| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Pupil by Henry James: rejoicing that school was out of the question: in any million of
boys it was probably good for all but one, and Morgan was that
millionth. It would have made him comparative and superior - it
might have made him really require kicking. Pemberton would try to
be school himself - a bigger seminary than five hundred grazing
donkeys, so that, winning no prizes, the boy would remain
unconscious and irresponsible and amusing - amusing, because,
though life was already intense in his childish nature, freshness
still made there a strong draught for jokes. It turned out that
even in the still air of Morgan's various disabilities jokes
flourished greatly. He was a pale lean acute undeveloped little
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Enemies of Books by William Blades: combined with artistic skill, is everywhere apparent. You open
the cover and find the same loving attention inside that has been
given to the outside, all the workmanship being true and thorough.
Indeed, so conservative is a good binding, that many a worthless
book has had an honoured old age, simply out of respect to its
outward aspect; and many a real treasure has come to a degraded end
and premature death through the unsightliness of its outward case
and the irreparable damage done to it in binding.
The weapon with which the binder deals the most deadly blows to books
is the "plough," the effect of which is to cut away the margins,
placing the print in a false position relatively to the back and head,
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Fables by Robert Louis Stevenson: tended his ulcer without complaint. But he loved the less to be
deceived or to see others cheated. He began to lie in wait for
heathen travellers, at covert parts of the road, and in the dusk of
the day, so that he might speak with them unseen; and these were
greatly taken with their wayside questioner, and told him things of
weight. The wearing of gyves (they said) was no command of
Jupiter's. It was the contrivance of a white-faced thing, a
sorcerer, that dwelt in that country in the Wood of Eld. He was
one like Glaucus that could change his shape, yet he could be
always told; for when he was crossed, he gobbled like a turkey. He
had three lives; but the third smiting would make an end of him
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