| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Gobseck by Honore de Balzac: bare outlines of the form beneath. She wore a loose gown trimmed with
snowy ruffles, which told plainly that her laundress' bills amounted
to something like two thousand francs in the course of a year. Her
dark curls escaped from beneath a bright Indian handkerchief, knotted
carelessly about her head after the fashion of Creole women. The bed
lay in disorder that told of broken slumber. A painter would have paid
money to stay a while to see the scene that I saw. Under the luxurious
hanging draperies, the pillow, crushed into the depths of an eider-
down quilt, its lace border standing out in contrast against the
background of blue silk, bore a vague impress that kindled the
imagination. A pair of satin slippers gleamed from the great bear-skin
Gobseck |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Within the Tides by Joseph Conrad: immobility, extended on his back, he seemed to preserve an austere
silence, as if disdaining in the finality of his awful knowledge to
hold converse with the living.
Suddenly Byrne flung himself on his knees by the side of the body,
and dry-eyed, fierce, opened the shirt wide on the breast, as if to
tear the secret forcibly from that cold heart which had been so
loyal to him in life! Nothing! Nothing! He raised the lamp, and
all the sign vouchsafed to him by that face which used to be so
kindly in expression was a small bruise on the forehead - the least
thing, a mere mark. The skin even was not broken. He stared at it
a long time as if lost in a dreadful dream. Then he observed that
Within the Tides |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Devil's Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce: _Biography of Bishop Potter_
HONORABLE, adj. Afflicted with an impediment in one's reach. In
legislative bodies it is customary to mention all members as
honorable; as, "the honorable gentleman is a scurvy cur."
HOPE, n. Desire and expectation rolled into one.
Delicious Hope! when naught to man it left --
Of fortune destitute, of friends bereft;
When even his dog deserts him, and his goat
With tranquil disaffection chews his coat
While yet it hangs upon his back; then thou,
The star far-flaming on thine angel brow,
The Devil's Dictionary |
