| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from American Notes by Rudyard Kipling: ferocity of the pagan.
The Italian reconstructs his friend with a long knife. The press
complains of the waywardness of the alien.
The Irishman and the native Californian in their hours of
discontent use the revolver, not once, but six times. The press
records the fact, and asks in the next column whether the world
can parallel the progress of San Francisco. The American who
loves his country will tell you that this sort of thing is
confined to the lower classes. Just at present an ex-judge who
was sent to jail by another judge (upon my word I cannot tell
whether these titles mean anything) is breathing red-hot
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from La Grande Breteche by Honore de Balzac: She must have suffered much! There was joy in her last glance, and it
remained stamped on her dead eyes.
" 'I brought away the will, and when it was opened I found that Madame
de Merret had appointed me her executor. She left the whole of her
property to the hospital at Vendome excepting a few legacies. But
these were her instructions as relating to la Grande Breteche: She
ordered me to leave the place, for fifty years counting from the day
of her death, in the state in which it might be at the time of her
death, forbidding any one, whoever he might be, to enter the
apartments, prohibiting any repairs whatever, and even settling a
salary to pay watchmen if it were needful to secure the absolute
La Grande Breteche |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Maria, or the Wrongs of Woman by Mary Wollstonecraft: Her husband was 'pot-valiant,' he feared her not at the moment,
nor had he then much reason, for she instantly turned the whole
force of her anger another way. She tore off my cap, scratched,
kicked, and buffetted me, till she had exhausted her strength,
declaring, as she rested her arm, 'that I had wheedled her husband
from her.--But, could any thing better be expected from a wretch,
whom she had taken into her house out of pure charity?' What a
torrent of abuse rushed out? till, almost breathless, she concluded
with saying, 'that I was born a strumpet; it ran in my blood,
and nothing good could come to those who harboured me.'
"My situation was, of course, discovered, and she declared
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