| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Frankenstein by Mary Shelley: happiness or misery. Urged by this view, I refused, and I did
right in refusing, to create a companion for the first creature.
He showed unparalleled malignity and selfishness in evil;
he destroyed my friends; he devoted to destruction beings who
possessed exquisite sensations, happiness, and wisdom; nor do I
know where this thirst for vengeance may end. Miserable himself
that he may render no other wretched, he ought to die.
The task of his destruction was mine, but I have failed.
When actuated by selfish and vicious motives, I asked you
to undertake my unfinished work, and I renew this request now,
when I am only induced by reason and virtue.
Frankenstein |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Lay Morals by Robert Louis Stevenson: part, that he did not fear to raise a laugh; indeed, he
feared nothing, and said anything; and he was greatly served
in this by a certain rustic privilege of his style, which,
like the talk of strong uneducated men, when it does not
impress by its force, still charms by its simplicity. The
mere story and the allegorical design enjoyed perhaps his
equal favour. He believed in both with an energy of faith
that was capable of moving mountains. And we have to remark
in him, not the parts where inspiration fails and is supplied
by cold and merely decorative invention, but the parts where
faith has grown to be credulity, and his characters become so
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Works of Samuel Johnson by Samuel Johnson: deferred the principal purpose of their lives to the
time when life itself was to forsake them.
It is not only uncertain, whether, through all the
casualties and dangers which beset the life of man,
we shall be able to reach the time appointed for
happiness or wisdom; but it is likely, that whatever
now hinders us from doing that which our reason
and conscience declare necessary to be done, will
equally obstruct us in times to come. It is easy for
the imagination, operating on things not yet existing,
to please itself with scenes of unmingled felicity,
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