| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from A Pair of Blue Eyes by Thomas Hardy: towards the Puffin steamboat. It had doubled the point, and was
no longer to be seen.
An overwhelming rush of exultation at having delivered the man she
revered from one of the most terrible forms of death, shook the
gentle girl to the centre of her soul. It merged in a defiance of
duty to Stephen, and a total recklessness as to plighted faith.
Every nerve of her will was now in entire subjection to her
feeling--volition as a guiding power had forsaken her. To remain
passive, as she remained now, encircled by his arms, was a
sufficiently complete result--a glorious crown to all the years of
her life. Perhaps he was only grateful, and did not love her. No
A Pair of Blue Eyes |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Kwaidan by Lafcadio Hearn: signify a very considerable amount of physical change. If it be legitimate
to believe in a future humanity to which the pleasure of mutual beneficence
will represent the whole joy of life, would it not also be legitimate to
imagine other transformations, physical and moral, which the facts of
insect-biology have proved to be within the range of evolutional
possibility?... I do not know. I most worshipfully reverence Herbert
Spencer as the greatest philosopher who has yet appeared in this world; and
I should be very sorry to write down anything contrary to his teaching, in
such wise that the reader could imagine it to have been inspired by
Synthetic Philosophy. For the ensuing reflections, I alone am responsible;
and if I err, let the sin be upon my own head.
Kwaidan |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Schoolmistress and Other Stories by Anton Chekhov: had married her to him because they had been attracted by his
handicraft. All the essentials for a happy life had been there,
but the trouble was that, just as he had got drunk after the
wedding and lay sprawling on the stove, so he had gone on without
waking up till now. His wedding he remembered, but of what
happened after the wedding -- for the life of him he could
remember nothing, except perhaps that he had drunk, lain on the
stove, and quarreled. Forty years had been wasted like that.
The white clouds of snow were beginning little by little to turn
gray. It was getting dusk.
"Where am I going?" the turner suddenly bethought him with a
The Schoolmistress and Other Stories |
