| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Polity of Athenians and Lacedaemonians by Xenophon: content to inflict punishment only in cases where a man does wrong
against his neighbour, Lycurgus imposed penalties no less severe on
him who openly neglected to make himself as good as possible? For
this, it seems, was his principle: in the one case, where a man is
robbed, or defrauded, or kidnapped, and made a slave of, the injury of
the misdeed, whatever it be, is personal to the individual so
maltreated; but in the other case whole communities suffer foul
treason at the hands of the base man and the coward. So that it was
only reasonable, in my opinion, that he should visit the heaviest
penalty upon these latter.
Moreover, he laid upon them, like some irresistible necessity, the
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Don Quixote by Miquel de Cervantes: these Christians owe nothing to my will; for even had I wished not
to accompany them, but remain at home, it would have been impossible
for me, so eagerly did my soul urge me on to the accomplishment of
this purpose, which I feel to be as righteous as to thee, dear father,
it seems wicked."
But neither could her father hear her nor we see him when she said
this; and so, while I consoled Zoraida, we turned our attention to our
voyage, in which a breeze from the right point so favoured us that
we made sure of finding ourselves off the coast of Spain on the morrow
by daybreak. But, as good seldom or never comes pure and unmixed,
without being attended or followed by some disturbing evil that
Don Quixote |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Life on the Mississippi by Mark Twain: is done on a great scale.
La Grange and Canton are growing towns, but I missed Alexandria;
was told it was under water, but would come up to blow in the summer.
Keokuk was easily recognizable. I lived there in 1857--an extraordinary
year there in real-estate matters. The 'boom' was something wonderful.
Everybody bought, everybody sold--except widows and preachers;
they always hold on; and when the tide ebbs, they get left.
Anything in the semblance of a town lot, no matter how situated,
was salable, and at a figure which would still have been high if the ground
had been sodded with greenbacks.
The town has a population of fifteen thousand now, and is progressing with
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