| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Altar of the Dead by Henry James: less acceptable it seemed. At the same time he had no illusion
about the effect of his refusal; he perfectly saw how it would make
for a rupture. He left her alone a week, but when at last he again
called this conviction was cruelly confirmed. In the interval he
had kept away from the church, and he needed no fresh assurance
from her to know she hadn't entered it. The change was complete
enough: it had broken up her life. Indeed it had broken up his,
for all the fires of his shrine seemed to him suddenly to have been
quenched. A great indifference fell upon him, the weight of which
was in itself a pain; and he never knew what his devotion had been
for him till in that shock it ceased like a dropped watch. Neither
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Riders of the Purple Sage by Zane Grey: Then, no longer able to withstand his own burning curiosity, he
questioned her in turn.
"Are you Oldring's Masked Rider?"
"Yes," she replied, and dropped her eyes.
"I knew it--I recognized your figure--and mask, for I saw you
once. Yet I can't believe it!...But you never were really that
rustler, as we riders knew him? A thief--a marauder--a kidnapper
of women--a murderer of sleeping riders!"
"No! I never stole--or harmed any one--in all my life. I only
rode and rode--"
"But why--why?" he burst out. "Why the name? I understand Oldring
Riders of the Purple Sage |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Manon Lescaut by Abbe Prevost: but the strict truth, of which I have assured myself by the most
serious examination. I had, perhaps, as strong an inclination
for pleasure as you, but Heaven had at the same time, in its
mercy, blessed me with a taste for virtue. I exercised my reason
in comparing the consequences of the one with those of the other,
and the divine aid was graciously vouchsafed to my reflections.
I conceived for the world a contempt which nothing can equal.
Can you guess what it is retains me in it now,' he added, `and
that prevents me from embracing a life of solitude? Simply the
sincere friendship I bear towards you. I know the excellent
qualities of both your heart and head. There is no good of which
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