| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Critias by Plato: three javelin-men, and four sailors to make up the complement of twelve
hundred ships.
Each of the ten kings was absolute in his own city and kingdom. The
relations of the different governments to one another were determined by
the injunctions of Poseidon, which had been inscribed by the first kings on
a column of orichalcum in the temple of Poseidon, at which the kings and
princes gathered together and held a festival every fifth and every sixth
year alternately. Around the temple ranged the bulls of Poseidon, one of
which the ten kings caught and sacrificed, shedding the blood of the victim
over the inscription, and vowing not to transgress the laws of their father
Poseidon. When night came, they put on azure robes and gave judgment
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from A Simple Soul by Gustave Flaubert: village; his father had left Colleville and bought the farm of Les
Ecots, so that now they would be neighbours. "Ah!" she exclaimed. He
then added that his parents were looking around for a wife for him,
but that he, himself, was not so anxious and preferred to wait for a
girl who suited him. She hung her head. He then asked her whether she
had ever thought of marrying. She replied, smilingly, that it was
wrong of him to make fun of her. "Oh! no, I am in earnest," he said,
and put his left arm around her waist while they sauntered along. The
air was soft, the stars were bright, and the huge load of hay
oscillated in front of them, drawn by four horses whose ponderous
hoofs raised clouds of dust. Without a word from their driver they
A Simple Soul |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Fables by Robert Louis Stevenson: III - THE TWO MATCHES.
ONE day there was a traveller in the woods in California, in the
dry season, when the Trades were blowing strong. He had ridden a
long way, and he was tired and hungry, and dismounted from his
horse to smoke a pipe. But when he felt in his pocket he found but
two matches. He struck the first, and it would not light.
"Here is a pretty state of things!" said the traveller. "Dying for
a smoke; only one match left; and that certain to miss fire! Was
there ever a creature so unfortunate? And yet," thought the
traveller, "suppose I light this match, and smoke my pipe, and
shake out the dottle here in the grass - the grass might catch on
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