| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Island of Doctor Moreau by H. G. Wells: give my right hand to forget; but they do not help the telling of
the story.
In the retrospect it is strange to remember how soon I fell
in with these monsters' ways, and gained my confidence again.
I had my quarrels with them of course, and could show some of
their teeth-marks still; but they soon gained a wholesome respect
for my trick of throwing stones and for the bite of my hatchet.
And my Saint-Bernard-man's loyalty was of infinite service to me.
I found their simple scale of honour was based mainly on the capacity
for inflicting trenchant wounds. Indeed, I may say--without vanity,
I hope--that I held something like pre-eminence among them.
The Island of Doctor Moreau |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Touchstone by Edith Wharton: blossomed into dividends, and a golden harvest awaited his sickle.
He glanced at his wife with the tranquil air of the man who
digests good luck as naturally as the dry ground absorbs a shower.
"Things are looking uncommonly well. I believe we shall be able
to go to town for two or three months next winter if we can find
something cheap."
She smiled luxuriously: it was pleasant to be able to say, with an
air of balancing relative advantages, "Really, on the baby's
account I shall be almost sorry; but if we do go, there's Kate
Erskine's house . . . she'll let us have it for almost nothing. . . ."
"Well, write her about it," he recommended, his eyes travelling on
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from In the South Seas by Robert Louis Stevenson: head, a meerschaum pipe in his mouth, a wife stretched at his back
with custody of the matches and tobacco. Twenty or thirty feet in
front of him the bulk of the workers squatted on the ground; some
of the bush here survived and in this the commons sat nearly to
their shoulders, and presented only an arc of brown faces, black
heads, and attentive eyes fixed on his majesty. Long pauses
reigned, during which the subjects stared and the king smoked.
Then Tembinok' would raise his voice and speak shrilly and briefly.
There was never a response in words; but if the speech were
jesting, there came by way of answer discreet, obsequious laughter
- such laughter as we hear in schoolrooms; and if it were
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