| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Boys' Life of Abraham Lincoln by Helen Nicolay: cabinet and a few other officials, made a little speech, and gave
him his commission. Grant replied with a few words, as modest as
they were brief, and in conversation afterward asked what special
duty was required of him. The President answered that the people
wanted him to take Richmond, and asked if he could do it. Grant
said that he could if he had the soldiers, and the President
promised that these would be furnished him. Grant did not stay in
Washington to enjoy the new honors of his high rank, but at once
set about preparations for his task. It proved a hard one. More
than a year passed before it was ended, and all the losses in
battle of the three years that had gone before seemed small in
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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: faint enthusiasm on our passage; weavers put their heads to the
windows; children cried out in ecstasy at sight of the two
'boaties' - BARGUETTES: and bloused pedestrians, who were
acquainted with our charioteer, jested with him on the nature of
his freight.
We had a shower or two, but light and flying. The air was clean
and sweet among all these green fields and green things growing.
There was not a touch of autumn in the weather. And when, at
Vadencourt, we launched from a little lawn opposite a mill, the sun
broke forth and set all the leaves shining in the valley of the
Oise.
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Anabasis by Xenophon: and was exiled from Athens. Sparta gave him land
and property in Scillus, where he lived for many
years before having to move once more, to settle
in Corinth. He died in 354 B.C.
The Anabasis is his story of the march to Persia
to aid Cyrus, who enlisted Greek help to try and
take the throne from Artaxerxes, and the ensuing
return of the Greeks, in which Xenophon played a
leading role. This occurred between 401 B.C. and
March 399 B.C.
PREPARER'S NOTE
 Anabasis |