| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Black Arrow by Robert Louis Stevenson: and Matcham, laying one hand upon Dick's arm, held up a warning
finger.
"Hist!" he said.
Then came a strange sound, breaking on the quiet. It was twice
repeated ere they recognised its nature. It was the sound of a big
man clearing his throat; and just then a hoarse, untuneful voice
broke into singing.
"Then up and spake the master, the king of the outlaws:
'What make ye here, my merry men, among the greenwood shaws?'
And Gamelyn made answer - he looked never adown:
'O, they must need to walk in wood that may not walk in town!'"
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Democracy In America, Volume 1 by Alexis de Toqueville: increase of the Anglo-American population for the next hundred
years; and before that space of time has elapsed, I believe that
the territories and dependencies of the United States will be
covered by more than 100,000,000 of inhabitants, and divided into
forty States. *i I admit that these 100,000,000 of men have no ho
hostile interests. I suppose, on the contrary, that they are all
equally interested in the maintenance of the Union; but I am
still of opinion that where there are 100,000,000 of men, and
forty distinct nations, unequally strong, the continuance of the
Federal Government can only be a fortunate accident.
[Footnote i: If the population continues to double every
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Youth by Joseph Conrad: "We had not heard or seen anything of him all that
time. We went aft to look. A doleful voice arose hail-
ing somewhere in the middle of the dock, 'Judea ahoy!'
. . . How the devil did he get there? . . . 'Hallo!'
we shouted. 'I am adrift in our boat without oars,' he
cried. A belated waterman offered his services, and
Mahon struck a bargain with him for half-a-crown to
tow our skipper alongside; but it was Mrs. Beard that
came up the ladder first. They had been floating about
the dock in that mizzly cold rain for nearly an hour. I
was never so surprised in my life.
Youth |
