| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from A Hero of Our Time by M.Y. Lermontov: In my early youth, from the moment I ceased
to be under the guardianship of my relations, I
began madly to enjoy all the pleasures which
money could buy -- and, of course, such pleasures
became irksome to me. Then I launched out
into the world of fashion -- and that, too, soon
palled upon me. I fell in love with fashionable
beauties and was loved by them, but my imagina-
tion and egoism alone were aroused; my heart
remained empty. . . I began to read, to study --
but sciences also became utterly wearisome to me.
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from In the Cage by Henry James: Mrs. Jordan took this in with complete intelligence. "Yes, and I
dare say it's some of your people that I do."
Her companion assented, but discriminated. "I doubt if you 'do'
them as much as I! Their affairs, their appointments and
arrangements, their little games and secrets and vices--those
things all pass before me."
This was a picture that could make a clergyman's widow not
imperceptibly gasp; it was in intention moreover something of a
retort to the thousand tulips. "Their vices? Have they got
vices?"
Our young critic even more overtly stared then with a touch of
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Prince by Nicolo Machiavelli: Enrico, he pressed on in great haste to Pistoia. When the Florentines
heard of his return, knowing that he would lose no time, they decided
to intercept him with their forces in the Val di Nievole, under the
belief that by doing so they would cut off his road to Pistoia.
Assembling a great army of the supporters of the Guelph cause, the
Florentines entered the Pistoian territories. On the other hand,
Castruccio reached Montecarlo with his army; and having heard where
the Florentines' lay, he decided not to encounter it in the plains of
Pistoia, nor to await it in the plains of Pescia, but, as far as he
possibly could, to attack it boldly in the Pass of Serravalle. He
believed that if he succeeded in this design, victory was assured,
The Prince |
