| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Maitre Cornelius by Honore de Balzac: but a spark of courage and of anger lurked there, and at the slightest
touch it could burst into flames and cast fire about him. The doctor
was a stout burgher, with a florid face, dressed in black, peremptory,
greedy of gain, and self-important. These two personages were framed,
as it were, in that panelled chamber, hung with high-warped tapestries
of Flanders, the ceiling of which, made of carved beams, was blackened
by smoke. The furniture, the bed, all inlaid with arabesques in
pewter, would seem to-day more precious than they were at that period
when the arts were beginning to produce their choicest masterpieces.
"Lampreys are not good for you," replied the physician.
That title, recently substituted for the former term of "myrrh-
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Roads of Destiny by O. Henry: had surprised him almost daily for years. Mr. Fentress knew the
formula of, and possessed the skill to compound, a certain potion
antagonistic to fatigue, the salient ingredient of which he described
(no doubt in pharmaceutical terms) as "genuine old hand-made Clover
Leaf '59, Private Stock."
Nor did the ceremony of administering the potion ever vary. Mr.
Fentress would first compound two of the celebrated mixtures--one for
the Governor, and the other for the General to "sample." Then the
Governor would make this little speech in his high, piping, quavering
voice:
"No, sir--not one drop until you have prepared one for yourself and
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Don Quixote by Miquel de Cervantes: one blow of a stick hast ended the course of thy well-spent life! Oh
pride of thy race, honour and glory of all La Mancha, nay, of all
the world, that for want of thee will be full of evil-doers, no longer
in fear of punishment for their misdeeds! Oh thou, generous above
all the Alexanders, since for only eight months of service thou hast
given me the best island the sea girds or surrounds! Humble with the
proud, haughty with the humble, encounterer of dangers, endurer of
outrages, enamoured without reason, imitator of the good, scourge of
the wicked, enemy of the mean, in short, knight-errant, which is all
that can be said!"
At the cries and moans of Sancho, Don Quixote came to himself, and
Don Quixote |
