| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Wrong Box by Stevenson & Osbourne: trouble? you poor boy, no!' cried Julia; and, in the warmth of
the moment, reached him her other hand; 'you may count on me,'
she added.
'Really?' said Gideon.
'Really and really!' replied the girl.
'I do then, and I will,' cried the young man. 'I admit the moment
is not well chosen; but I have no friends--to speak of.'
'No more have I,' said Julia. 'But don't you think it's perhaps
time you gave me back my hands?'
'La ci darem la mano,' said the barrister, 'the merest moment
more! I have so few friends,' he added.
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Essays & Lectures by Oscar Wilde: the first glimmering of that splendid dawn which broke over the
hills of Galilee and flooded the earth like wine, was hidden from
his eyes.
There are many points in the description of the ideal historian
which one may compare to the picture which Plato has given us of
the ideal philosopher. They are both 'spectators of all time and
all existence.' Nothing is contemptible in their eyes, for all
things have a meaning, and they both walk in august reasonableness
before all men, conscious of the workings of God yet free from all
terror of mendicant priest or vagrant miracle-worker. But the
parallel ends here. For the one stands aloof from the world-storm
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Melmoth Reconciled by Honore de Balzac: they convert all their friends into fellow-conspirators. Like all
people possessed by one idea, these ladies press everything into the
service of their great project, slowly elaborating their toils, much
as the ant-lion excavates its funnel in the sand and lies in wait at
the bottom for its victim. Suppose that no one strays, after all, into
that carefully constructed labyrinth? Suppose that the ant-lion dies
of hunger and thirst in her pit? Such things may be, but if any
heedless creature once enters in, it never comes out. All the wires
which could be pulled to induce action on the captain's part were
tried; appeals were made to the secret interested motives that always
come into play in such cases; they worked on Castanier's hopes and on
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