| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Cavalry General by Xenophon: roads where numbers are no advantage. Again, in the passage of rivers,
defiles, and the like, it is possible for a general with a head on his
shoulders to hang on the heels of an enemy in security, and to
determine with precision[11] the exact number of the enemy he will
care to deal with. Occasionally the fine chance occurs to atack the
foe while encamping or breakfasting or supping, or as the men turn out
of bed: seasons at which the soldier is apt to be unharnessed--the
hoplite for a shorter, the cavalry trooper for a longer period.[12]
[11] See "Anab." II. v. 18; "Cyrop." III. iii. 47; IV. i. 18.
{tamieusasthai}, "with the precision of a controller."
[12] Cf. "Hell." II. iv. 6; VII. i. 16.
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Altar of the Dead by Henry James: on her leaving him, not a little agitated by this sudden
liberality. She wasn't a person with whom, after all, one got on
so very fast: it had taken him months and months to learn her
name, years and years to learn her address. If she had looked, on
this reunion, so much older to him, how in the world did he look to
her? She had reached the period of life he had long since reached,
when, after separations, the marked clock-face of the friend we
meet announces the hour we have tried to forget. He couldn't have
said what he expected as, at the end of his waiting, he turned the
corner where for years he had always paused; simply not to pause
was a efficient cause for emotion. It was an event, somehow; and
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Heart of the West by O. Henry: the sentiment, but they'd compile into a cook book that would sell
into the millions.
"I guess I must have had my conscience pretty well inflicted with
culinary meditations, for, without intending to do so, I says, out
loud, to the imaginary waiter, 'Cut it thick and have it rare, with
the French fried, and six, soft-scrambled, on toast.'
"Mame turned her head quick as a wing. Her eyes were sparkling and she
smiled sudden.
"'Medium for me,' she rattles out, 'with the Juliennes, and three,
straight up. Draw one, and brown the wheats, double order to come. Oh,
Jeff, wouldn't it be glorious! And then I'd like to have a half fry,
Heart of the West |
