| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte: Adele's part to be supported by me, nor do I now acknowledge any,
for I am not her father; but hearing that she was quite destitute, I
e'en took the poor thing out of the slime and mud of Paris, and
transplanted it here, to grow up clean in the wholesome soil of an
English country garden. Mrs. Fairfax found you to train it; but now
you know that it is the illegitimate offspring of a French opera-
girl, you will perhaps think differently of your post and protegee:
you will be coming to me some day with notice that you have found
another place--that you beg me to look out for a new governess, &c.-
-Eh?"
"No: Adele is not answerable for either her mother's faults or
Jane Eyre |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Gorgias by Plato: SOCRATES: He, then, has the first place in the scale of happiness who has
never had vice in his soul; for this has been shown to be the greatest of
evils.
POLUS: Clearly.
SOCRATES: And he has the second place, who is delivered from vice?
POLUS: True.
SOCRATES: That is to say, he who receives admonition and rebuke and
punishment?
POLUS: Yes.
SOCRATES: Then he lives worst, who, having been unjust, has no deliverance
from injustice?
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Life on the Mississippi by Mark Twain: that dead-bell rang out a blood-curdling alarum over my head!
The shock of it nearly paralyzed me; for it was the first time I had
ever heard it.
I gathered myself together and flew to the corpse-room. About midway
down the outside rank, a shrouded figure was sitting upright,
wagging its head slowly from one side to the other--a grisly spectacle!
Its side was toward me. I hurried to it and peered into its face.
Heavens, it was Adler!
Can you divine what my first thought was? Put into words,
it was this: 'It seems, then, you escaped me once:
there will be a different result this time!'
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