| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Sons of the Soil by Honore de Balzac: through the influence of Soudry, Gaubertin, and Sarcus the rich, unfit
for military service, on account of a pretended weakness in the
muscles of the right arm; but as Jean-Louis had since wielded
instruments of husbandry with remarkable force and skill, a good deal
of talk on the subject had gone through the district. Soudry, Rigou,
and Gaubertin, who were the special protectors of the family, had
warned Tonsard that he must not expect to save Nicolas, who was tall
and vigorous, from being recruited if he drew a fatal number.
Nevertheless Gaubertin and Rigou were so well aware of the importance
of conciliating bold men able and willing to do mischief, if properly
directed against Les Aigues, that Rigou held out certain hopes of
|
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Octopus by Frank Norris: last hope. Promptly it crumbled away. Like the former, this
place had been already filled, and Minna left the door of the
house with the certainty that her chance had come to naught, and
that now she entered into the last struggle with life--the death
struggle--shorn of her last pitiful defence, her last safeguard,
her last penny.
As she once more resumed her interminable walk, she realised she
was weak, faint; and she knew that it was the weakness of
complete exhaustion, and the faintness of approaching starvation.
Was this the end coming on? Terror of death aroused her.
"I MUST, I MUST do something, oh, anything. I must have
|
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Washington Irving: to be met with in broad daylight.
It was, as I have said, a fine autumnal day; the sky was
clear and serene, and nature wore that rich and golden livery
which we always associate with the idea of abundance. The forests
had put on their sober brown and yellow, while some trees of the
tenderer kind had been nipped by the frosts into brilliant dyes
of orange, purple, and scarlet. Streaming files of wild ducks
began to make their appearance high in the air; the bark of the
squirrel might be heard from the groves of beech and hickory-
nuts, and the pensive whistle of the quail at intervals from the
neighboring stubble field.
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow |
