| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Forged Coupon by Leo Tolstoy: this period of active service gave vivid reality to
the battle-scenes in "War and Peace," and are
traceable in the reflections and conversation of the
two heroes, Prince Andre and Pierre Besukhov.
On the eve of the battle of Borodino, Prince
Andre, talking with Pierre in the presence of his
devoted soldier-servant Timokhine, says,--
"'Success cannot possibly be, nor has it ever
been, the result of strategy or fire-arms or num-
bers.'
"'Then what does it result from?' said Pierre.
The Forged Coupon |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne: moment, took thorough possession of her, and closed her lips, or
impelled her to speak words amiss. After putting her finger in
her mouth, with many ungracious refusals to answer good Mr.
Wilson's
136 THE SCARLET LETTER
The Scarlet Letter |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Father Damien by Robert Louis Stevenson: faltered and stumbled in his narrow path of duty; I will suppose
that, in the horror of his isolation, perhaps in the fever of
incipient disease, he, who was doing so much more than he had
sworn, failed in the letter of his priestly oath - he, who was so
much a better man than either you or me, who did what we have never
dreamed of daring - he too tasted of our common frailty. "O, Iago,
the pity of it!" The least tender should be moved to tears; the
most incredulous to prayer. And all that you could do was to pen
your letter to the Reverend H. B. Gage!
Is it growing at all clear to you what a picture you have drawn of
your own heart? I will try yet once again to make it clearer. You
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