| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Maggie: A Girl of the Streets by Stephen Crane: a conclusion that his sister would have been more firmly good had
she better known why. However, he felt that he could not hold such
a view. He threw it hastily aside.
Chapter XIV
In a hilarious hall there were twenty-eight tables and twenty-
eight women and a crowd of smoking men. Valiant noise was made on
a stage at the end of the hall by an orchestra composed of men who
looked as if they had just happened in. Soiled waiters ran to and
fro, swooping down like hawks on the unwary in the throng;
clattering along the aisles with trays covered with glasses;
stumbling over women's skirts and charging two prices for
 Maggie: A Girl of the Streets |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Tragedy of Pudd'nhead Wilson by Mark Twain: her baby layin' aroun' one day, en went out callin'; an one 'o de
niggers roun'bout de place dat was 'mos' white, she come in en see de
chile layin' aroun', en tuck en put her own chile's clo's on
de queen's chile, en put de queen's chile's clo'es on her own chile,
en den lef' her own chile layin' aroun', en tuck en toted de queen's
chile home to de nigger quarter, en nobody ever foun' it out,
en her chile was de king bimeby, en sole de queen's chile down de
river one time when dey had to settle up de estate. Dah, now--de preacher
said it his own self, en it ain't no sin, 'ca'se white folks done it.
DEY done it--yes, DEY done it; en not on'y jis' common white folks nuther,
but de biggest quality dey is in de whole bilin'. _Oh_, I's _so_ glad I
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Memories and Portraits by Robert Louis Stevenson: then to look forward to the grave, so far it seems now to look
backward upon these emotions; so hard to recall justly that loath
submission, as of the sacrificial bull, with which we stooped our
necks under the yoke of destiny. I met my old companion but the
other day; I cannot tell of course what he was thinking; but, upon
my part, I was wondering to see us both so much at home, and so
composed and sedentary in the world; and how much we had gained,
and how much we had lost, to attain to that composure; and which
had been upon the whole our best estate: when we sat there prating
sensibly like men of some experience, or when we shared our
timorous and hopeful counsels in a western islet.
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