| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Research Magnificent by H. G. Wells: dogs entertaining Mr. Rathbone-Sanders at tea, and they all seemed a
little surprised, and, except Mr. Rathbone-Sanders, they all seemed
pleased to see him again so soon. His explanation of why he hadn't
gone back to London from Chichester struck him as a little
unconvincing in the cold light of Mr. Rathbone-Sanders' eye. But
Amanda was manifestly excited by his return, and he told them his
impressions of Chichester and described the entertainment of the
evening guest at a country inn and suddenly produced his copy of the
REPUBLIC. "I found this in a book-shop," he said, "and I brought it
for you, because it describes one of the best dreams of aristocracy
there has ever been dreamt."
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from A Voyage to Abyssinia by Father Lobo: be built, fitted out with masts, sails, and cordage, and victualled
with bread, water, wine, sugar, vinegar, and oil. All this indeed
cannot be done out of one tree, but may out of several of the same
kind. They saw the trunk into planks, and sew them together with
thread which they spin out of the bark, and which they twist for the
cables; the leaves stitched together make the sails. This boat thus
equipped may be furnished with all necessaries from the same tree.
There is not a month in which the cocoa does not produce a bunch of
nuts, from twenty to fifty. At first sprouts out a kind of seed or
capsula, of a shape not unlike the scabbard of a scimitar, which
they cut, and place a vessel under, to receive the liquor that drops
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Hiero by Xenophon: your ears are sealed, since no one cares to speak evil against a
monarch to his face.
[23] Cf. Cic. "pro Arch." 20, "Themistoclem illum dixisse aiunt cum ex
eo quaereretur, 'quod acroama aut cujus vocem libentissime
audiret': 'ejus, a quo sua virtus optime praedicaretur.'"
Then Hiero: And what pleasure do you suppose mere abstinence from evil
words implies, when it is an open secret that those silent persons are
cherishing all evil thoughts against the tyrant?[24] What mirth, do
you imagine, is to be extracted from their panegyrics who are
suspected of bestowing praise out of mere flattery?
[24] "One knows plainly that these dumb attendants stand there like
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