| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Paz by Honore de Balzac: chivalric, and as much in love as Adam. To know that he was the pivot
on which the splendor the household depended, to see Clementine when
she got out of her carriage on returning from some fete, or got into
it in the morning when she took her drive, to meet her on the
boulevards in her pretty equipage, looking like a flower in a whorl of
leaves, inspired poor Thaddeus with mysterious delights, which glowed
in the depths of his heart but gave no signs upon his face.
How happened it that for five whole months the countess had never
perceived the captain? Because he hid himself from her knowledge, and
carefully concealed the pains he took to avoid her. Nothing so
resembles the Divine love as hopeless human love. A man must have
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Heart of the West by O. Henry: Raidler.
"The little /senor/," he announced, "presents his compliments"
(Raidler credited Ylario with the preliminary) "and desires some
pounded ice, one hot bath, one gin feez-z, that the windows be all
closed, toast, one shave, one Newyorkheral', cigarettes, and to send
one telegram."
Raidler took a quart bottle of whisky from his medicine cabinet.
"Here, take him this," he said.
Thus was instituted the reign of terror at the Solito Ranch. For a few
weeks McGuire blustered and boasted and swaggered before the cow-
punchers who rode in for miles around to see this latest importation
Heart of the West |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Malbone: An Oldport Romance by Thomas Wentworth Higginson: and never wants anything more. So I have him to watch. Think
of living so near a beaver or a water-rat with clothes on!
Good-by. Leave the door ajar, it is so warm."
And Kate went down to the landing. It was near the "baptismal
shore," where every Sunday the young people used to watch the
immersions; they liked to see the crowd of spectators, the
eager friends, the dripping convert, the serene young minister,
the old men and girls who burst forth in song as the new
disciple rose from the waves. It was the weekly festival in
that region, and the sunshine and the ripples made it
gladdening, not gloomy. Every other day in the week the
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