| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Some Reminiscences by Joseph Conrad: when I published "The Mirror of the Sea," a volume of impressions
and memories, the same remarks were made to me. Practical
remarks. But, truth to say, I have never understood the kind of
thrift they recommended. I wanted to pay my tribute to the sea,
its ships and its men, to whom I remain indebted for so much
which has gone to make me what I am. That seemed to me the only
shape in which I could offer it to their shades. There could not
be a question in my mind of anything else. It is quite possible
that I am a bad economist; but it is certain that I am
incorrigible.
Having matured in the surroundings and under the special
Some Reminiscences |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Across The Plains by Robert Louis Stevenson: serious countenance of the great emperor was turned approvingly (if
only for a moment) on the followers of Apollo, and that sternly
gentle voice bade the artist cherish his art.
And here there fall two warnings to be made. First, if you are to
continue to be a law to yourself, you must beware of the first
signs of laziness. This idealism in honesty can only be supported
by perpetual effort; the standard is easily lowered, the artist who
says "IT WILL DO," is on the downward path; three or four pot-
boilers are enough at times (above all at wrong times) to falsify a
talent, and by the practice of journalism a man runs the risk of
becoming wedded to cheap finish. This is the danger on the one
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Village Rector by Honore de Balzac: care of Soeur Marthe. During the two months that their child was in
danger the Sauviats betrayed to the whole community the depth of their
tenderness. Sauviat no longer went about the country to sales; he
stayed in the shop, going upstairs and down to his daughter's room,
sitting up with her every night in company with his wife. His silent
anguish seemed so great that no one dared to speak to him; his
neighbors looked at him with compassion, but they only asked news of
Veronique from Soeur Marthe. During the days when the child's danger
reached a crisis, the neighbors and passers saw, for the first and
only time in Sauviat's life, tears in his eyes and rolling down his
hollow cheeks; he did not wipe them, but stood for hours as if
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