| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Death of the Lion by Henry James: a story as strange to me, and as beguiling, as some tale in the
Arabian Nights. Thus it was that my informant had encumbered
herself with the ponderous tome; but she hastened to assure me that
this was the first time she had brought it out. For her visit to
Mr. Paraday it had simply been a pretext. She didn't really care a
straw that he should write his name; what she did want was to look
straight into his face.
I demurred a little. "And why do you require to do that?"
"Because I just love him!" Before I could recover from the
agitating effect of this crystal ring my companion had continued:
"Hasn't there ever been any face that you've wanted to look into?"
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Frances Waldeaux by Rebecca Davis: trembling lips. "I ought to have seen it at first.
Those luring, terrible eyes. It is Pauline Felix's heart
that is in her. Rotten to the core--rotten----"
"I don't care. I'll stand by her." But George's face,
too, began to lose its color. He shook himself
uncomfortably. "The thing's done now," he muttered.
"Certainly, certainly," Frances repeated mechanically.
"Tell her that I am sorry I spoke of her mother before
her. It was rude--brutal. I ask her pardon."
"Oh, she'll soon forget that! Lisa has a warm heart, if
you take her right. There's lots of hearty fun in her
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Reason Discourse by Rene Descartes: much more truth in the reasonings of each individual with reference to the
affairs in which he is personally interested, and the issue of which must
presently punish him if he has judged amiss, than in those conducted by a
man of letters in his study, regarding speculative matters that are of no
practical moment, and followed by no consequences to himself, farther,
perhaps, than that they foster his vanity the better the more remote they
are from common sense; requiring, as they must in this case, the exercise
of greater ingenuity and art to render them probable. In addition, I had
always a most earnest desire to know how to distinguish the true from the
false, in order that I might be able clearly to discriminate the right
path in life, and proceed in it with confidence.
Reason Discourse |
