| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Rape of Lucrece by William Shakespeare: 'Thy secret pleasure turns to open shame,
Thy private feasting to a public fast;
Thy smoothing titles to a ragged name,
Thy sugar'd tongue to bitter wormwood taste:
Thy violent vanities can never last.
How comes it then, vile Opportunity,
Being so bad, such numbers seek for thee?
'When wilt thou be the humble suppliant's friend,
And bring him where his suit may be obtain'd?
When wilt thou sort an hour great strifes to end?
Or free that soul which wretchedness hath chain'd?
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from In the Cage by Henry James: that it was impossible sufficiently to put it on; for what she
wished to express to him was the maximum of her contempt, and that
element in her nature was confusedly stored. "A bishop" was
putting it on, but the counter-clerk's approaches were vile. The
night, after this, when, in the fulness of time, Mrs. Jordan
mentioned the grand long talks, the girl at last brought out:
"Should I see them?--I mean if I WERE to give up everything for
you."
Mrs. Jordan at this became most arch. "I'd send you to all the
bachelors!"
Our young lady could be reminded by such a remark that she usually
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Woodlanders by Thomas Hardy: in at the door. The articles were mainly those that had belonged
to the previous owner of the house, and had been bought in by the
late Mr. Charmond at the auction; but changing fashion, and the
tastes of a young wife, had caused them to be relegated to this
dungeon.
Here Fitzpiers sat on the floor against the wall till she had
hauled out materials for a bed, which she spread on the floor in
one of the aforesaid nooks. She obtained water and a basin, and
washed the dried blood from his face and hands; and when he was
comfortably reclining, fetched food from the larder. While he ate
her eyes lingered anxiously on his face, following its every
The Woodlanders |
