| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe: and clangorous, yet apparently muffled reverberation. Completely
unnerved, I leaped to my feet; but the measured rocking movement
of Usher was undisturbed. I rushed to the chair in which he sat.
His eyes were bent fixedly before him, and throughout his whole
countenance there reigned a stony rigidity. But, as I placed my
hand upon his shoulder, there came a strong shudder over his
whole person; a sickly smile quivered about his lips; and I saw
that he spoke in a low, hurried, and gibbering murmur, as if
unconscious of my presence. Bending closely over him, I at
length drank in the hideous import of his words.
"Not hear it?--yes, I hear it, and have heard it. Long-
The Fall of the House of Usher |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Tales and Fantasies by Robert Louis Stevenson: in the sunshine.
Dick paused for an instant on the threshold of the platform.
Then, in two steps, he was by her side and speaking almost
with a sob.
'Esther,' he said, 'have pity on me. What have I done? Can
you not forgive me? Esther, you loved me once - can you not
love me still?'
'How can I tell you? How am I to know?' she answered. 'You
are all a lie to me - all a lie from first to last. You were
laughing at my folly, playing with me like a child, at the
very time when you declared you loved me. Which was true?
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Alcibiades II by Platonic Imitator: other and esteeming that of the greatest importance in the state,
'Wherein he himself most excelled.' (Euripides, Antiope.)
--I mean that which was best in any art, while he was entirely ignorant of
what was best for himself and for the state, because, as I think, he trusts
to opinion which is devoid of intelligence. In such a case should we not
be right if we said that the state would be full of anarchy and
lawlessness?
ALCIBIADES: Decidedly.
SOCRATES: But ought we not then, think you, either to fancy that we know
or really to know, what we confidently propose to do or say?
ALCIBIADES: Yes.
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