| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson by Robert Louis Stevenson: written to you at all during your illness. I find two sheets begun
with your name, but that is no excuse. . . . I am keeping bravely;
getting about better, every day, and hope soon to be in my usual
fettle. My books begin to come; and I fell once more on the Old
Bailey session papers. I have 1778, 1784, and 1786. Should you be
able to lay hands on any other volumes, above all a little later, I
should be very glad you should buy them for me. I particularly
want ONE or TWO during the course of the Peninsular War. Come to
think, I ought rather to have communicated this want to Bain.
Would it bore you to communicate to that effect with the great man?
The sooner I have them, the better for me. 'Tis for Henry Shovel.
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Massimilla Doni by Honore de Balzac: "The sun, monsieur, gives light and heat to the world, only because it
is at a distance of thirty-three millions of leagues. Get nearer to
it, and science warns you that it is not really hot or luminous,--for
science is of some use," he added, looking at Capraja.
"Not so bad for a Frenchman and a doctor," said Capraja, patting the
foreigner on the shoulder. "You have in those words explained the
thing which Europeans least understand in all Dante: his Beatrice.
Yes, Beatrice, that ideal figure, the queen of the poet's fancies,
chosen above all the elect, consecrated with tears, deified by memory,
and for ever young in the presence of ineffectual desire!"
"Prince," said the Duke to Emilio, "come and sup with me. You cannot
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Mayor of Casterbridge by Thomas Hardy: The trusser and his family proceeded on their way, and soon
entered the Fair-field, which showed standing-places and
pens where many hundreds of horses and sheep had been
exhibited and sold in the forenoon, but were now in great
part taken away. At present, as their informant had
observed, but little real business remained on hand, the
chief being the sale by auction of a few inferior animals,
that could not otherwise be disposed of, and had been
absolutely refused by the better class of traders, who came
and went early. Yet the crowd was denser now than during
the morning hours, the frivolous contingent of visitors,
The Mayor of Casterbridge |
