure, or seeming
cure, wrought on the body of the Scottish squire, may mean
nothing but a trick, to which he of the Leopard may be accessory,
and wherein the Bishop of Tyre, prelate as he is, may have some
share."
This hypothesis, indeed, could not be so easily reconciled with
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