| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Washington Irving: his path; and if, by chance, a huge blockhead of a beetle came
winging his blundering flight against him, the poor varlet was
ready to give up the ghost, with the idea that he was struck with
a witch's token. His only resource on such occasions, either to
drown thought or drive away evil spirits, was to sing psalm tunes
and the good people of Sleepy Hollow, as they sat by their doors
of an evening, were often filled with awe at hearing his nasal
melody, "in linked sweetness long drawn out," floating from the
distant hill, or along the dusky road.
Another of his sources of fearful pleasure was to pass long
winter evenings with the old Dutch wives, as they sat spinning by
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Soul of Man by Oscar Wilde: you, that you will find what you really are, and what you really
want.' To his own friends he says the same thing. He tells them
to be themselves, and not to be always worrying about other things.
What do other things matter? Man is complete in himself. When
they go into the world, the world will disagree with them. That is
inevitable. The world hates Individualism. But that is not to
trouble them. They are to be calm and self-centred. If a man
takes their cloak, they are to give him their coat, just to show
that material things are of no importance. If people abuse them,
they are not to answer back. What does it signify? The things
people say of a man do not alter a man. He is what he is. Public
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from At the Earth's Core by Edgar Rice Burroughs: but whither to flee was indeed a momentous question.
The speed of the fellow seemed to preclude the possibility
of escaping him upon the open beach. There was but a
single alternative--the rude skiff--and with a celerity
which equaled his, I pushed the thing into the sea and
as it floated gave a final shove and clambered in over the end.
A cry of rage rose from the owner of the primitive craft,
and an instant later his heavy, stone-tipped spear grazed
my shoulder and buried itself in the bow of the boat beyond.
Then I grasped the paddle, and with feverish haste urged
the awkward, wobbly thing out upon the surface of the sea.
At the Earth's Core |
