| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Rape of Lucrece by William Shakespeare: No more than wax shall be accounted evil,
Wherein is stamp'd the semblance of a devil.
Their smoothness, like a goodly champaign plain,
Lays open all the little worms that creep;
In men, as in a rough-grown grove, remain
Cave-keeping evils that obscurely sleep:
Through crystal walls each little mote will peep:
Though men can cover crimes with bold stern looks,
Poor women's faces are their own faults' books.
No man inveigb against the wither'd flower,
But chide rough winter that the flower hath kill'd!
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Tristram Shandy by Laurence Sterne: reserve it for either of those parts of my story--I ruin the story I'm
upon;--and if I tell it here--I anticipate matters, and ruin it there.
--What would your worship have me to do in this case?
--Tell it, Mr Shandy, by all means.--You are a fool, Tristram, if you do.
O ye powers! (for powers ye are, and great ones too)--which enable mortal
man to tell a story worth the hearing--that kindly shew him, where he is to
begin it--and where he is to end it--what he is to put into it--and what he
is to leave out--how much of it he is to cast into a shade--and whereabouts
he is to throw his light!--Ye, who preside over this vast empire of
biographical freebooters, and see how many scrapes and plunges your
subjects hourly fall into;--will you do one thing?
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Fantastic Fables by Ambrose Bierce: your Majesty, but for the fact that its missiles can be so
effectively averted by my peculiar method of treating the armour
plates with a new- "
The King signed to the Great Head Factotum to approach.
"Search this man," he said, "and report how many pockets he has."
"Forty-three, Sire," said the Great Head Factotum, completing the
scrutiny.
"May it please your Majesty," cried the Ingenious Patriot, in
terror, "one of them contains tobacco."
"Hold him up by the ankles and shake him," said the King; "then
give him a check for forty-two million tumtums and put him to
Fantastic Fables |
