| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Essays & Lectures by Oscar Wilde: civilisation much good. But that swift legion of fiery-footed
engines that bore to the burning ruins of Chicago the loving help
and generous treasure of the world was as noble and as beautiful as
any golden troop of angels that ever fed the hungry and clothed the
naked in the antique times. As beautiful, yes; all machinery may
be beautiful when it is undecorated even. Do not seek to decorate
it. We cannot but think all good machinery is graceful, also, the
line of strength and the line of beauty being one.
Give then, as I said, to your workmen of to-day the bright and
noble surroundings that you can yourself create. Stately and
simple architecture for your cities, bright and simple dress for
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Soul of the Far East by Percival Lowell: when fortune has proved unpropitious, an artificial method of
counteracting the inequalities of fate. That such is the plain
unglamoured view of the procedure is shown by the age at which the
object is adopted. Usually the future son or daughter enters the
adoptive household as an infant, intentionally so on the part of the
would-be parents. His ignorance of a previous relationship largely
increases his relative value; for the possibility of his making
comparisons in his own mind between a former state of existence and
the present one unfavorable to the latter is not pleasant for the
adopters to contemplate. He is therefore acquired young. The
amusement derived from his company is thus seen to be distinctly
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Bronte Sisters: and majestic clumps of trees. 'And what a paradise you live in!'
'It is a lovely evening,' answered I; and I sighed to think how
little I had felt its loveliness, and how little of a paradise
sweet Grassdale was to me - how still less to the voluntary exile
from its scenes. Whether Mr. Hargrave divined my thoughts, I
cannot tell, but, with a half-hesitating, sympathising seriousness
of tone and manner, he asked if I had lately heard from Mr.
Huntingdon.
'Not lately,' I replied.
'I thought not,' he muttered, as if to himself, looking
thoughtfully on the ground.
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall |
