| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Story of an African Farm by Olive Schreiner: forehead; the other she laid on his heart.
With a cry of suppressed agony Waldo sprung from the bed, flung open the
upper half of the door, and leaned out, breathing heavily.
Great God! it might be only a dream, but the pain was very real, as though
a knife ran through his heart, as though some treacherous murderer crept on
him in the dark! The strong man drew his breath like a frightened woman.
"Only a dream, but the pain was very real," he muttered, as he pressed his
right hand upon his breast. Then he folded his arms on the door, and stood
looking out into the starlight.
The dream was with him still; the woman who was his friend was not
separated from him by years--only that very night he had seen her. He
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Little Rivers by Henry van Dyke: is no interpretation. It is music,--as Sidney Lanier defines it,--
"Love in search of a word."
But it is not only to the real life of birds and flowers that the
little rivers introduce you. They lead you often into familiarity
with human nature in undress, rejoicing in the liberty of old
clothes, or of none at all. People do not mince along the banks of
streams in patent-leather shoes or crepitating silks. Corduroy and
home-spun and flannel are the stuffs that suit this region; and the
frequenters of these paths go their natural gaits, in calf-skin or
rubber boots, or bare-footed. The girdle of conventionality is
laid aside, and the skirts rise with the spirits.
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from On the Duty of Civil Disobedience by Henry David Thoreau: hands of it, and, if he gives it no thought longer, not to
give it practically his support. If I devote myself to
other pursuits and contemplations, I must first see, at
least, that I do not pursue them sitting upon another man's
shoulders. I must get off him first, that he may pursue his
contemplations too. See what gross inconsistency is tolerated.
I have heard some of my townsmen say, "I should like to
have them order me out to help put down an insurrection
of the slaves, or to march to Mexico--see if I would go";
and yet these very men have each, directly by their
allegiance, and so indirectly, at least, by their money,
On the Duty of Civil Disobedience |
