| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Vailima Prayers & Sabbath Morn by Robert Louis Stevenson: for the health, the work, the food, and the bright skies, that make
our lives delightful; for our friends in all parts of the earth,
and our friendly helpers in this foreign isle. Let peace abound in
our small company. Purge out of every heart the lurking grudge.
Give us grace and strength to forbear and to persevere. Offenders,
give us the grace to accept and to forgive offenders. Forgetful
ourselves, help us to bear cheerfully the forgetfulness of others.
Give us courage and gaiety and the quiet mind. Spare to us our
friends, soften to us our enemies. Bless us, if it may be, in all
our innocent endeavours. If it may not, give us the strength to
encounter that which is to come, that we be brave in peril,
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Iron Puddler by James J. Davis: Republican in the house to watch them would scare them away from
the bait. He wanted them to take bribes and be ruined by the
scandal, and that would bring the Republicans back to power. It
was a good enough way to "turn the rogues out" by first letting
them become rogues, but my heart was not set on party success
only. I believed in protecting the public. So I went ahead and
got bondsmen to qualify me. But as often as I got men to sign my
bond, the boss went them and got them off again. A firm of
lawyers, Greenlee & Call, stood by me in my struggle to make my
bond. These men were ten years older than I. I was twenty-five.
They acted as godfathers to me. They gave me the use of their
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Charmides and Other Poems by Oscar Wilde: Like silver moons the pale narcissi lay:
And the curved waves that streaked the great green bay
Laughed i' the sun, and life seemed very sweet.
Outside the young boy-priest passed singing clear,
'Jesus the son of Mary has been slain,
O come and fill His sepulchre with flowers.'
Ah, God! Ah, God! those dear Hellenic hours
Had drowned all memory of Thy bitter pain,
The Cross, the Crown, the Soldiers and the Spear.
URBS SACRA AETERNA
Rome! what a scroll of History thine has been;
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