| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Island Nights' Entertainments by Robert Louis Stevenson: nothing; and the harps were silent.
The first landfall I made was when I got through the bush of wild
cocoanuts, and came in view of the bogies on the wall. Mighty
queer they looked by the shining of the lantern, with their painted
faces and shell eyes, and their clothes and their hair hanging.
One after another I pulled them all up and piled them in a bundle
on the cellar roof, so as they might go to glory with the rest.
Then I chose a place behind one of the big stones at the entrance,
buried my powder and the two shells, and arranged my match along
the passage. And then I had a look at the smoking head, just for
good-bye. It was doing fine.
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Running a Thousand Miles for Freedom by William and Ellen Craft: place of any consequence between there and Phila-
delphia, and also knowing that if we were fortu-
nate we should be in the latter place early the
next morning, I thought I might indulge in a
few minutes' sleep in the car; but I, like Bunyan's
Christian in the arbour, went to sleep at the wrong
time, and took too long a nap. So, when the train
reached Havre de Grace, all the first-class pas-
sengers had to get out of the carriages and into
a ferry-boat, to be ferried across the Susquehanna
river, and take the train on the opposite side.
Running a Thousand Miles for Freedom |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Tao Teh King by Lao-tze: that the sage (ruler), wishing to be above men, puts himself by his
words below them, and, wishing to be before them, places his person
behind them.
2. In this way though he has his place above them, men do not feel his
weight, nor though he has his place before them, do they feel it an
injury to them.
3. Therefore all in the world delight to exalt him and do not weary of
him. Because he does not strive, no one finds it possible to strive
with him.
67. 1. All the world says that, while my Tao is great, it yet appears
to be inferior (to other systems of teaching). Now it is just its
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