| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Master of Ballantrae by Robert Louis Stevenson: hulking fellow of the country, with a broad axe on his shoulder,
looking open-mouthed, now at the treasure, which was just at his
feet, and now at our disputation, in which we had gone far enough
to have weapons in our hands. We had no sooner observed him than
he found his legs and made off again among the pines.
This was no scene to put our minds at rest: a couple of armed men
in sea-clothes found quarrelling over a treasure, not many miles
from where a pirate had been captured - here was enough to bring
the whole country about our ears. The quarrel was not even made
up; it was blotted from our minds; and we got our packets together
in the twinkling of an eye, and made off, running with the best
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Marriage Contract by Honore de Balzac: A fortunate accident settled the question of my setting out on
this career, which did not particularly smile on me, for you know
my predilection for the life of the East. After thirty-five years
of slumber, my highly-respected mother woke up to the recollection
that she had a son who might do her honor. Often when a vine-stock
is eradicated, some years after shoots come up to the surface of
the ground; well, my dear boy, my mother had almost torn me up by
the roots from her heart, and I sprouted again in her head. At the
age of fifty-eight, she thinks herself old enough to think no more
of any men but her son. At this juncture she has met in some hot-
water cauldron, at I know not what baths, a delightful old maid--
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Euthydemus by Plato: minister to the evil principle which rules them; and when under the
guidance of wisdom and prudence, they are greater goods: but in themselves
they are nothing?
That, he replied, is obvious.
What then is the result of what has been said? Is not this the result--
that other things are indifferent, and that wisdom is the only good, and
ignorance the only evil?
He assented.
Let us consider a further point, I said: Seeing that all men desire
happiness, and happiness, as has been shown, is gained by a use, and a
right use, of the things of life, and the right use of them, and good-
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