| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Goodness of St. Rocque and Other Stories by Alice Dunbar: water-moccasin that wriggled and forked its venomous red tongue
in an attempt to exercise its death-dealing prerogative. This
Athanasia insisted must go back into its native black waters, and
paid the price the boys asked that it might enjoy its freedom.
The gamins laughed and chattered in their soft patois; the Don
smiled tenderly upon Athanasia, and she durst not look at the
reeds as she talked, lest their crescendo sadness yield a
foreboding. Just then a wee girl appeared, clad in a multi-hued
garment, evidently a sister to the small fishermen. Her keen
black eyes set in a dusky face glanced sharply and suspiciously
at the group as she clambered over the wet embankment, and it
 The Goodness of St. Rocque and Other Stories |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from From the Earth to the Moon by Jules Verne: explosive eider-down. Its pressure had no result, other than
the more effectual ramming down of the charge in the Columbiad.
"I have lost," said the captain, who forthwith paid President
Barbicane the sum of three thousand dollars.
Barbicane did not wish to accept the money from one of his
fellow-travelers, but gave way at last before the determination
of Nicholl, who wished before leaving the earth to fulfill all
his engagements.
"Now," said Michel Ardan, "I have only one thing more to wish
for you, my brave captain."
"What is that?" asked Nicholl.
 From the Earth to the Moon |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Beauty and The Beast by Bayard Taylor: to have a peep at the uniforms, no report of what they had seen or
heard was likely to be made at home. Peace brought to them a
relief, like the awakening from an uncomfortable dream: their lives
at once reverted to the calm which they had breathed for thirty
years preceding the national disturbance. In their ways they had
not materially changed for a hundred years. The surplus produce of
their farms more than sufficed for the very few needs which those
farms did not supply, and they seldom touched the world outside of
their sect except in matters of business. They were satisfied with
themselves and with their lot; they lived to a ripe and beautiful
age, rarely "borrowed trouble," and were patient to endure that
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