| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Circular Staircase by Mary Roberts Rinehart: I ought to say nothing but good of the dead--Mr. Armstrong saw
nothing of this fair prospect. To him these trees and lawns were
not the work of God. They were property, at so much an acre. He
loved money, Miss Innes. He offered up everything to his golden
calf. Not power, not ambition, was his fetish: it was money."
Then he dropped his pulpit manner, and, turning to me with his
engaging smile: "In spite of all this luxury," he said, "the
country people here have a saying that Mr. Paul Armstrong could
sit on a dollar and see all around it. Unlike the summer people,
he gave neither to the poor nor to the church. He loved money
for its own sake."
The Circular Staircase |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Symposium by Xenophon: who know and can do all things,[72] deign to be my friends; so that,
by reason of their care for me, I can never escape from their
sight,[73] neither by night nor by day, whithersoever I essay to go,
whatsoever I take in hand to do.[74] But because they know beforehand
the end and issue of each event, they give me signals, sending
messengers, be it some voice,[75] or vision of the night, with omens
of the solitary bird, which tell me what I should and what I should
not do. When I listen to their warnings all goes well with me, I have
no reason to repent; but if, as ere now has been the case, I have been
disobedient, chastisement has overtaken me.
[72] Cf. "Mem." I. i. 19; I. iv. 18.
The Symposium |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Menexenus by Plato: And so the war against the barbarians was fought out to the end by the
whole city on their own behalf, and on behalf of their countrymen. There
was peace, and our city was held in honour; and then, as prosperity makes
men jealous, there succeeded a jealousy of her, and jealousy begat envy,
and so she became engaged against her will in a war with the Hellenes. On
the breaking out of war, our citizens met the Lacedaemonians at Tanagra,
and fought for the freedom of the Boeotians; the issue was doubtful, and
was decided by the engagement which followed. For when the Lacedaemonians
had gone on their way, leaving the Boeotians, whom they were aiding, on the
third day after the battle of Tanagra, our countrymen conquered at
Oenophyta, and righteously restored those who had been unrighteously
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