| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Chance by Joseph Conrad: believe caution to be the first duty of sagacity. Fyne sat down as
if preparing himself to witness a joust, I thought.
"Do you think so, Mrs. Fyne?" I said sagaciously. "Of course you
are in a position . . . " I was continuing with caution when she
struck out vivaciously for immediate assent.
"Obviously! Clearly! You yourself must admit . . . "
"But, Mrs. Fyne," I remonstrated, "you forget that I don't know your
brother."
This argument which was not only sagacious but true, overwhelmingly
true, unanswerably true, seemed to surprise her.
I wondered why. I did not know enough of her brother for the
Chance |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Country Doctor by Honore de Balzac: better half, so to speak, for the two have taken up house together.
They both lodge with a peddler's widow, and make over their money to
her. She is a kind soul, who boards them and looks after them, and
their clothes as if they were her children.
"In his quality of local postman, Goguelat carries all the news of the
countryside, and a good deal of practice acquired in this way has made
him an orator in great request at up-sittings, and the champion teller
of stories in the district. Gondrin looks upon him as a very knowing
fellow, and something of a wit; and whenever Goguelat talks about
Napoleon, his comrade seems to understand what he is saying from the
movement of his lips. There will be an up-sitting (as they call it) in
|
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Washington Irving: plied her spinning-wheel at one end of the piazza, honest Balt
would sit smoking his evening pipe at the other, watching the
achievements of a little wooden warrior, who, armed with a sword
in each hand, was most valiantly fighting the wind on the
pinnacle of the barn. In the mean time, Ichabod would carry on
his suit with the daughter by the side of the spring under the
great elm, or sauntering along in the twilight, that hour so
favorable to the lover's eloquence.
I profess not to know how women's hearts are wooed and won.
To me they have always been matters of riddle and admiration.
Some seem to have but one vulnerable point, or door of access;
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow |
