| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Letters from England by Elizabeth Davis Bancroft: privileged to go FIRST into the ANTE-ROOM leave it, the general
circle pass in, and they also go in and out the same doors. But to
go back. The left-hand door opens and Sir Edward Cust leads in the
Countess Dietrichstein, who is the eldest Ambassadress, as the
Countess St. Aulair is in Paris. As she enters she drops her train
and the gentlemen ushers open it out like a peacock's tail. Then
Madam Van de Weyer, who comes next, follows close upon the train of
the former, then Baroness Brunnow, the Madam Bunsen, then Madam
Lisboa, then Lady Palmerston, who, as the wife of the Minister for
Foreign Affairs, is to introduce the Princess Callimachi, Baroness
de Beust, and myself. She stations herself by the side of the Queen
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Crito by Plato: opinion that Socrates 'did well to die,' but not for the 'sophistical'
reasons which Plato has put into his mouth. And there would be no
difficulty in arguing that Socrates should have lived and preferred to a
glorious death the good which he might still be able to perform. 'A
rhetorician would have had much to say upon that point.' It may be
observed however that Plato never intended to answer the question of
casuistry, but only to exhibit the ideal of patient virtue which refuses to
do the least evil in order to avoid the greatest, and to show his master
maintaining in death the opinions which he had professed in his life. Not
'the world,' but the 'one wise man,' is still the paradox of Socrates in
his last hours. He must be guided by reason, although her conclusions may
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Chita: A Memory of Last Island by Lafcadio Hearn: elbow, rubbed his eyes, and asked her, with exasperating
calmness, "Que tienes? que tienes?" (What ails thee?)
--"Oh, Feliu! the sea is coming upon us!" she answered, in the
same tongue. But she screamed out a word inspired by her fear:
she did not cry, "Se nos viene el mar encima!" but "Se nos viene
LA ALTURA!"--the name that conveys the terrible thought of depth
swallowed up in height,--the height of the high sea.
"No lo creo!" muttered Feliu, looking at the floor; then in a
quiet, deep voice he said, pointing to an oar in the corner of
the room, "Echame ese remo."
She gave it to him. Still reclining upon one elbow, Feliu
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