| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Turn of the Screw by Henry James: They were at this period extravagantly and preternaturally fond
of me; which, after all, I could reflect, was no more than a
graceful response in children perpetually bowed over and hugged.
The homage of which they were so lavish succeeded, in truth,
for my nerves, quite as well as if I never appeared to myself,
as I may say, literally to catch them at a purpose in it.
They had never, I think, wanted to do so many things for their
poor protectress; I mean--though they got their lessons better
and better, which was naturally what would please her most--
in the way of diverting, entertaining, surprising her;
reading her passages, telling her stories, acting her charades,
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Cruise of the Jasper B. by Don Marquis: be able to leave without being hampered with this matter. No
one, for many years, had paid any attention to the Jasper B.,
with the exception of the old truck farmer, Abernethy, who used
sometimes to fish from her deck, and----"
"Truck farmer!" cried Cleggett. "Abernethy?"
"Truck farmer," repeated Wilton Barnstable.
"Is not Abernethy an old sea captain?" asked Cleggett.
"Why, no, I believe not," said Barnstable. "At least I never
heard so. He is well known as a small truck gardener in this
neighborhood. It is true that he comes of a seafaring
family--indeed, it is his boast. But, in a community where
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from My Aunt Margaret's Mirror by Walter Scott: "Spare me, I entreat you," replied Aunt Margaret. "You remember
the Gaelic song, though I dare say I mispronounce the words--
'Hatil mohatil, na dowski mi.'
(I am asleep, do not waken me.)
I tell you, kinsman, that the sort of waking dreams which my
imagination spins out, in what your favourite Wordsworth calls
'moods of my own mind,' are worth all the rest of my more active
days. Then, instead of looking forwards, as I did in youth, and
forming for myself fairy palaces, upon the verge of the grave I
turn my eyes backward upon the days and manners of my better
time; and the sad, yet soothing recollections come so close and
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