| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Cavalry General by Xenophon: for giving them effect the officer will need perpetually to act as
circumstances require.[1] He must take in the situation at a glance,
and carry out unflinchingly whatever is expedient for the moment. To
set down in writing everything that he must do, is not a whit more
possible than to know the future as a whole.[2] But of all hints and
suggestions the most important to my mind is this: whatever you
determine to be right, with diligence endeavour to perform. For be it
tillage of the soil, or trading, or seafaring, or the art of ruling,
without pains applied to bring the matter to perfection, the best
theories in the world, the most correct conclusions, will be
fruitless.
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from A Midsummer Night's Dream by William Shakespeare: With Orenge-tawny bill.
The Throstle, with his note so true,
The Wren and little quill
Tyta. What Angell wakes me from my flowry bed?
Bot. The Finch, the Sparrow, and the Larke,
The plainsong Cuckow gray;
Whose note full many a man doth marke,
And dares not answere, nay.
For indeede, who would set his wit to so foolish a bird?
Who would giue a bird the lye, though he cry Cuckow,
neuer so?
A Midsummer Night's Dream |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Gentle Grafter by O. Henry: City was built between the Rio Grande and a deep wide arroyo that used
to be the old bed of the river. The bank between the stream and its
old bed was cracking and giving away, when we saw it, on account of
the high water caused by the rain. Andy looks at it a long time. That
man's intellects was never idle. And then he unfolds to me a
instantaneous idea that has occurred to him. Right there was organized
a trust; and we walked back into town and put it on the market.
"First we went to the main saloon in Bird City, called the Blue Snake,
and bought it. It cost us $1,200. And then we dropped in, casual, at
Mexican Joe's place, referred to the rain, and bought him out for
$500. The other one came easy at $400.
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