| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Figure in the Carpet by Henry James: little demon of subtlety. We had begun by disputing, but I soon
saw that without my stirring a finger his infatuation would have
its bad hours. He would bound off on false scents as I had done -
he would clap his hands over new lights and see them blown out by
the wind of the turned page. He was like nothing, I told him, but
the maniacs who embrace some bedlamitical theory of the cryptic
character of Shakespeare. To this he replied that if we had had
Shakespeare's own word for his being cryptic he would at once have
accepted it. The case there was altogether different - we had
nothing but the word of Mr. Snooks. I returned that I was
stupefied to see him attach such importance even to the word of Mr.
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from What is Man? by Mark Twain: crown before they take it away. There was not room enough and I
have made it too small; but it never fitted him, anyway.
Now we turn the corner of the century with a new line of
monarchs--the Lancastrian kings.
Henry IV.; fourteen squares of YELLOW paper. (Fig. 17.)
This hen has laid the egg of a new dynasty and realizes the
magnitude of the event. She is giving notice in the usual way.
You notice I am improving in the construction of hens. At first
I made them too much like other animals, but this one is
orthodox. I mention this to encourage you. You will find that
the more you practice the more accurate you will become. I could
What is Man? |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Pool in the Desert by Sara Jeanette Duncan: words were casual.
'Quite right. The ayah was silly about coming--didn't want to leave
her babies or something--so I had to leave her behind. Everything
else is either here or in the ekkas.'
'The brute! Never mind--they're not much use in a railway journey.
You can pick up another at Bombay. Then I suppose I'd better get
in.'
'I suppose you better had. Unless you think of walking,' she
laughed, and he took the place beside her.
Ram Singh again unquestioningly took up the reins.
'Nobody else going down?'
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