| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Georgics by Virgil: In lonely lawns they feed them, by the course
Of brimming streams, where moss is, and the banks
With grass are greenest, where are sheltering caves,
And far outstretched the rock-flung shadow lies.
Round wooded Silarus and the ilex-bowers
Of green Alburnus swarms a winged pest-
Its Roman name Asilus, by the Greeks
Termed Oestros- fierce it is, and harshly hums,
Driving whole herds in terror through the groves,
Till heaven is madded by their bellowing din,
And Tanager's dry bed and forest-banks.
Georgics |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Agnes Grey by Anne Bronte: still she feared he was setting his heart too much upon the matter;
and once I heard her whisper as she left the room, 'God grant he be
not disappointed! I know not how he would bear it.'
Disappointed he was; and bitterly, too. It came like a thunder-
clap on us all, that the vessel which contained our fortune had
been wrecked, and gone to the bottom with all its stores, together
with several of the crew, and the unfortunate merchant himself. I
was grieved for him; I was grieved for the overthrow of all our
air-built castles: but, with the elasticity of youth, I soon
recovered the shook.
Though riches had charms, poverty had no terrors for an
Agnes Grey |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The American by Henry James: Lord Deepmere isn't very intellectual, so she had to spell it out to him.
He said he admired you 'no end,' and that he wanted you to know it;
but he didn't like being mixed up with that sort of underhand work,
and he came to you and told tales. That was about the amount of it,
wasn't it? And then you said you were perfectly happy."
"I don't see why we should talk of Lord Deepmere," said Madame de Cintre.
"It was not for that you came here. And about my mother, it doesn't
matter what you suspect and what you know. When once my mind has
been made up, as it is now, I should not discuss these things.
Discussing anything, now, is very idle. We must try and live each as we can.
I believe you will be happy again; even, sometimes, when you think of me.
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