| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Scarecrow of Oz by L. Frank Baum: said the Bumpy Man. Then he looked at Cap'n Bill uneasily
and added: "Won't you let the poor things go?"
"I'll see," replied the sailor, and walked out to where
the birds were fluttering and complaining because the
strings would not allow them to fly away.
"Listen to me!" he cried, and at once they became
still. "We three people who are strangers in your land
want to go to some other country, and we want three of
you birds to carry us there. We know we are asking a
great favor, but it's the only way we can think of --
excep' walkin', an' I'm not much good at that because
The Scarecrow of Oz |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Prufrock/Other Observations by T. S. Eliot: In a minute there is time
For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.
For I have known them all already, known them all:
Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,
I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;
I know the voices dying with a dying fall
Beneath the music from a farther room.
So how should I presume?
And I have known the eyes already, known them all--
The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase,
And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin,
Prufrock/Other Observations |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Republic by Plato: of Pramnian wine, which is of a heating nature; and yet the sons of
Asclepius blame neither the damsel who gives him the drink, nor Patroclus
who is attending on him. The truth is that this modern system of nursing
diseases was introduced by Herodicus the trainer; who, being of a sickly
constitution, by a compound of training and medicine tortured first himself
and then a good many other people, and lived a great deal longer than he
had any right. But Asclepius would not practise this art, because he knew
that the citizens of a well-ordered State have no leisure to be ill, and
therefore he adopted the 'kill or cure' method, which artisans and
labourers employ. 'They must be at their business,' they say, 'and have no
time for coddling: if they recover, well; if they don't, there is an end
The Republic |
