| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Apology by Xenophon: escape paying[13] the penalty of old age, in increasing dimness of
sight and dulness of hearing. I shall find myself slower to learn new
lessons, and apter to forget the lessons I have learnt. And if to
these be added the consciousness of failing powers, the sting of self-
reproach, what prospect have I of any further joy in living? It may
be, you know," he added, "that God out of his great kindness is
intervening in my behalf[14] to suffer me to close my life in the
ripeness of age, and by the gentlest of deaths. For if at this time
sentence of death be passed upon me, it is plain I shall be allowed to
meet an end which, in the opinion of those who have studied the
matter, is not only the easiest in itself, but one which will cause
The Apology |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Glasses by Henry James: put pressure on her to marry him. She didn't know I would take it
that way, else she would never have brought him to see me. It was
in her view a part of the conspiracy that to show him a kindness I
asked him at last to sit to me. I dare say moreover she was
disgusted to hear that I had ended by attempting almost as many
sketches of his beauty as I had attempted of hers. What was the
value of tributes to beauty by a hand that could so abase itself?
My relation to poor Dawling's want of modelling was simple enough.
I was really digging in that sandy desert for the buried treasure
of his soul.
CHAPTER VI
|
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Mirror of the Sea by Joseph Conrad: and powerful, those emblems of hope make company for the look-out
man in the night watches; and so the days glide by, with a long
rest for those characteristically shaped pieces of iron, reposing
forward, visible from almost every part of the ship's deck, waiting
for their work on the other side of the world somewhere, while the
ship carries them on with a great rush and splutter of foam
underneath, and the sprays of the open sea rust their heavy limbs.
The first approach to the land, as yet invisible to the crew's
eyes, is announced by the brisk order of the chief mate to the
boatswain: "We will get the anchors over this afternoon" or "first
thing to-morrow morning," as the case may be. For the chief mate
The Mirror of the Sea |
