| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table by Oliver Wendell Holmes: forms of life in the two continents. Our naturalists have often
referred to this incidentally or expressly; but the ANIMUS of
Nature in the two half globes of the planet is so momentous a point
of interest to our race, that it should be made a subject of
express and elaborate study. Go out with me into that walk which
we call THE MALL, and look at the English and American elms. The
American elm is tall, graceful, slender-sprayed, and drooping as if
from languor. The English elm is compact, robust, holds its
branches up, and carries its leaves for weeks longer than our own
native tree.
Is this typical of the creative force on the two sides of the
The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen: in spite of every occasional doubt of Willoughby's constancy,
could not witness the rapture of delightful expectation
which filled the whole soul and beamed in the eyes
of Marianne, without feeling how blank was her own prospect,
how cheerless her own state of mind in the comparison,
and how gladly she would engage in the solicitude of
Marianne's situation to have the same animating object
in view, the same possibility of hope. A short, a very
short time however must now decide what Willoughby's
intentions were; in all probability he was already in town.
Marianne's eagerness to be gone declared her dependence
Sense and Sensibility |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Plutarch's Lives by A. H. Clough: into the plain. At the sight of the golden armor glittering in
the sun as they marched down in their order, the elephants with
their castles on their backs, and the men in their purple, as
their manner was when they were going to give battle, the front
stopped their march, and called out for Eumenes, for they would
not advance a step but under his conduct; and fixing their arms
in the ground, gave the word among themselves to stand, requiring
their officers also not to stir or engage or hazard themselves
without Eumenes. News of this being brought to Eumenes, he
hastened those that carried his litter, and drawing back the
curtains on both sides, joyfully put forth his right hand. As
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