| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Study of a Woman by Honore de Balzac: as many ill-bred persons are apt to do. He rang for his valet, ordered
tea, and drank immoderately of it when it came; which will not seem
extraordinary to persons who like tea; but to explain the circumstance
to others, who regard that beverage as a panacea for indigestion, I
will add that Eugene was, by this time, writing letters. He was
comfortably seated, with his feet more frequently on the andirons
than, properly, on the rug. Ah! to have one's feet on the polished bar
which connects the two griffins of a fender, and to think of our love
in our dressing-gown is so delightful a thing that I deeply regret the
fact of having neither mistress, nor fender, nor dressing-gown.
The first letter which Eugene wrote was soon finished; he folded and
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Philebus by Plato: will acknowledge that this element is illusory, and you will never say that
the corresponding excess or defect of pleasure or pain is real or true.
PROTARCHUS: Certainly not.
SOCRATES: Next let us see whether in another direction we may not find
pleasures and pains existing and appearing in living beings, which are
still more false than these.
PROTARCHUS: What are they, and how shall we find them?
SOCRATES: If I am not mistaken, I have often repeated that pains and aches
and suffering and uneasiness of all sorts arise out of a corruption of
nature caused by concretions, and dissolutions, and repletions, and
evacuations, and also by growth and decay?
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Poems by Bronte Sisters: Oh, opening skies, I hail, I bless pour light!
Part, clouds and shadows! Glorious Sun appear!
Part, mental gloom! Come insight from on high!
Dusk dawn in heaven still strives with daylight clear
The longing soul doth still uncertain sigh.
Oh! to behold the truth--that sun divine,
How doth my bosom pant, my spirit pine!
This day, Time travails with a mighty birth;
This day, Truth stoops from heaven and visits earth;
Ere night descends I shall more surely know
What guide to follow, in what path to go;
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