| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Snow Image by Nathaniel Hawthorne: majestic playfulness, formed on the perpendicular side of a
mountain by some immense rocks, which had been thrown together in
such a position as, when viewed at a proper distance, precisely
to resemble the features of the human countenance. It seemed as
if an enormous giant, or a Titan, had sculptured his own likeness
on the precipice. There was the broad arch of the forehead, a
hundred feet in height; the nose, with its long bridge; and the
vast lips, which, if they could have spoken, would have rolled
their thunder accents from one end of the valley to the other.
True it is, that if the spectator approached too near, he lost
the outline of the gigantic visage, and could discern only a heap
The Snow Image |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Devil's Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce: men with a priest at their head, bearing a crucifix, entered and
captured the ghoul, which, thinking to escape by the stratagem, had
transformed itself to the semblance of a well known citizen, but was
nevertheless hanged, drawn and quartered in the midst of hideous
popular orgies. The citizen whose shape the demon had assumed was so
affected by the sinister occurrence that he never again showed himself
in Amiens and his fate remains a mystery.
GLUTTON, n. A person who escapes the evils of moderation by
committing dyspepsia.
GNOME, n. In North-European mythology, a dwarfish imp inhabiting the
interior parts of the earth and having special custody of mineral
The Devil's Dictionary |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from American Notes by Rudyard Kipling: California was further up the reach, and with the corner of my
eye I could see him casting with long casts and much skill. Then
he struck, and my fish broke for the weir in the same instant,
and down the reach we came, California and I, reel answering reel
even as the morning stars sing together.
The first wild enthusiasm of capture had died away. We were both
at work now in deadly earnest to prevent the lines fouling, to
stall off a down-stream rush for shaggy water just above the
weir, and at the same time to get the fish into the shallow bay
down-stream that gave the best practicable landing. Portland bid
us both be of good heart, and volunteered to take the rod from my
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