| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Vision Splendid by William MacLeod Raine: retorted ironically.
"Now is the best time. I may not see you this evening."
"Oh, it's to be this evening, is it?"
"To the best of my belief and hope."
His complacency struck a spark from her. "You needn't be so cock
sure. I daresay she won't have you."
His smile took her into his confidence. "That's what I'm afraid of
myself, but I daren't let her see it."
"That sounds better."
"I think she wants to eat her cake and have it, too."
"Meaning, please?"
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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: leaf in the forget-me-not. A symphony in forget-me-not; I think
Theophile Gautier might thus have characterised that two days'
panorama. The sky was blue and cloudless; and the sliding surface
of the river held up, in smooth places, a mirror to the heaven and
the shores. The washerwomen hailed us laughingly; and the noise of
trees and water made an accompaniment to our dozing thoughts, as we
fleeted down the stream.
The great volume, the indefatigable purpose of the river, held the
mind in chain. It seemed now so sure of its end, so strong and
easy in its gait, like a grown man full of determination. The surf
was roaring for it on the sands of Havre.
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Alexandria and her Schools by Charles Kingsley: except an allegoric one. But has he thrown them away for the sake of
getting a step nearer to Socrates, or Plato, or Aristotle? Surely not.
To them, as to the old Jewish sages, man is most important when regarded
not merely as a soul, but as a man, a social being of flesh and blood.
Aristotle declares politics to be the architectonical science, the
family and social relations to be the eternal master-facts of humanity.
Plato, in his Republic, sets before himself the Constitution of a State,
as the crowning problem of his philosophy. Every work of his, like
every saying of his master Socrates, deals with the common, outward,
vulgar facts of human life, and asserts that there is a divine meaning
in them, and that reverent induction from them is the way to obtain the
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