| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Woman and Labour by Olive Schreiner: is performed today by one small, well-adjusted steam crane; and the demand
for large masses of human creatures as mere reservoirs of motor force for
accomplishing the simplest processes was imperative. So strong, indeed,
was the consciousness of the importance to society of continuous child-
bearing on the part of woman, that as late as the middle of the sixteenth
century Martin Luther wrote: "If a woman becomes weary or at last dead
from bearing, that matters not; let her only die from bearing, she is there
to do it;" and he doubtless gave expression, in a crude and somewhat brutal
form, to a conviction common to the bulk of his contemporaries, both male
and female.
Today, this condition has almost completely reversed itself.
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from An Inland Voyage by Robert Louis Stevenson: a thicket of willows, overtopped by elms and poplars, under which
the river ran flush and fleet, and where a kingfisher flew past
like a piece of the blue sky. On these different manifestations
the sun poured its clear and catholic looks. The shadows lay as
solid on the swift surface of the stream as on the stable meadows.
The light sparkled golden in the dancing poplar leaves, and brought
the hills into communion with our eyes. And all the while the
river never stopped running or took breath; and the reeds along the
whole valley stood shivering from top to toe.
There should be some myth (but if there is, I know it not) founded
on the shivering of the reeds. There are not many things in nature
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Venus and Adonis by William Shakespeare: Still she entreats, and prettily entreats,
For to a pretty ear she tunes her tale;
Still is he sullen, still he lours and frets,
'Twixt crimson shame and anger ashy-pale; 76
Being red she loves him best; and being white,
Her best is better'd with a more delight.
Look how he can, she cannot choose but love;
And by her fair immortal hand she swears, 80
From his soft bosom never to remove,
Till he take truce with her contending tears,
Which long have rain'd, making her cheeks all wet;
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