| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Essays of Travel by Robert Louis Stevenson: of wintering has somehow to his own eyes the air of an act of bold
contract; and, since he has wilfully sought low temperatures, he is
not so apt to shudder at a touch of chill. He came for that, he
looked for it, and he throws it from him with the thought.
A long straight reach of valley, wall-like mountains upon either hand
that rise higher and higher and shoot up new summits the higher you
climb; a few noble peaks seen even from the valley; a village of
hotels; a world of black and white - black pine-woods, clinging to
the sides of the valley, and white snow flouring it, and papering it
between the pine-woods, and covering all the mountains with a
dazzling curd; add a few score invalids marching to and fro upon the
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Eve and David by Honore de Balzac: neither audacity enough nor capital enough for such speculation.
Machinery for producing paper in any length was just coming into use
in England. It was one of the most urgent needs of the time,
therefore, that the paper trade should keep pace with the requirements
of the French system of civil government, a system by which the right
of discussion was to be extended to every man, and the whole fabric
based upon continual expression of individual opinion; a grave
misfortune, for the nation that deliberates is but little wont to act.
So, strange coincidence! while Lucien was drawn into the great
machinery of journalism, where he was like to leave his honor and his
intelligence torn to shreds, David Sechard, at the back of his
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Plain Tales from the Hills by Rudyard Kipling: Mamma and Papa, and the wisdom of taking his bride Home.
Then she sent Pluffles out for a walk, to think over what she had
said. Pluffles left, blowing his nose very hard and holding
himself very straight. Mrs. Hauksbee laughed.
What Pluffles had intended to do in the matter of the engagement
only Mrs. Reiver knew, and she kept her own counsel to her death.
She would have liked it spoiled as a compliment, I fancy.
Pluffles enjoyed many talks with Mrs. Hauksbee during the next few
days. They were all to the same end, and they helped Pluffles in
the path of Virtue.
Mrs. Hauksbee wanted to keep him under her wing to the last.
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