| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Tragedy of Pudd'nhead Wilson by Mark Twain: "For more than twenty years I have amused my compulsory
leisure with collecting these curious physical signatures in this town.
At my house I have hundreds upon hundreds of them.
Each and every one is labeled with name and date; not labeled the
next day or even the next hour, but in the very minute that the
impression was taken. When I go upon the witness stand I will
repeat under oath the things which I am now saying. I have the
fingerprints of the court, the sheriff, and every member of the jury.
There is hardly a person in this room, white or black,
whose natal signature I cannot produce, and not one of them can
so disguise himself that I cannot pick him out from a multitude
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Story of an African Farm by Olive Schreiner: their pews, and the light shines in through the windows on the artificial
flowers in the women's bonnets. We have the same miserable feeling that we
have in a shop where all the clerks are very smart. We wish our father
hadn't brought us to town, and we were out on the karoo. Then the man in
the pulpit begins to preach. His text is "He that believeth not shall be
damned."
The day before the magistrate's clerk, who was an atheist, has died in the
street struck by lightning.
The man in the pulpit mentions no name; but he talks of "The hand of God
made visible amongst us." He tells us how, when the white stroke fell,
quivering and naked, the soul fled, robbed of his earthly filament, and lay
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Sesame and Lilies by John Ruskin: peoples' strength as rust to armour, lay up treasures for the rust;
and the Robber-kings, treasures for the robber; but how few kings
have ever laid up treasures that needed no guarding--treasures of
which, the more thieves there were, the better! Broidered robe,
only to be rent; helm and sword, only to be dimmed; jewel and gold,
only to be scattered;--there have been three kinds of kings who have
gathered these. Suppose there ever should arise a Fourth order of
kings, who had read, in some obscure writing of long ago, that there
was a Fourth kind of treasure, which the jewel and gold could not
equal, neither should it be valued with pure gold. A web made fair
in the weaving, by Athena's shuttle; an armour, forged in divine
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