| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from My Antonia by Willa Cather: the plantation melodies that Negro minstrel troupes brought to town.
Even Nina played the Swedish Wedding March.
Mrs. Harling had studied the piano under a good teacher,
and somehow she managed to practise every day.
I soon learned that if I were sent over on an errand and found
Mrs. Harling at the piano, I must sit down and wait quietly
until she turned to me. I can see her at this moment:
her short, square person planted firmly on the stool,
her little fat hands moving quickly and neatly over the keys,
her eyes fixed on the music with intelligent concentration.
IV
My Antonia |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Mansion by Henry van Dyke: Only that good which is done for the love of doing it.
Only those plans in which the welfare of others is the master
thought.
Only those labors in which the sacrifice is greater than the
reward.
Only those gifts in which the giver forgets himself."
The man lay silent. A great weakness, an unspeakable despondency
and
humiliation were upon him. But the face of the Keeper of the
Gate was
infinitely tender as he bent over him.
|
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Anabasis by Xenophon: and was exiled from Athens. Sparta gave him land
and property in Scillus, where he lived for many
years before having to move once more, to settle
in Corinth. He died in 354 B.C.
The Anabasis is his story of the march to Persia
to aid Cyrus, who enlisted Greek help to try and
take the throne from Artaxerxes, and the ensuing
return of the Greeks, in which Xenophon played a
leading role. This occurred between 401 B.C. and
March 399 B.C.
PREPARER'S NOTE
Anabasis |
