| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Emma by Jane Austen: and that Mr. Churchill had sent his nephew a few lines, containing,
upon the whole, a tolerable account of Mrs. Churchill, and only
wishing him not to delay coming back beyond the next morning early;
but that Mr. Frank Churchill having resolved to go home directly,
without waiting at all, and his horse seeming to have got a cold,
Tom had been sent off immediately for the Crown chaise, and the
ostler had stood out and seen it pass by, the boy going a good pace,
and driving very steady.
There was nothing in all this either to astonish or interest,
and it caught Emma's attention only as it united with the subject
which already engaged her mind. The contrast between Mrs. Churchill's
Emma |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Ruling Passion by Henry van Dyke: not telling you how it ought to have been, I am telling you how it
was. This isn't Vaillantcoeur's account-book; it's his story. You
must strike your balances as you go along.
And all the time, you see, he felt sure that he was a stronger man
and a braver man than Prosper. He was hungry to prove it in the
only way that he could understand. The sense of rivalry grew into a
passion of hatred, and the hatred shaped itself into a blind,
headstrong desire to fight. Everything that Prosper did well,
seemed like a challenge; every success that he had was as hard to
bear as an insult. All the more, because Prosper seemed unconscious
of it. He refused to take offence, went about his work quietly and
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Catherine de Medici by Honore de Balzac: --the two sets of planks of course not yielding, being themselves
bound together by ropes. These wedges were driven in on a line with
the knees and the ankles. The choice of these places where there is
little flesh, and where, consequently, the wedge could only be forced
in by crushing the bones, made this form of torture, called the
"question," horribly painful. In the "ordinary question" four wedges
were driven in,--two at the knees, two at the ankles; but in the
"extraordinary question" the number was increased to eight, provided
the doctor certified that the prisoner's vitality was not exhausted.
At the time of which we write the "boots" were also applied in the
same manner to the hands and wrists; but, being pressed for time, the
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