| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Allan Quatermain by H. Rider Haggard: them I told her what I knew of the danger which encompassed her,
and how we found Kara, and how all the guards and men-servants
were gone, and she was alone with her women in that great place;
and she told me, too, that a rumour had spread through the town
that our army had been utterly destroyed, and that Sorais was
marching in triumph on Milosis, and how in consequence thereof
all men had fallen away from her.
Though all this takes some time to tell, we had not been but
six or seven minutes in the palace; and notwithstanding that
the golden roof of the temple being very lofty was ablaze with
the rays of the rising sun, it was not yet dawn, nor would be
Allan Quatermain |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from A Modest Proposal by Jonathan Swift: roads and cabbin-doors crowded with beggars of the female sex,
followed by three, four, or six children, all in rags, and
importuning every passenger for an alms. These mothers instead of
being able to work for their honest livelihood, are forced to
employ all their time in stroling to beg sustenance for their
helpless infants who, as they grow up, either turn thieves for
want of work, or leave their dear native country, to fight for
the Pretender in Spain, or sell themselves to the Barbadoes.
I think it is agreed by all parties, that this prodigious number
of children in the arms, or on the backs, or at the heels of
their mothers, and frequently of their fathers, is in the present
A Modest Proposal |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Father Sergius by Leo Tolstoy: wanted him to lay his hands on the boy and pray for him. Father
Sergius refused and returned to his cell. But next day (it was
in autumn and the nights were already cold) on going out for
water he saw the same mother with her son, a pale boy of
fourteen, and was met by the same petition.
He remembered the parable of the unjust judge, and though he had
previously felt sure that he ought to refuse, he now began to
hesitate and, having hesitated, took to prayer and prayed until a
decision formed itself in his soul. This decision was, that he
ought to accede to the woman's request and that her faith might
save her son. As for himself, he would in this case be but an
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