| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Mirror of the Sea by Joseph Conrad: is done only to spite his kingly brother of the West. We gazed
helplessly at the systematic, cold, gray-eyed obstinacy of the
Easterly weather, while short rations became the order of the day,
and the pinch of hunger under the breast-bone grew familiar to
every sailor in that held-up fleet. Every day added to our
numbers. In knots and groups and straggling parties we flung to
and fro before the closed gate. And meantime the outward-bound
ships passed, running through our humiliated ranks under all the
canvas they could show. It is my idea that the Easterly Wind helps
the ships away from home in the wicked hope that they shall all
come to an untimely end and be heard of no more. For six weeks did
The Mirror of the Sea |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift: exempted. And it would be hard indeed, if so remote a prince's
notions of virtue and vice were to be offered as a standard for
all mankind.
To confirm what I have now said, and further to show the
miserable effects of a confined education, I shall here insert a
passage, which will hardly obtain belief. In hopes to ingratiate
myself further into his majesty's favour, I told him of "an
invention, discovered between three and four hundred years ago,
to make a certain powder, into a heap of which, the smallest
spark of fire falling, would kindle the whole in a moment,
although it were as big as a mountain, and make it all fly up in
Gulliver's Travels |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Droll Stories, V. 1 by Honore de Balzac: with desire, and spurred by his "alacks" and "alases" which nearly
choked him, glided like an eel into the domicile of the veritable
Queen of the Council--for before her bowed humbly all the authority,
science, and wisdom of Christianity. The major domo did not know him,
and was going to bundle him out again, when one of the chamber-women
called him from the top of the stairs--"Eh M. Imbert, it is Madame's
young fellow," and poor Philippe, blushing like a wedding night, ran
up the stairs, shaking with happiness and delight. The servant took
him by the hand and led into the chamber where sat Madame, lightly
attired like a brave woman who awaits her conqueror.
The dazzling Imperia was seated near a table covered with a shaggy
Droll Stories, V. 1 |
