| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Muse of the Department by Honore de Balzac: fervor of an improvised passion, to which everything was unpropitious.
" ' "And what is it?"
" ' "That you will never attempt to find out whose servant I am. If I
am to go to you, it must be at night, and you must receive me in the
dark."
" ' "Very good," said I.
" 'We had got as far as this, when the carriage drew up under a garden
wall.
" ' "You must allow me to bandage your eyes," said the maid. "You can
lean on my arm, and I will lead you."
" 'She tied a handkerchief over my eyes, fastening it in a tight knot
The Muse of the Department |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Mansion by Henry van Dyke: furriers,
the makers of rare and costly antiquities, retail traders in
luxuries of life, were beneath the notice of a house that had its
foundations in the high finance, and was built literally and
figuratively
in the shadow of St. Petronius' Church.
At the same time there was something self-pleased and
congratulatory in
the way in which the mansion held its own amid the changing
neighborhood.
It almost seemed to be lifted up a little, among the tall
|
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from On Horsemanship by Xenophon: then beat out the dust, following the lie of the hair. The hair on the
spine (and dorsal region) ought not to be touched with any instrument
whatever; the hand alone should be used to rub and smooth it, and in
the direction of its natural growth, so as to preserve from injury
that part of the horse's back on which the rider sits.
The head should be drenched with water simply; for, being bony, if you
try to cleanse it with iron or wooden instruments injury may be
caused. So, too, the forelock should be merely wetted; the long hairs
of which it is composed, without hindering the animal's vision, serve
to scare away from the eyes anything that might trouble them.
Providence, we must suppose,[6] bestowed these hairs upon the horse,
On Horsemanship |
