| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Poems of Goethe, Bowring, Tr. by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe: the old tradition which forms the subject of this Ballad, but he
never carried out his design.]
OH, enter old minstrel, thou time-honour'd one!
We children are here in the hall all alone,
The portals we straightway will bar.
Our mother is praying, our father is gone
To the forest, on wolves to make war.
Oh sing us a ballad, the tale then repeat,
'Till brother and I learn it right;
We long have been hoping a minstrel to meet,
For children hear tales with delight.
|
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Scaramouche by Rafael Sabatini: desired him to spend himself and that magnificent speed of his
against the greater speed that whole days of fencing in succession
for nearly two years had given the master. With a beautiful, easy
pressure of forte on foible Andre-Louis kept himself completely
covered in that second bout, which once more culminated in a lunge.
Expecting it now, Andre-Louis parried it by no more than a deflecting
touch. At the same moment he stepped suddenly forward, right within
the other's guard, thus placing his man so completely at his mercy
that, as if fascinated, the Marquis did not even attempt to recover
himself.
This time Andre-Louis did not laugh: He just smiled into the dilating
|
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Stories From the Old Attic by Robert Harris: itself.'" So the king applied himself to books of wisdom, and to
seeking the knowledge of all his many scholars and sending
throughout all his realm to find the wise from every land. Dozens
came and dozens pretended to instruct him in wisdom or in the way to
happiness, but while he found some really good advice and some
satisfying rules for life, happiness still eluded him.
Then one day came a woman from a land beyond the sunrise. Her words
were few but they so affected those who listened that she was
immediately granted an audience with the king, who explained the
discontent of his condition.
"Here before me," he said, "it would seem that I have everything a
|
