| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne: upon the tenderest spot. The poor, as we have already said, whom
she sought out to be the objects of her bounty, often reviled the
hand that was stretched forth to succour them. Dames of elevated
rank, likewise, whose doors she entered in the way of her
occupation, were accustomed to distil drops of bitterness into
her heart; sometimes through that alchemy of quiet malice, by
which women can concoct a subtle poison from ordinary trifles;
and sometimes, also, by a coarser expression, that fell upon the
sufferer's defenceless breast like a rough blow upon an ulcerated
wound. Hester had schooled herself long and well; and she never
responded to these attacks, save by a flush of crimson that rose
The Scarlet Letter |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Passionate Pilgrim by William Shakespeare: My vow was earthly, thou a heavenly love:
Thy grace being gain'd cures all disgrace in me.
My vow was breath, and breath a vapour is;
Then, thou fair sun, that on this earth doth shine,
Exhale this vapour vow; in thee it is:
If broken, then it is no fault of mine.
If by me broke, what fool is not so wise
To break an oath, to win a paradise?
IV.
Sweet Cytherea, sitting by a brook
With young Adonis, lovely, fresh, and green,
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Parmenides by Plato: in which greatness is; and this too when the small itself is not there,
which the one, if it is great, must exceed; this, however, is impossible,
seeing that smallness is wholly absent.
True.
But absolute greatness is only greater than absolute smallness, and
smallness is only smaller than absolute greatness.
Very true.
Then other things not greater or less than the one, if they have neither
greatness nor smallness; nor have greatness or smallness any power of
exceeding or being exceeded in relation to the one, but only in relation to
one another; nor will the one be greater or less than them or others, if it
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