| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The New Machiavelli by H. G. Wells: peculiar shyness. And I do not believe we ever had occasion either
of us to use the word "love." It was not only that we were
instinctively shy of the subject, but that we were mightily ashamed
of the extent of our ignorance and uncertainty in these matters. We
evaded them elaborately with an assumption of exhaustive knowledge.
We certainly had no shyness about theology. We marked the
emancipation of our spirits from the frightful teachings that had
oppressed our boyhood, by much indulgence in blasphemous wit. We
had a secret literature of irreverent rhymes, and a secret art of
theological caricature. Britten's father had delighted his family
by reading aloud from Dr. Richard Garnett's TWILIGHT OF THE GODS,
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Dracula by Bram Stoker: to lunch with us and see him then. You could catch the quick
3:34 train, which will leave you at Paddington before eight."
He was surprised at my knowledge of the trains offhand, but he does
not know that I have made up all the trains to and from Exeter,
so that I may help Jonathan in case he is in a hurry.
So he took the papers with him and went away, and I sit here thinking,
thinking I don't know what.
LETTER (by hand), VAN HELSING TO MRS. HARKER
25 September, 6 o'clock
"Dear Madam Mina,
"I have read your husband's so wonderful diary. You may sleep without doubt.
Dracula |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Secrets of the Princesse de Cadignan by Honore de Balzac: day gay, and frivolous for the world; but in that sad struggle to
escape my real life I wasted my fortune. The revolution of 1830 came;
it came at the very moment when I had met, at the end of that Arabian
Nights' life, a pure and sacred love which (I desire to be honest) I
had longed to know. Was it not natural in a woman whose heart,
repressed by many causes and accidents, was awakening at an age when a
woman feels herself cheated if she has never known, like the women she
sees about her, a happy love? Ah! why was Michel Chrestien so
respectful? Why did he not seek to meet me? There again was another
mockery! But what of that? in falling, I have lost everything; I have
no illusions left; I had tasted of all things except the one fruit for
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