| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Margret Howth: A Story of To-day by Rebecca Harding Davis: would see the struggle; the body might be nerveless or sickly,
but it had the great power of reticence; the calm with which she
faced the closest gaze was natural to her,--no mask. When she
left her room and went down, the same unaltered quiet that had
baffled Knowles steadied her step and cooled her eyes.
After you have made a sacrifice of yourself for others, did you
ever notice how apt you were to doubt, as soon as the deed was
irrevocable, whether, after all, it were worth while to have done
it? How mean seems the good gained! How new and unimagined the
agony of empty hands and stifled wish! Very slow the angels are,
sometimes, that are sent to minister!
Margret Howth: A Story of To-day |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg by Mark Twain: correspondents who had come from everywhere. It was the best-
dressed house the town had ever produced. There were some tolerably
expensive toilets there, and in several cases the ladies who wore
them had the look of being unfamiliar with that kind of clothes. At
least the town thought they had that look, but the notion could have
arisen from the town's knowledge of the fact that these ladies had
never inhabited such clothes before.
The gold-sack stood on a little table at the front of the platform
where all the house could see it. The bulk of the house gazed at it
with a burning interest, a mouth-watering interest, a wistful and
pathetic interest; a minority of nineteen couples gazed at it
The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Road to Oz by L. Frank Baum: "So I should imagine," replied the Emperor, with true politeness.
They were shown to their rooms and permitted to make such toilets as
they could, and soon they assembled again in the grand tin dining-hall,
even Toto being present. For the Emperor was fond of Dorothy's
little dog, and the girl explained to her friends that in Oz all
animals were treated with as much consideration as the people--"if
they behave themselves," she added.
Toto behaved himself, and sat in a tin high-chair beside Dorothy and
ate his dinner from a tin platter.
Indeed, they all ate from tin dishes, but these were of pretty shapes
and brightly polished; Dorothy thought they were just as good as silver.
The Road to Oz |
