| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Gobseck by Honore de Balzac: convictions and forms and moral systems become so many meaningless
words to him. The one thing that always remains, the one sure instinct
that nature has implanted in us, is the instinct of self-interest. If
you had lived as long as I have, you would know that there is but one
concrete reality invariable enough to be worth caring about, and that
is--GOLD. Gold represents every form of human power. I have traveled.
I found out that there were either hills or plains everywhere: the
plains are monotonous, the hills a weariness; consequently, place may
be left out of the question. As to manners; man is man all the world
over. The same battle between the poor and the rich is going on
everywhere; it is inevitable everywhere; consequently, it is better to
Gobseck |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Garden Party by Katherine Mansfield: morning."
"How do you know?"
"Dad heard them. Baa!" He sounded like the little lamb that trots behind
and seems to wait to be carried.
"Cock-a-doodle-do!" shrilled Isabel. With her red cheeks and bright eyes
she looked like a rooster.
"What'll I be?" Lottie asked everybody, and she sat there smiling, waiting
for them to decide for her. It had to be an easy one.
"Be a donkey, Lottie." It was Kezia's suggestion. "Hee-haw! You can't
forget that."
"Hee-haw!" said Lottie solemnly. "When do I have to say it?"
|
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Georgics by Virgil: Learns to fling wrath into his horns, with blows
Provokes the air, and scattering clouds of sand
Makes prelude of the battle; afterward,
With strength repaired and gathered might breaks camp,
And hurls him headlong on the unthinking foe:
As in mid ocean when a wave far of
Begins to whiten, mustering from the main
Its rounded breast, and, onward rolled to land
Falls with prodigious roar among the rocks,
Huge as a very mountain: but the depths
Upseethe in swirling eddies, and disgorge
Georgics |
