| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Soul of Man by Oscar Wilde: moment. It was a fatal day when the public discovered that the pen
is mightier than the paving-stone, and can be made as offensive as
the brickbat. They at once sought for the journalist, found him,
developed him, and made him their industrious and well-paid
servant. It is greatly to be regretted, for both their sakes.
Behind the barricade there may be much that is noble and heroic.
But what is there behind the leading-article but prejudice,
stupidity, cant, and twaddle? And when these four are joined
together they make a terrible force, and constitute the new
authority.
In old days men had the rack. Now they have the press. That is an
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Wheels of Chance by H. G. Wells: fresh developments through their activities for the next eight
hours or more. They are both sleeping healthily you will perhaps
be astonished to hear. Here is the girl--what girls are coming to
nowadays only Mrs. Lynn Linton can tell!--in company with an
absolute stranger, of low extraction and uncertain accent,
unchaperoned and unabashed; indeed, now she fancies she is safe,
she is, if anything, a little proud of her own share in these
transactions. Then this Mr. Hoopdriver of yours, roseate idiot
that he is! is in illegal possession of a stolen bicycle, a
stolen young lady, and two stolen names, established with them in
an hotel that is quite beyond his means, and immensely proud of
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from A House of Pomegranates by Oscar Wilde: 'Tell me how I may do it, and lo! it shall be done.'
'Alas! I know not,' said the little Mermaid: 'the Sea-folk have
no souls.' And she sank down into the deep, looking wistfully at
him.
Now early on the next morning, before the sun was the span of a
man's hand above the hill, the young Fisherman went to the house of
the Priest and knocked three times at the door.
The novice looked out through the wicket, and when he saw who it
was, he drew back the latch and said to him, 'Enter.'
And the young Fisherman passed in, and knelt down on the sweet-
smelling rushes of the floor, and cried to the Priest who was
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