| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Charmides and Other Poems by Oscar Wilde: Of lone Helvellyn, for this note of strife
Shunned your untroubled crags and crystal rills,
Where is that Spirit which living blamelessly
Yet dared to kiss the smitten mouth of his own century!
Speak ye Rydalian laurels! where is he
Whose gentle head ye sheltered, that pure soul
Whose gracious days of uncrowned majesty
Through lowliest conduct touched the lofty goal
Where love and duty mingle! Him at least
The most high Laws were glad of, he had sat at Wisdom's feast;
But we are Learning's changelings, know by rote
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Just Folks by Edgar A. Guest: Must someone always say to me:
"We caught a bunch here yesterday"?
I am not prone to discontent,
Nor over-zealous now to climb;
If victory is not yet meant
For me I'll calmly bide my time.
But I should like just once to go
Out fishing on some lake or bay
And not have someone mutter: "Oh,
You should have been here yesterday."
The Pup
Just Folks |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe: terrible night together."
The antique volume which I had taken up was the "Mad
Trist" of Sir Launcelot Canning; but I had called it a favourite
of Usher's more in sad jest than in earnest; for, in truth, there
is little in its uncouth and unimaginative prolixity which could
have had interest for the lofty and spiritual ideality of my
friend. It was, however, the only book immediately at hand; and
I indulged a vague hope that the excitement which now agitated
the hypochondriac, might find relief (for the history of mental
disorder is full of similar anomalies) even in the extremeness of
the folly which I should read. Could I have judged, indeed, by
The Fall of the House of Usher |
