| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from A Woman of No Importance by Oscar Wilde: Stutfield. I have given up trying to reform him. It would take a
Public Company with a Board of Directors and a paid Secretary to do
that. But you have the secretary already, Lord Illingworth,
haven't you? Gerald Arbuthnot has told us of his good fortune; it
is really most kind of you.
LORD ILLINGWORTH. Oh, don't say that, Lady Hunstanton. Kind is a
dreadful word. I took a great fancy to young Arbuthnot the moment
I met him, and he'll be of considerable use to me in something I am
foolish enough to think of doing.
LADY HUNSTANTON. He is an admirable young man. And his mother is
one of my dearest friends. He has just gone for a walk with our
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from God The Invisible King by H. G. Wells: a danger to themselves or others.
The letters that come from such types written during their sane
intervals, are entirely sane. Some, who are probably unaware--I
think they should know--of the offences or possibilities that
justify their incarceration, write with a certain resentment at
their position; others are entirely acquiescent, but one or two
complain of the neglect of friends and relations. But all are as
manifestly capable of religion and of the religious life as any
other intelligent persons during the lucid interludes that make up
nine-tenths perhaps of their lives. . . . Suppose now one of these
cases, and suppose that the infirmity takes the form of some cruel,
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Schoolmistress and Other Stories by Anton Chekhov: "Such trouble!" said the constable, "such trouble! It's a real
affliction. The people are very much upset, your honor; they
haven't slept these three nights. The children are crying. The
cows ought to be milked, but the women won't go to the stall --
they are afraid . . . for fear the gentleman should appear to
them in the darkness. Of course they are silly women, but some of
the men are frightened too. As soon as it is dark they won't go
by the hut one by one, but only in a flock together. And the
witnesses too. . . ."
Dr. Startchenko, a middle-aged man in spectacles with a dark
beard, and the examining magistrate Lyzhin, a fair man, still
The Schoolmistress and Other Stories |
