| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Paz by Honore de Balzac: "Isn't everything going on right?" asked the count, taking the
"bocchettino" of his narghile from his lips.
"Everything is going on so right that other people with an income of
two hundred thousand francs would ruin themselves by going at our
pace, and we have only one hundred and ten thousand."
So saying she pulled the bell-cord (an exquisite bit of needlework). A
footman entered, dressed like a minister.
"Tell Captain Paz that I wish to see him."
"If you think you are going to find out anything that way--" said
Comte Adam, laughing.
It is well to mention that Adam and Clementine, married in December,
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Some Reminiscences by Joseph Conrad: bedroom above a wild heap of rags, broken mahogany and splintered
boards which had been Mr. Nicholas B.'s bedstead. Detecting the
servant in the act of stealing away with a japanned tin box, they
tore it from him, and because he resisted they threw him out of
the dining-room window. The house was on one floor but raised
well above the ground, and the fall was so serious that the man
remained lying stunned till the cook and a stable-boy ventured
forth at dusk from their hiding-places and picked him up. By
that time the mob had departed carrying off the tin box, which
they supposed to be full of paper money. Some distance from the
house in the middle of a field they broke it open. They found
Some Reminiscences |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Snow Image by Nathaniel Hawthorne: silvery liquid on the clouds, through which it slowly melted till
they became all bright; then he saw the same sweet radiance
dancing on the leafy trees which rustled as if to shake it off,
or sleeping on the high tops of hills, or hovering down in
distant valleys, like the material of unshaped dreams; lastly, he
looked into the spring, and there the light was mingling with the
water. In its crystal bosom, too, beholding all heaven reflected
there, he found an emblem of a pure and tranquil breast. He
listened to that most ethereal of all sounds, the song of
crickets, coming in full choir upon the wind, and fancied that,
if moonlight could be heard, it would sound just like that.
The Snow Image |
