The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Heart of the West by O. Henry: to the sad sultan of the sour countenance, or it'll be the bowstring
for yours.' But I never had any doubt I could do it.
"I began with him like you'd feed a starving man. I showed him the
horse-cars on Broadway and the Staten Island ferry-boats. And then I
piled up the sensations on him, but always keeping a lot of warmer
ones up my sleeve.
"At the end of the third day he looked like a composite picture of
five thousand orphans too late to catch a picnic steamboat, and I was
wilting down a collar every two hours wondering how I could please him
and whether I was going to get my thou. He went to sleep looking at
the Brooklyn Bridge; he disregarded the sky-scrapers above the third
Heart of the West |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Marie by H. Rider Haggard: escaped. As they dared not go forward for fear lest they should fall
into the hands of the Zulus, they fled back northwards, running all
night, only to find in the morning that they had lost their way in the
bush. This had happened nearly a month before--or, at any rate, Klaus
thought so, for no doubt the days went very slowly--during which time
they had wandered about, trying to shape some sort of course by the sun
with the object of returning to the camp. They met no man, black or
white, and supported themselves upon game, which they shot and ate raw
or sun-dried, till at length all their powder was done and they threw
away their heavy roers, which they could no longer carry.
It was at this juncture that from the top of a tall tree Klaus saw a
Marie |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from On the Duty of Civil Disobedience by Henry David Thoreau: improvement is slow, because the few are not as materially
wiser or better than the many. It is not so important that
many should be good as you, as that there be some absolute
goodness somewhere; for that will leaven the whole lump.
There are thousands who are in opinion opposed to slavery
and to the war, who yet in effect do nothing to put an end
to them; who, esteeming themselves children of Washington
and Franklin, sit down with their hands in their pockets,
and say that they know not what to do, and do nothing; who
even postpone the question of freedom to the question of
free trade, and quietly read the prices-current along with
On the Duty of Civil Disobedience |