| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Vailima Prayers & Sabbath Morn by Robert Louis Stevenson: reason to trust. That evening the prayer seemed unusually short
and formal. As the singing stopped he arose abruptly and left the
room. I hastened after him, fearing some sudden illness. 'What is
it?' I asked. 'It is this,' was the reply; 'I am not yet fit to
say, "Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass
against us."'
It is with natural reluctance that I touch upon the last prayer of
my husband's life. Many have supposed that he showed, in the
wording of this prayer, that he had some premonition of his
approaching death. I am sure he had no such premonition. It was I
who told the assembled family that I felt an impending disaster
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Hidden Masterpiece by Honore de Balzac: that we cannot walk round her. She is a silhouette with only one side,
a semblance cut in outline, an image that can't turn nor change her
position. I feel no air between this arm and the background of the
picture; space and depth are wanting. All is in good perspective; the
atmospheric gradations are carefully observed, and yet in spite of
your conscientious labor I cannot believe that this beautiful body has
the warm breath of life. If I put my hand on that firm, round throat I
shall find it cold as marble. No, no, my friend, blood does not run
beneath that ivory skin; the purple tide of life does not swell those
veins, nor stir those fibres which interlace like net-work below the
translucent amber of the brow and breast. This part palpitates with
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Maria, or the Wrongs of Woman by Mary Wollstonecraft: CHAPTER 7
"ADDRESSING these memoirs to you, my child, uncertain whether I
shall ever have an opportunity of instructing you, many observations
will probably flow from my heart, which only a mother--a mother
schooled in misery, could make.
"The tenderness of a father who knew the world, might be great;
but could it equal that of a mother--of a mother, labouring under
a portion of the misery, which the constitution of society seems
to have entailed on all her kind? It is, my child, my dearest
daughter, only such a mother, who will dare to break through all
restraint to provide for your happiness--who will voluntarily
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