| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne: asunder, leaving this great hollow into which human beings were now
penetrating for the first time.
The whole history of the carboniferous period was written upon these
gloomy walls, and a geologist might with ease trace all its diverse
phases. The beds of coal were separated by strata of sandstone or
compact clays, and appeared crushed under the weight of overlying
strata.
At the age of the world which preceded the secondary period, the
earth was clothed with immense vegetable forms, the product of the
double influence of tropical heat and constant moisture; a vapoury
atmosphere surrounded the earth, still veiling the direct rays of the
Journey to the Center of the Earth |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Four Arthurian Romances by Chretien DeTroyes: get no counsel here. Yet it would not be right for me to go away
without taking leave. My sister may know, however, that she
might obtain by kindness whatever she desired of my property; but
I will never surrender my heritage to her by force, if I can help
it, and if I can find any aid or counsel." "You have spoken
wisely," said the King; "since she is present here, I advise,
recommend, and urge her to surrender to you what is your right."
Then the other, who was confident of the best knight in the
world, replied: "Sire, may God confound me, if ever I bestow on
her from my estates any castle, town, clearing, forest, land, or
anything else. But if any knight dares to take arms on her
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Betty Zane by Zane Grey: "I did not ask that," answered Betty, flushing slightly. "But I shall remember
it as a promise and some day I may ask it of you."
He looked wonderingly at the girl beside him. He had spent most of his life
among educated and cultured people. He had passed several years in the
backwoods. But with all his experience with people he had to confess that this
young woman was as a revelation to him. She could ride like an Indian and
shoot like a hunter. He had heard that she could run almost as swiftly as her
brothers. Evidently she feared nothing, for he had just seen an example of her
courage in a deed that had tried even his own nerve, and, withal, she was a
bright, happy girl, earnest and true, possessing all the softer graces of his
sisters, and that exquisite touch of feminine delicacy and refinement which
Betty Zane |
