| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Perfect Wagnerite: A Commentary on the Niblung's Ring by George Bernard Shaw: into the mine where Alberic's slaves are piling up wealth for him
under the invisible whip.
Third Scene
This gloomy place need not be a mine: it might just as well be a
match-factory, with yellow phosphorus, phossy jaw, a large
dividend, and plenty of clergymen shareholders. Or it might be a
whitelead factory, or a chemical works, or a pottery, or a
railway shunting yard, or a tailoring shop, or a little
gin-sodden laundry, or a bakehouse, or a big shop, or any other
of the places where human life and welfare are daily sacrificed
in order that some greedy foolish creature may be able to hymn
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Father Sergius by Leo Tolstoy: brethren for his pride, but at the same time, after a night spent
in prayer, he decided that he must leave this monastery, and he
wrote to the starets begging permission to return to him. He
wrote that he felt his weakness and incapacity to struggle
against temptation without his help and penitently confessed his
sin of pride. By return of post came a letter from the starets,
who wrote that Sergius's pride was the cause of all that had
happened. The old man pointed out that his fits of anger were
due to the fact that in refusing all clerical honours he
humiliated himself not for the sake of God but for the sake of
his pride. 'There now, am I not a splendid man not to want
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from First Inaugural Address by Abraham Lincoln: of the people? Is there any better or equal hope in the world?
In our present differences is either party without faith of being
in the right? If the Almighty Ruler of Nations, with his eternal
truth and justice, be on your side of the North, or on yours
of the South, that truth and that justice will surely prevail,
by the judgment of this great tribunal, the American people.
By the frame of the government under which we live, this same people
have wisely given their public servants but little power for mischief;
and have, with equal wisdom, provided for the return of that little
to their own hands at very short intervals. While the people retain
their virtue and vigilance, no administration, by any extreme of
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