| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Alexandria and her Schools by Charles Kingsley: astronomic science seemed to awaken suddenly to a true inductive method,
and after him to fall into its old slumber for 300 years. In the
meantime Timocharis, Aristyllus, and Conon had each added their mites to
the discoveries of Eratosthenes: but to Hipparchus we owe that theory
of the heavens, commonly called the Ptolemaic system, which, starting
from the assumption that the earth was the centre of the universe,
attempted to explain the motions of the heavenly bodies by a complex
system of supposed eccentrics and epicycles. This has of course now
vanished before modern discoveries. But its value as a scientific
attempt lies in this: that the method being a correct one, correct
results were obtained, though starting from a false assumption; and
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from A Second Home by Honore de Balzac: low voice, "by her mother."
A modest tap at the door silenced the Count, who expected to see the
two ladies appear. A little page came in, evidently in a great hurry;
but, abashed by the presence of the two gentlemen, he beckoned to a
housekeeper, who followed him. Dressed in a blue cloth jacket with
short tails, and blue-and-white striped trousers, his hair cut short
all round, the boy's expression was that of a chorister, so strongly
was it stamped with the compulsory propriety that marks every member
of a bigoted household.
"Mademoiselle Gatienne," said he, "do you know where the books are for
the offices of the Virgin? The ladies of the Congregation of the
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Mansion by Henry van Dyke: connections,
to verify and place himself, to know who and where he was.
At last it grew clear. John Weightman was sitting on a stone,
not far from a road in a strange land.
The road was not a formal highway, fenced and graded. It was
more like
a great travel-trace, worn by thousands of feet passing across
the open country in the same direction. Down in the valley,
into which he could look, the road seemed to form itself
gradually out of
many minor paths; little footways coming across the meadows,
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