| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Dracula by Bram Stoker: Arthur and Quincey in pajamas and slippers, the former spoke, "I heard
your man call up Dr. Van Helsing and tell him of an accident.
So I woke Quincey or rather called for him as he was not asleep.
Things are moving too quickly and too strangely for sound
sleep for any of us these times. I've been thinking
that tomorrow night will not see things as they have been.
We'll have to look back, and forward a little more than we have done.
May we come in?"
I nodded, and held the door open till they had entered, then I closed
it again. When Quincey saw the attitude and state of the patient,
and noted the horrible pool on the floor, he said softly, "My God!
Dracula |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Perfect Wagnerite: A Commentary on the Niblung's Ring by George Bernard Shaw: You cannot persuade any moral enthusiast to accept this as a pure
oscillation from action to reaction. If he is a Puritan he looks
upon the Restoration as a national disaster: if he is an artist
he regards it as the salvation of the country from gloom, devil
worship and starvation of the affections. The Puritan is ready to
try the Commonwealth again with a few modern improvements: the
Amateur is equally ready to try the Restoration with modern
enlightenments. And so for the present we must be content to
proceed by reactions, hoping that each will establish some
permanently practical and beneficial reform or moral habit that
will survive the correction of its excesses by the next reaction.
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Inaugural Address by John F. Kennedy: both rightly alarmed by the steady spread of the deadly atom, yet both racing
to alter that uncertain balance of terror that stays the hand of Mankind's
final war.
So let us begin anew. . .remembering on both sides that civility
is not a sign of weakness, and sincerity is always subject to proof.
Let us never negotiate out of fear, but let us never fear to negotiate.
Let both sides explore what problems unite us instead of belaboring
those problems which divide us. Let both sides, for the first time,
formulate serious and precise proposals for the inspection and
control of arms. . .and bring the absolute power to destroy
other nations under the absolute control of all nations.
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