| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Troll Garden and Selected Stories by Willa Cather: asked the minister in a trembling voice.
"No, sir, I don't, and it is disgraceful he should force me
into it! I won't marry him."
"Then, Canute, I cannot marry you," said the minister,
standing as straight as his rheumatic limbs would let him.
"Are you ready to marry us now, sir?" said Canute, laying one
iron hand on his stooped shoulder. The little preacher was a good
man, but like most men of weak body he was a coward and had a
horror of physical suffering, although he had known so much of it.
So with many qualms of conscience he began to repeat the marriage
service. Lena sat sullenly in her chair, staring at the fire.
The Troll Garden and Selected Stories |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from In the South Seas by Robert Louis Stevenson: intelligence of men and business. Alone in his islands, it was he
who dealt and profited; he was the planter and the merchant; and
his subjects toiled for his behoof in servitude. When they wrought
long and well their taskmaster declared a holiday, and supplied and
shared a general debauch. The scale of his providing was at times
magnificent; six hundred dollars' worth of gin and brandy was set
forth at once; the narrow land resounded with the noise of revelry:
and it was a common thing to see the subjects (staggering
themselves) parade their drunken sovereign on the fore-hatch of a
wrecked vessel, king and commons howling and singing as they went.
At a word from Nakaeia's mouth the revel ended; Makin became once
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Tom Sawyer, Detective by Mark Twain: "Swear it?"
"Yes, I swear it."
"So do I. Now do you know what that means?"
"No. What does it mean?"
"Means that them thieves DIDN'T GET THE DI'MONDS."
"Jimminy! What makes you think that?"
"I don't only think it, I know it. Didn't the breeches
and goggles and whiskers and hand-bag and every blessed
thing turn to ghost-stuff? Everything it had on turned,
didn't it? It shows that the reason its boots turned
too was because it still had them on after it started
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