| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen: and agreeable! The children are all hanging about her already,
as if she was an old acquaintance. And they both long
to see you of all things, for they have heard at Exeter
that you are the most beautiful creatures in the world;
and I have told them it is all very true, and a great
deal more. You will be delighted with them I am sure.
They have brought the whole coach full of playthings
for the children. How can you be so cross as not to come?
Why they are your cousins, you know, after a fashion.
YOU are my cousins, and they are my wife's, so you must
be related."
Sense and Sensibility |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Divine Comedy (translated by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow) by Dante Alighieri: And thou shalt see thy creed and my discourse
Fit in the truth as centre in a circle.
That which can die, and that which dieth not,
Are nothing but the splendour of the idea
Which by his love our Lord brings into being;
Because that living Light, which from its fount
Effulgent flows, so that it disunites not
From Him nor from the Love in them intrined,
Through its own goodness reunites its rays
In nine subsistences, as in a mirror,
Itself eternally remaining One.
The Divine Comedy (translated by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow) |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from A Woman of No Importance by Oscar Wilde: Nothing succeeds like excess.
LADY HUNSTANTON. I hope I shall remember that. It sounds an
admirable maxim. But I'm beginning to forget everything. It's a
great misfortune.
LORD ILLINGWORTH. It is one of your most fascinating qualities,
Lady Hunstanton. No woman should have a memory. Memory in a woman
is the beginning of dowdiness. One can always tell from a woman's
bonnet whether she has got a memory or not.
LADY HUNSTANTON. How charming you are, dear Lord Illingworth. You
always find out that one's most glaring fault is one's most
important virtue. You have the most comforting views of life.
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