| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Man against the Sky by Edwin Arlington Robinson: "I have your word that Aristotle knows,
And you mine that I don't know Aristotle."
He's all at odds with all the unities,
And what's yet worse, it doesn't seem to matter;
He treads along through Time's old wilderness
As if the tramp of all the centuries
Had left no roads -- and there are none, for him;
He doesn't see them, even with those eyes, --
And that's a pity, or I say it is.
Accordingly we have him as we have him --
Going his way, the way that he goes best,
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Lady Baltimore by Owen Wister: I of my thoughts concerning John Mayrant, and the vicissitudes of his
heart, and the Custom House, that I was moved to have words with the old
man upon the general topic.
"Well," I said, "and so Mr. John is going to be married."
No attempt to start a chat ever failed more signally. He assented with a
manner of mingled civility and reserve that was perfection, and after the
two syllables of which his answer consisted, he remained as impenetrably
respectful as before. I felt rather high and dry, but I tried it again:--
"And I'm sure, Daddy Ben, that you feel as sorry as any of the family
that the phosphates failed."
Again he replied with his two syllables of assent, and again he stood
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Secret Sharer by Joseph Conrad: to my first command.
I could not stop a moment longer in the room. I motioned him to get out
of sight and made my way on the poop. That unplayful cub had the watch.
I walked up and down for a while thinking things out, then beckoned him over.
"Send a couple of hands to open the two quarter-deck ports,"
I said, mildly.
He actually had the impudence, or else so forgot himself in his wonder
at such an incomprehensible order, as to repeat:
"Open the quarter-deck ports! What for, sir?"
"The only reason you need concern yourself about is because I tell you
to do so. Have them open wide and fastened properly."
The Secret Sharer |
