| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Snow Image by Nathaniel Hawthorne: sake of indulging this idle habit. They knew not that the Great
Stone Face had become a teacher to him, and that the sentiment
which was expressed in it would enlarge the young man's heart,
and fill it with wider and deeper sympathies than other hearts.
They knew not that thence would come a better wisdom than could
be learned from books, and a better life than could be moulded on
the defaced example of other human lives. Neither did Ernest know
that the thoughts and affections which came to him so naturally,
in the fields and at the fireside, and wherever he communed with
himself, were of a higher tone than those which all men shared
with him. A simple soul,--simple as when his mother first taught
The Snow Image |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Captain Stormfield by Mark Twain: expects to be received with a torchlight procession."
"I reckon he is disappointed, then."
"No, he isn't. No man is allowed to be disappointed here.
Whatever he wants, when he comes - that is, any reasonable and
unsacrilegious thing - he can have. There's always a few millions
or billions of young folks around who don't want any better
entertainment than to fill up their lungs and swarm out with their
torches and have a high time over a barkeeper. It tickles the
barkeeper till he can't rest, it makes a charming lark for the
young folks, it don't do anybody any harm, it don't cost a rap, and
it keeps up the place's reputation for making all comers happy and
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Tales of Unrest by Joseph Conrad: and held, between the conventional fury of its jaws, a crude gas flame
that resembled a butterfly. The room was empty, of course; but, as he
stepped in, it became filled all at once with a stir of many people;
because the strips of glass on the doors of wardrobes and his wife's
large pier-glass reflected him from head to foot, and multiplied his
image into a crowd of gentlemanly and slavish imitators, who were
dressed exactly like himself; had the same restrained and rare
gestures; who moved when he moved, stood still with him in an
obsequious immobility, and had just such appearances of life and
feeling as he thought it dignified and safe for any man to manifest.
And like real people who are slaves of common thoughts, that are not
Tales of Unrest |
