| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Troll Garden and Selected Stories by Willa Cather: the world. He had made himself so agreeable that old Mrs.
Ericson's friends began to come up to her and tell how lucky she
was to get her smart son back again, and please to get him to play
his flute. Joe Vavrika, who could still play very well when he
forgot that he had rheumatism, caught up a fiddle from Johnny
Oleson and played a crazy Bohemian dance tune that set the wheels
going. When he dropped the bow every one was ready to dance.
Olaf, in a frock coat and a solemn made-up necktie, led the grand
march with his mother. Clara had kept well out of that
by sticking to the piano. She played the march with a pompous
solemnity which greatly amused the prodigal son, who went over and
The Troll Garden and Selected Stories |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Lin McLean by Owen Wister: galloping among them, his spurred and booted kindred. And his manner took
on that alertness a horse shows on turning into the home road. As the
stage took him toward Washakie, old friends turned up every fifty miles
or so, shambling out of a cabin or a stable, and saying, in casual tones,
"Hello, Lin, where've you been at?"
At Lander, there got into the stage another old acquaintance, the Bishop
of Wyoming. He knew Lin at once, and held out his hand, and his greeting
was hearty.
"It took a week for my robes to catch up with me," he said, laughing.
Then, in a little while, "How was the East?"
"First-rate," said Lin, not looking at him. He was shy of the
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Sesame and Lilies by John Ruskin: accumulated wealth would have re-asserted itself in some other
article, or some other imaginary sign. There is only one cure for
public distress--and that is public education, directed to make men
thoughtful, merciful, and just. There are, indeed, many laws
conceivable which would gradually better and strengthen the national
temper; but, for the most part, they are such as the national temper
must be much bettered before it would bear. A nation in its youth
may be helped by laws, as a weak child by backboards, but when it is
old it cannot that way strengthen its crooked spine.
And besides; the problem of land, at its worst, is a bye one;
distribute the earth as you will, the principal question remains
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