The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg by Mark Twain: very great service once, possibly without knowing the full value of
it, and he wished he had a fortune, he would leave it to you when he
died, and a curse apiece for the rest of the citizens. Now, then,
if it was you that did him that service, you are his legitimate
heir, and entitled to the sack of gold. I know that I can trust to
your honour and honesty, for in a citizen of Hadleyburg these
virtues are an unfailing inheritance, and so I am going to reveal to
you the remark, well satisfied that if you are not the right man you
will seek and find the right one and see that poor Goodson's debt of
gratitude for the service referred to is paid. This is the remark
'YOU ARE FAR FROM BEING A BAD MAN: GO, AND REFORM.'
The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Dreams & Dust by Don Marquis: A golden glory from the dawn!--
Fool's gold?--thy dullness proves them all
My lands--not thine!
For when all title-deeds are gone,
Still, still will satyr, nymph, and faun
Through brake and covert pipe and call
In dances bold and bacchanal--
For them, for me, you hold in pawn,
My lands--not thine!
TO A DANCING DOLL
FORMAL, quaint, precise, and trim,
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Fisherman's Luck by Henry van Dyke: comparison of the two Williams, Shakspeare and Watson? Inhuman
selfishness! Of course it was my plain duty to sacrifice my
inclinations, and get my fly-rod, and row away across the bay, with
a deceptive appearance of cheerfulness, to catch a basket of trout
in--
III
THE SECRETS OF INTIMACY
THERE! I came within eight letters of telling the name of the
brook, a thing that I am firmly resolved not to do. If it were an
ordinary fishless little river, or even a stream with nothing better
than grass-pike and sunfish in it, you should have the name and
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