| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood by Howard Pyle: "Only this," quoth Robin; "that thou wilt let me blow thrice upon
my bugle horn."
The Friar bent his brows and looked shrewdly at Robin Hood. "Now I
do verily think that thou hast some cunning trick in this," quoth he.
"Ne'ertheless, I fear thee not, and will let thee have thy wish,
providing thou wilt also let me blow thrice upon this little whistle."
"With all my heart," quoth Robin, "so, here goes for one."
So saying, he raised his silver horn to his lips and blew thrice
upon it, clear and high.
Meantime, the Friar stood watching keenly for what might come
to pass, holding in his fingers the while a pretty silver whistle,
The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from What is Man? by Mark Twain: Poor old dying John of Gaunt volleying second-rate puns at his
own name, is a pathetic instance of it. "We may assume" that it is
Bacon's fault, but the Stratford Shakespeare has to bear the blame.
No imagination was ever at once so strong and so thoroughly
subjugated. It stopped at the first check from good sense.
In truth, much of Bacon's life was passed in a visionary world--
amid things as strange as any that are described in the ARABIAN TALES
. . . amid buildings more sumptuous than the palace of Aladdin,
fountains more wonderful than the golden water of Parizade,
conveyances more rapid than the hippogryph of Ruggiero, arms more
formidable than the lance of Astolfo, remedies more effacious
What is Man? |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Life on the Mississippi by Mark Twain: When the negro steersman sits on one end of it, that end tilts down near
the ground, while the other sticks up high in air. This great see-saw goes
rolling and pitching like a ship at sea, and it is not every circus rider
that could stay on it.
The plantation contains two thousand six hundred acres;
six hundred and fifty are in cane; and there is a fruitful
orange grove of five thousand trees. The cane is
cultivated after a modern and intricate scientific fashion,
too elaborate and complex for me to attempt to describe;
but it lost $40,000 last year. I forget the other details.
However, this year's crop will reach ten or twelve hundred
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