| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Dream Life and Real Life by Olive Schreiner: above the snow two tiny, quivering green leaves. Spring cannot fail us.
There were other flowers in the box once; a bunch of white acacia flowers,
gathered by the strong hand of a man, as we passed down a village street on
a sultry afternoon, when it had rained, and the drops fell on us from the
leaves of the acacia trees. The flowers were damp; they made mildew marks
on the paper I folded them in. After many years I threw them away. There
is nothing of them left in the box now, but a faint, strong smell of dried
acacia, that recalls that sultry summer afternoon; but the rose is in the
box still.
It is many years ago now; I was a girl of fifteen, and I went to visit in a
small up-country town. It was young in those days, and two days' journey
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Blue Flower by Henry van Dyke: opportunity of a lifetime, yes, of an age, perhaps of many
ages, came to me. I simply could not throw it away. I must
use it, make the best of it, at any danger, at any cost. You
shall judge for yourself whether I was right or wrong. But you
must judge fairly, without haste, without prejudice. I ask you
to make me one promise. You will suspend judgment, you will say
nothing, you will keep my secret, until you have been with me
three times at the place where I am now taking you."
By this time it was clear to me that I had to do with a
case lying far outside of the common routine of life;
something subtle, abnormal, hard to measure, in which a clear
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Barlaam and Ioasaph by St. John of Damascus: sense to see that my whole body doth not attain to the bulk of
ostrich eggs. How then could I contain such a pearl?"'
"Thus senseless, then, are also they that trust in idols: for
these be their handiwork, and they worship that which their
fingers made, saying, `These be our creators.' How then deem
they their creators those which have been formed and fashioned by
themselves? Nay more, they safeguard their gods, lest they be
stolen by thieves, and yet they call them guardians of their
safety. And yet what folly not to know that they, which be
unable to guard and aid themselves, can in no wise guard and save
others! `For' saith he, `why, on behalf of the living, should
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