| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Juana by Honore de Balzac: room breathing the very spirit of the middle-ages, with smoky old
pictures, old tapestries, antique "brazero," a plumed hat hanging to a
nail, the musket of the guerrillas, and the cloak of Bartholo. The
kitchen adjoined this unique living-room, where the inmates took their
meals and warmed themselves over the dull glow of the brazier, smoking
cigars and discoursing bitterly to animate all hearts with hatred
against the French. Silver pitchers and precious dishes of plate and
porcelain adorned a buttery shelf of the old fashion. But the light,
sparsely admitted, allowed these dazzling objects to show but
slightly; all things, as in pictures of the Dutch school, looked
brown, even the faces. Between the shop and this living-room, so fine
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Walden by Henry David Thoreau: birds, I silently smiled at my incessant good fortune. As the
sparrow had its trill, sitting on the hickory before my door, so had
I my chuckle or suppressed warble which he might hear out of my
nest. My days were not days of the week, bearing the stamp of any
heathen deity, nor were they minced into hours and fretted by the
ticking of a clock; for I lived like the Puri Indians, of whom it is
said that "for yesterday, today, and tomorrow they have only one
word, and they express the variety of meaning by pointing backward
for yesterday forward for tomorrow, and overhead for the passing
day." This was sheer idleness to my fellow-townsmen, no doubt; but
if the birds and flowers had tried me by their standard, I should
Walden |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from 1492 by Mary Johntson: within the bight.
The next day, an hour before noon, arrived that king
hurricane.
They are known now, these storms of Europe's west and
Asia's east. Take all our Mediterranean storms and heap
them into one!
Through the day our anchors held in our Bay of Comfort,
and we blessed our Admiral. But at eve the _Margarita_,
the _Juana_ and the _San Sebastian_ lost bottom, feared breaking
against the rocky shore and stood out for sea room. The
_Consolacion_ stayed fast, and at dawn was woe to see noth-
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