| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Twice Told Tales by Nathaniel Hawthorne: strangest part of the affair is the effect of this vagary, even
on a sober-minded man like myself. The black veil, though it
covers only our pastor's face, throws its influence over his
whole person, and makes him ghostlike from head to foot. Do you
not feel it so?"
"Truly do I," replied the lady; "and I would not be alone with
him for the world. I wonder he is not afraid to be alone with
himself!"
"Men sometimes are so," said her husband.
The afternoon service was attended with similar circumstances. At
its conclusion, the bell tolled for the funeral of a young lady.
Twice Told Tales |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from When the World Shook by H. Rider Haggard: Afterwards I received the confidence of Bickley.
"Look here, Arbuthnot," he said. "I want to own up to
something. I think I ought to, because of certain things I have
observed, in order to prevent possible future misunderstandings."
"What's that?" I asked innocently.
"Only this. As you know, I have always been a confirmed
bachelor on principle. Women introduce too many complications
into life, and although it involves some sacrifice, on the whole,
I have thought it best to do without them and leave the carrying
on of the world to others."
"Well, what of it? Your views are not singular, Bickley."
When the World Shook |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne: instance, however, as not unfrequently in other cases, her
sentence bore that she should stand a certain time upon the
platform, but without undergoing that gripe about the neck and
confinement of the head, the proneness to which was the most
devilish characteristic of this ugly engine. Knowing well her
part, she ascended a flight of wooden steps, and was thus
displayed to the surrounding multitude, at about the height of a
man's shoulders above the street.
Had there been a Papist among the crowd of Puritans, he might
have seen in this beautiful woman, so picturesque in her attire
The Scarlet Letter |
