| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Boys' Life of Abraham Lincoln by Helen Nicolay: purposes, I have desired that all my works and acts may be
according to His will, and that it might be so I have sought His
aid; but if, after endeavoring to do my best in the light which
he affords me, I find my efforts fail, I must believe that for
some purpose unknown to me, He wills it otherwise. If I had had
my way, this war would never have been commenced. If I had been
allowed my way, this war would have been ended before this; but
we find it still continues, and we must believe that He permits
it for some wise purpose of His own, mysterious and unknown to
us; and though with our limited understandings we may not be able
to comprehend it, yet we cannot but believe that He who made the
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Complete Poems of Longfellow by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: Holding its lantern o'er the restless surge.
Like the great giant Christopher it stands
Upon the brink of the tempestuous wave,
Wading far out among the rocks and sands,
The night-o'ertaken mariner to save.
And the great ships sail outward and return,
Bending and bowing o'er the billowy swells,
And ever joyful, as they see it burn,
They wave their silent welcomes and farewells.
They come forth from the darkness, and their sails
Gleam for a moment only in the blaze,
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Maid Marian by Thomas Love Peacock: him ghostly counsel."
"You well remember," said Robin Hood, "the sorrowful knight who dined
with us here twelve months and a day gone by."
"Well do I," said Friar Tuck. "His lands were in jeopardy with a
certain abbot, who would allow him no longer day for their redemption.
Whereupon you lent to him the four hundred pounds which he needed,
and which he was to repay this day, though he had no better security
to give than our Lady the Virgin."
"I never desired better," said Robin, "for she never yet failed
to send me my pay; and here is one of her own flock, this faithful and
well-favoured monk of St. Mary's, hath brought it me duly, principal and
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