| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Almayer's Folly by Joseph Conrad: Almayer ceased his mumbling and opened his eyes. He caught hold
of his daughter's hand and pressed it to his face, while Nina
with the other hand smoothed his rumpled grey hair, looking
defiantly over her father's head at the officer, who had now
regained his composure and returned her look with a cool, steady
stare. Below, in front of the verandah, they could hear the
tramp of seamen mustering there according to orders. The
sub-lieutenant came up the steps, while Babalatchi stood up
uneasily and, with finger on lip, tried to catch Nina's eye.
"You are a good girl," whispered Almayer, absently, dropping his
daughter's hand.
Almayer's Folly |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Commission in Lunacy by Honore de Balzac: startled animal, with his left hand in his pocket, and the right hand
holding a hat with a greasy lining, the Marquise gave Rastignac a look
wherein lay a germ of mockery. The good man's rather foolish
appearance was so completely in harmony with his grotesque figure and
scared looks, that Rastignac, catching sight of Bianchon's dejected
expression of humiliation through his uncle, could not help laughing,
and turned away. The Marquise bowed a greeting, and made a great
effort to rise from her seat, falling back again, not without grace,
with an air of apologizing for her incivility by affected weakness.
At this instant the person who was standing between the fireplace and
the door bowed slightly, and pushed forward two chairs, which he
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin by Benjamin Franklin: of state on any occasion; and I was a good deal chagrin'd at
their appearance, as I could not avoid their accompanying me.
What made it worse was, that, as soon as we began to move,
they drew their swords and rode with them naked all the way.
Somebody wrote an account of this to the proprietor, and it gave him
great offense. No such honor had been paid him when in the province,
nor to any of his governors; and he said it was only proper to
princes of the blood royal, which may be true for aught I know,
who was, and still am, ignorant of the etiquette in such cases.
This silly affair, however, greatly increased his rancour against me,
which was before not a little, on account of my conduct in the
The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin |
