| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Island of Doctor Moreau by H. G. Wells: ear-penetrating intensity.
"Ah!" said Moreau, letting the curved instrument fall to his side again.
Immediately there was a crashing through the yellow canes,
and a sound of voices from the dense green jungle that marked
the morass through which I had run on the previous day.
Then at three or four points on the edge of the sulphurous area
appeared the grotesque forms of the Beast People hurrying towards us.
I could not help a creeping horror, as I perceived first one and then
another trot out from the trees or reeds and come shambling along
over the hot dust. But Moreau and Montgomery stood calmly enough;
and, perforce, I stuck beside them.
 The Island of Doctor Moreau |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Eryxias by Platonic Imitator: hearing is procured by the aid of medicine.
CRITIAS: Very likely.
SOCRATES: But if, again, we obtain by wealth the aid of medicine, shall we
not regard wealth as useful for virtue?
CRITIAS: True.
SOCRATES: And also the instruments by which wealth is procured?
CRITIAS: Certainly.
SOCRATES: Then you think that a man may gain wealth by bad and disgraceful
means, and, having obtained the aid of medicine which enables him to
acquire the power of hearing, may use that very faculty for the acquisition
of virtue?
|
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Miracle Mongers and Their Methods by Harry Houdini: comes on the stage (as he does sometimes
three or four times in a day) but he first
drinks the Brazil water, without which he
can do nothing at all, for all that comes
from him has a tincture of the red, and
it only varies and alters according to the
abundance of water which he takes, and
the strength of the white-wine vinegar, in
which all the glasses are washed.
CHAPTER TEN
DEFIERS OF POISONOUS REPTILES: THARDO;
 Miracle Mongers and Their Methods |