The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Tao Teh King by Lao-tze: 'The Tao, when brightest seen, seems light to lack;
Who progress in it makes, seems drawing back;
Its even way is like a rugged track.
Its highest virtue from the vale doth rise;
Its greatest beauty seems to offend the eyes;
And he has most whose lot the least supplies.
Its firmest virtue seems but poor and low;
Its solid truth seems change to undergo;
Its largest square doth yet no corner show
A vessel great, it is the slowest made;
Loud is its sound, but never word it said;
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Amazing Interlude by Mary Roberts Rinehart: speech and came out.
"Good gracious!" she said, and gave an alarmed glance at the sky. But
it was the noon hour, when every good German abandons war for food, and
the sky was empty.
The boys cheered perceptibly. Here was at last some one who spoke a
Christian tongue.
"Must have taken the wrong turning, miss," said one of them, saluting.
"Where do you want to go?" she asked. "You are very close to the Belgian
Front here. It is not at all safe."
They all saluted; then, staring at her curiously, told her.
"Dear me!" said Sara Lee. "You are a long way off. And a long way
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Persuasion by Jane Austen: and smiles reined in and spirits dancing in private rapture.
In half a minute Charles was at the bottom of Union Street again,
and the other two proceeding together: and soon words enough had passed
between them to decide their direction towards the comparatively quiet
and retired gravel walk, where the power of conversation would make
the present hour a blessing indeed, and prepare it for all
the immortality which the happiest recollections of their own future lives
could bestow. There they exchanged again those feelings
and those promises which had once before seemed to secure everything,
but which had been followed by so many, many years of division
and estrangement. There they returned again into the past,
 Persuasion |