| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Democracy In America, Volume 2 by Alexis de Toqueville: good things of this world, in order to devote their faculties
exclusively to the thought of another, it may be foreseen that
the soul would at length escape from its grasp, to plunge into
the exclusive enjoyment of present and material pleasures. The
chief concern of religions is to purify, to regulate, and to
restrain the excessive and exclusive taste for well-being which
men feel at periods of equality; but they would err in attempting
to control it completely or to eradicate it. They will not
succeed in curing men of the love of riches: but they may still
persuade men to enrich themselves by none but honest means.
This brings me to a final consideration, which comprises, as
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The School For Scandal by Richard Brinsley Sheridan: expectations?
SIR OLIVER. That you have a wealthy uncle, I have heard; but how your
expectations will turn out is more, I believe, than you can tell.
CHARLES. Oh, no!--there can be no doubt. They tell me I'm
a prodigious favourite, and that he talks of leaving me everything.
SIR OLIVER. Indeed! this is the first I've heard of it.
CHARLES. Yes, yes, 'tis just so. Moses knows 'tis true; don't you,
Moses?
MOSES. Oh, yes! I'll swear to't.
SIR OLIVER. Egad, they'll persuade me presently I'm at Bengal.
[Aside.]
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from At the Sign of the Cat & Racket by Honore de Balzac: the household, in obedience, no doubt, to these old customs, he stood
sternly awaiting the appearance of his three assistants, ready to
scold them in case they were late. These young disciples of Mercury
knew nothing more terrible than the wordless assiduity with which the
master scrutinized their faces and their movements on Monday in search
of evidence or traces of their pranks. But at this moment the old
clothier paid no heed to his apprentices; he was absorbed in trying to
divine the motive of the anxious looks which the young man in silk
stockings and a cloak cast alternately at his signboard and into the
depths of his shop. The daylight was now brighter, and enabled the
stranger to discern the cashier's corner enclosed by a railing and
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