| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions by Edwin A. Abbot: the top of which you and your countrymen move about,
without rising above it or falling below it.
I am not a plane Figure, but a Solid. You call me a Circle;
but in reality I am not a Circle, but an infinite number of Circles,
of size varying from a Point to a Circle of thirteen inches
in diameter, one placed on the top of the other. When I cut through
your plane as I am now doing, I make in your plane a section
which you, very rightly, call a Circle. For even a Sphere --
which is my proper name in my own country -- if he manifest himself
at all to an inhabitant of Flatland -- must needs manifest himself
as a Circle.
Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Hated Son by Honore de Balzac: constitution? Was it well to nurse him long? If she died, would
Beauvouloir undertake the care of the poor child's health?
To the questions of the countess, Beauvouloir, deeply touched, replied
that he feared, as much as she did, an attempt to poison Etienne; but
there was, he assured her, no danger as long as she nursed the child;
and in future, when obliged to feed him, she must taste the food
herself.
"If Madame la comtesse," he said, "feels anything strange upon her
tongue, a prickly, bitter, strong salt taste, reject the food. Let the
child's clothes be washed under her own eye and let her keep the key
of the chest which contains them. Should anything happen to the child
|
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Snow Image by Nathaniel Hawthorne: than height, and rolled along on his short and sturdy legs as
substantial as an elephant, though not quite so big. Then the
mother resumed her work. What it was I forget; but she was either
trimming a silken bonnet for Violet, or darning a pair of
stockings for little Peony's short legs. Again, however, and
again, and yet other agains, she could not help turning her head
to the window to see how the children got on with their
snow-image.
Indeed, it was an exceedingly pleasant sight, those bright little
souls at their task! Moreover, it was really wonderful to observe
how knowingly and skilfully they managed the matter. Violet
The Snow Image |
