| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Louis Lambert by Honore de Balzac: whether the element that constitutes electricity does not enter as a
base into the specific fluid whence our Ideas and Volitions proceed?
Whether the hair, which loses its color, turns white, falls out, or
disappears, in proportion to the decay or crystallization of our
thoughts, may not be in fact a capillary system, either absorbent or
diffusive, and wholly electrical? Whether the fluid phenomena of the
Will, a matter generated within us, and spontaneously reacting under
the impress of conditions as yet unobserved, were at all more
extraordinary than those of the invisible and intangible fluid
produced by a voltaic pile, and applied to the nervous system of a
dead man? Whether the formation of Ideas and their constant diffusion
Louis Lambert |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Michael Strogoff by Jules Verne: heroism -- "the hero's cool courage," according to the defini-
tion of the physiologist. He possessed a fine nose, with
large nostrils; and a well-shaped mouth, with the slightly-
projecting lips which denote a generous and noble heart.
Michael Strogoff had the temperament of the man of
action, who does not bite his nails or scratch his head in
doubt and indecision. Sparing of gestures as of words, he
always stood motionless like a soldier before his superior;
but when he moved, his step showed a firmness, a freedom
of movement, which proved the confidence and vivacity of
his mind.
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte by Karl Marx: French history. With some this fact may detract of its value. A
pedantic, supercilious notion is extensively abroad among us that we are
an "Anglo Saxon" nation; and an equally pedantic, supercilious habit
causes many to look to England for inspiration, as from a racial
birthplace Nevertheless, for weal or for woe, there is no such thing
extant as "Anglo-Saxon"--of al nations, said to be "Anglo-Saxon," in the
United States least. What we still have from England, much as
appearances may seem to point the other way, is not of our
bone-and-marrow, so to speak, but rather partakes of the nature of
"importations. "We are no more English on account of them than we are
Chinese because we all drink tea.
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