| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from On the Origin of Species by Charles Darwin: Species of the same genus vary in an analogous manner -- Reversions to long
lost characters -- Summary.
I have hitherto sometimes spoken as if the variations--so common and
multiform in organic beings under domestication, and in a lesser degree in
those in a state of nature--had been due to chance. This, of course, is a
wholly incorrect expression, but it serves to acknowledge plainly our
ignorance of the cause of each particular variation. Some authors believe
it to be as much the function of the reproductive system to produce
individual differences, or very slight deviations of structure, as to make
the child like its parents. But the much greater variability, as well as
the greater frequency of monstrosities, under domestication or cultivation,
On the Origin of Species |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Under the Andes by Rex Stout: but they were incapable of a decision so sensible.
Many hours had passed, and we had alternated on four watches.
We had plenty of rest and were really quite fit. The gash on my
leg had proven a mere trifle; I was a little stiff, but there was
no pain.
Desiree's foot was almost entirely well; she was able to walk
with ease, and had insisted on taking a turn at watch, making such
a point of it that we had humored her.
Something had to happen, and I suppose it was as well that the
Incas should start it. For we had met with a misfortune that made
us see the beginning of the end. Our fish was no longer fit to
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Taras Bulba and Other Tales by Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol: bed early. He lay down on a rug and covered himself with a sheepskin
pelisse, for the night air was quite sharp and he liked to lie warm
when he was at home. He was soon snoring, and the whole household
speedily followed his example. All snored and groaned as they lay in
different corners. The watchman went to sleep the first of all, he had
drunk so much in honour of the young masters' home-coming.
The mother alone did not sleep. She bent over the pillow of her
beloved sons, as they lay side by side; she smoothed with a comb their
carelessly tangled locks, and moistened them with her tears. She gazed
at them with her whole soul, with every sense; she was wholly merged
in the gaze, and yet she could not gaze enough. She had fed them at
Taras Bulba and Other Tales |
