| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from In Darkest England and The Way Out by General William Booth: it is only stubborn, reckless perseverance that can hope to succeed;
it is well that we recognise this. How many ages did men try to make
gunpowder and never succeeded? They would put saltpetre to charcoal,
or charcoal to sulphur, or saltpetre to sulphur, and so were ever
unable to make the compound explode. But it has only been discovered
within the last few hundred years that all three were needed.
Before that gunpowder was a mere imagination, a phantasy of the
alchemists. How easy it is to make gunpowder, now the secret of its
manufacture is known!
But take a simpler illustration, one which lies even within the memory
of some that read these pages. From the beginning of the world down to
In Darkest England and The Way Out |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Paz by Honore de Balzac: "Oh! his name is Thaddeus, is it?"
"Yes; Thaddeus folded the paper and gave it back to me, and then he
said: 'I thought, Adam, that we were one for life or death, and that
we should never part. Do you want to be rid of me?' 'Oh!' I said, 'if
you take it that way, Thaddeus, don't let us say another word about
it. If I ruin myself you shall be ruined too.' 'You haven't fortune
enough to live as a Laginski should,' he said, 'and you need a friend
who will take care of your affairs, and be a father and a brother and
a trusty confidant.' My dear child, as Paz said that he had in his
look and voice, calm as they were, a maternal emotion, and also the
gratitude of an Arab, the fidelity of a dog, the friendship of a
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson by Robert Louis Stevenson: sympathy. It is a good thing to be a good man, whether deaf or
whether dumb; and of all our fellow-craftsmen (whom yet they count
a jealous race), I never knew one but gave you the name of honesty
and kindness: come to think of it gravely, this is better than the
finest hearing. We are all on the march to deafness, blindness,
and all conceivable and fatal disabilities; we shall not all get
there with a report so good. My good news is a health
astonishingly reinstated. This climate; these voyagings; these
landfalls at dawn; new islands peaking from the morning bank; new
forested harbours; new passing alarms of squalls and surf; new
interests of gentle natives, - the whole tale of my life is better
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