| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe: between his wish to help George, and a certain confused notion of
maintaining law and order: so, as he shambled about, he delivered
himself as follows:
"Well, George, I s'pose you're running away--leaving your
lawful master, George--(I don't wonder at it)--at the same time,
I'm sorry, George,--yes, decidedly--I think I must say that,
George--it's my duty to tell you so."
"Why are you sorry, sir?" said George, calmly.
"Why, to see you, as it were, setting yourself in opposition
to the laws of your country."
"_My_ country!" said George, with a strong and bitter emphasis;
Uncle Tom's Cabin |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Ten Years Later by Alexandre Dumas: D'Artagnan with so much friendship as to deprive the
musketeer of his breath for five minutes.
"Why, you are stronger than ever," said D'Artagnan, "and
still, happily, in your arms." Porthos saluted D'Artagnan
with a gracious smile. During the five minutes D'Artagnan
was recovering his breath, he reflected that he had a very
difficult part to play. It was necessary that he always
should question and never reply. By the time his respiration
returned, he had fixed his plans for the campaign.
CHAPTER 70
Wherein the Ideas of D'Artagnan, at first
Ten Years Later |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Catherine de Medici by Honore de Balzac: between the pillars,--the arcade being, let us remark, encumbered
during the day-time with tables, and clerks sitting on stools, such as
we all remember seeing some fifteen years ago under the "piliers des
Halles." From these outposts, the clerks and apprentices talked,
questioned, answered each other, and called to the passers,--customs
which the great Walter Scott has made use of in his "Fortunes of
Nigel."
The sign, which represented an ermine, hung outside, as we still see
in some village hostelries, from a rich bracket of gilded iron
filagree. Above the ermine, on one side of the sign, were the words:--
LECAMVS
|
