| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Tales of Unrest by Joseph Conrad: forward with the speed of fear.
IV
This is, imperfectly, what he said--
"It was after the great trouble that broke the alliance of the four
states of Wajo. We fought amongst ourselves, and the Dutch watched
from afar till we were weary. Then the smoke of their fire-ships was
seen at the mouth of our rivers, and their great men came in boats
full of soldiers to talk to us of protection and peace. We answered
with caution and wisdom, for our villages were burnt, our stockades
weak, the people weary, and the weapons blunt. They came and went;
there had been much talk, but after they went away everything seemed
Tales of Unrest |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Critias by Plato: wall which began at the sea and went all round: this was everywhere
distant fifty stadia from the largest zone or harbour, and enclosed the
whole, the ends meeting at the mouth of the channel which led to the sea.
The entire area was densely crowded with habitations; and the canal and the
largest of the harbours were full of vessels and merchants coming from all
parts, who, from their numbers, kept up a multitudinous sound of human
voices, and din and clatter of all sorts night and day.
I have described the city and the environs of the ancient palace nearly in
the words of Solon, and now I must endeavour to represent to you the nature
and arrangement of the rest of the land. The whole country was said by him
to be very lofty and precipitous on the side of the sea, but the country
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Lesson of the Master by Henry James: afternoons, was performed. The autumn was fine, the lake was blue
and his book took form and direction. These felicities, for the
time, embroidered his life, which he suffered to cover him with its
mantle. At the end of six weeks he felt he had learnt St. George's
lesson by heart, had tested and proved its doctrine. Nevertheless
he did a very inconsistent thing: before crossing the Alps he
wrote to Marian Fancourt. He was aware of the perversity of this
act, and it was only as a luxury, an amusement, the reward of a
strenuous autumn, that he justified it. She had asked of him no
such favour when, shortly before he left London, three days after
their dinner in Ennismore Gardens, he went to take leave of her.
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