| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Economist by Xenophon: and allowed of no improvement; and where there is no prospect of
improvement, more than half the pleasure to be got from the possession
vanishes. The height of happiness was, he maintained, to see your
purchase, be it dead chattel or live animal,[33] go on improving daily
under your own eyes.[34] Now, nothing shows a larger increase[35] than
a piece of land reclaimed from barren waste and bearing fruit a
hundredfold. I can assure you, Socrates, many is the farm which my
father and I made worth I do not know how many times more than its
original value. And then, Socrates, this valuable invention[36] is so
easy to learn that you who have but heard it know and understand it as
well as I myself do, and can go away and teach it to another if you
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Poems of William Blake by William Blake: And kisses me, and binds his nuptial bands around my breast.
And says; Thou mother of my children, I have loved thee
And I have given thee a crown that none can take away.
But how this is sweet maid, I know not, and I cannot know
I ponder, and I cannot ponder; yet I live and love.
The daughter of beauty wip'd her pitying tears with her white veil,
And said, Alas! I knew not this, and therefore did I weep:
That God would love a Worm I knew, and punish the evil foot
That wilful bruis'd its helpless form: but that he cherish'd it
With milk and oil I never knew, and therefore did I weep,
And I complaind in the mild air, because I fade away.
Poems of William Blake |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Large Catechism by Dr. Martin Luther: reproved, in order that they may learn to know themselves and amend
before the punishment begins, they become mad and foolish so as to
fairly merit wrath, as now we see daily in bishops and princes.
But terrible as are these threatenings, so much the more powerful is
the consolation in the promise, that those who cling to God alone
should be sure that He will show them mercy that is, show them pure
goodness and blessing not only for themselves, but also to their
children and children's children, even to the thousandth generation and
beyond that. This ought certainly to move and impel us to risk our
hearts in all confidence with God, if we wish all temporal and eternal
good, since the Supreme Majesty makes such sublime offers and presents
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