| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Vailima Prayers & Sabbath Morn by Robert Louis Stevenson: fortune, and, down to the gates of death, loyal and loving one to
another. As the clay to the potter, as the windmill to the wind,
as children of their sire, we beseech of Thee this help and mercy
for Christ's sake.
FOR GRACE
GRANT that we here before Thee may be set free from the fear of
vicissitude and the fear of death, may finish what remains before
us of our course without dishonour to ourselves or hurt to others,
and, when the day comes, may die in peace. Deliver us from fear
and favour: from mean hopes and cheap pleasures. Have mercy on
each in his deficiency; let him be not cast down; support the
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Jolly Corner by Henry James: who looked young through successful indifference with her precious
reference, above all, to memories and histories into which he could
enter, she was as exquisite for him as some pale pressed flower (a
rarity to begin with), and, failing other sweetnesses, she was a
sufficient reward of his effort. They had communities of
knowledge, "their" knowledge (this discriminating possessive was
always on her lips) of presences of the other age, presences all
overlaid, in his case, by the experience of a man and the freedom
of a wanderer, overlaid by pleasure, by infidelity, by passages of
life that were strange and dim to her, just by "Europe" in short,
but still unobscured, still exposed and cherished, under that pious
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Underdogs by Mariano Azuela: mesquites are still a long way off and there are no tele-
graph poles to hang you to!"
Blondie pulled his gun out, pressed the muzzle against
the prisoner's chest and brought his finger against the
trigger slowly . . . slowly. . . . The prisoner turned pale
as a corpse; his face lengthened; his eyelids were fixed
in a glassy stare. He breathed in agony, his whole body
shook as with ague. Blondie kept his gun in the same
position for a moment long as all eternity. His eyes
shone queerly. An expression of supreme pleasure lit up
his fat puffy face.
The Underdogs |
