| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from A Princess of Parms by Edgar Rice Burroughs: "The great waterway which leads to Helium is but fifty
miles to the south," murmured Sola, half to herself; "a
swift thoat might make it in three hours; and then to
Helium it is five hundred miles, most of the way through
thinly settled districts. They would know and they would
follow us. We might hide among the great trees for a time,
but the chances are small indeed for escape. They would
follow us to the very gates of Helium, and they would take
toll of life at every step; you do not know them."
"Is there no other way we might reach Helium?" I asked.
"Can you not draw me a rough map of the country we
|
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Red Badge of Courage by Stephen Crane: for an instant. "Well," he said, "I had to order
in th' 12th to help th' 76th, an' I haven't really got
any. But there's th' 304th. They fight like a
lot 'a mule drivers. I can spare them best
of any."
The youth and his friend exchanged glances
of astonishment.
The general spoke sharply. "Get 'em ready,
then. I'll watch developments from here, an'
send you word when t' start them. It'll happen
in five minutes."
The Red Badge of Courage |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Muse of the Department by Honore de Balzac: for her cleverness by the most gentlemanly men of the place,
encouraged their admiration by conversations, for which it was
subsequently asserted, she prepared herself beforehand. Finding
herself listened to with rapture, she soon began to listen to herself,
enjoyed haranguing her audience, and at last regarded her friends as
the chorus in a tragedy, there only to give her her cues. In fact, she
had a very fine collection of phrases and ideas, derived either from
books or by assimilating the opinions of her companions, and thus
became a sort of mechanical instrument, going off on a round of
phrases as soon as some chance remark released the spring. To do her
justice, Dinah was choke full of knowledge, and read everything, even
The Muse of the Department |
