| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Mistress Wilding by Rafael Sabatini: Then Blake paused, stepped back, returned his sword to its scabbard, and
bending himself - but whether to bow or not was not quite plain - he
took some paces backwards, then turned and went out by the window as he
had come. But there was a sudden purposefulness in the way he did it
that might have warned them this withdrawal was not quite the retreat
it seemed.
They watched him with many emotions, predominant among which was relief,
and when he was gone Diana rose and came to Ruth.
"Come," she said, and sought to lead her from the room.
But there was Richard now to be reckoned with, Richard from whom the
palsy was of a sudden fallen, now that the cause of it had withdrawn.
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Young Forester by Zane Grey: struck by lightning."
"Now, how do you make that out?" asked father, intensely interested.
"See the free, wide rings from the pith out to about number forty-five. The
tree was healthy up to that time. Then it met with an injury of some kind,
as is indicated by this black scar. After that the rings grew narrower. The
tree struggled to live."
We walked on with me talking as fast as I could get the words out. I showed
father a giant, bushy chestnut which was dominating all the trees around
it, and told him how it retarded their growth. On the other hand, the other
trees were absorbing nutrition from the ground that would have benefited
the chestnut.
The Young Forester |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Touchstone by Edith Wharton: Second edition ready next week. THE BOOK OF THE YEAR. . . ."
He looked up stupidly. His wife still sat with her head thrown
back, her pure profile detached against the cushions. She was
smiling a little over the prospect his last words had opened.
Behind her head shivers of sun and shade ran across the striped
awning. A row of maples and a privet hedge hid their neighbor's
gables, giving them undivided possession of their leafy half-acre;
and life, a moment before, had been like their plot of ground,
shut off, hedged in from importunities, impenetrably his and hers.
Now it seemed to him that every maple-leaf, every privet-bud, was
a relentless human gaze, pressing close upon their privacy. It
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