| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from House of Seven Gables by Nathaniel Hawthorne: station and habits, will first consider whether the urgency of
the end may compensate for the disagreeableness of the means.
It does so in the present instance."
He then renewed the conversation, and made great pecuniary
offers to the carpenter, in case the latter should give information
leading to the discovery of the lost document, and the consequent
success of the Eastern claim. For a long time Matthew Maule is
said to have turned a cold ear to these propositions. At last,
however, with a strange kind of laugh, he inquired whether Mr.
Pyncheon would make over to him the old wizard's
homestead-ground, together with the House of the Seven Gables,
House of Seven Gables |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe: and the silent tarn--a pestilent and mystic vapour, dull,
sluggish, faintly discernible, and leaden-hued.
Shaking off from my spirit what must have been a dream,
I scanned more narrowly the real aspect of the building. Its
principal feature seemed to be that of an excessive antiquity.
The discoloration of ages had been great. Minute fungi
overspread the whole exterior, hanging in a fine tangled web-work
from the eaves. Yet all this was apart from any extraordinary
dilapidation. No portion of the masonry had fallen; and there
appeared to be a wild inconsistency between its still perfect
adaptation of parts, and the crumbling condition of the
The Fall of the House of Usher |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Boys' Life of Abraham Lincoln by Helen Nicolay: the "Tuesday after the first Monday" of November in that year.
The great mass of Republicans wished Mr. Lincoln to be reelected.
The Democrats had long ago fixed upon General McClellan, with his
grievances against the President, as their future candidate. It
is not unusual for Presidents to discover would-be rivals in
their own cabinets. Considering the strong men who formed Mr.
Lincoln's cabinet, and the fact that four years earlier more than
one of them had active hopes of being chosen in his stead, it is
remarkable that there was so little of this.
The one who developed the most serious desire to succeed him was
Salmon P. Chase, his Secretary of the Treasury. Devoted with all
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