| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Cavalry General by Xenophon: men, will you succeed, unless, under God's blessing, these same men
have been prepared and made ready to meet their officer in a friendly
spirit. They must come to look upon him as of greater sagacity than
themselves in all that concerns encounter with the enemy. This
friendly disposition on the part of his subordinates, one must
suppose, will best be fostered by a corresponding sympathy on the part
of their commander towards the men themselves, and that not by simple
kindness but by the obvious pains he takes on their behalf, at one
time to provide them with food, and at another to secure safety of
retreat, or again by help of outposts and the like, to ensure
protection during rest and sleep.
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Perfect Wagnerite: A Commentary on the Niblung's Ring by George Bernard Shaw: his type, our manifold nature was so marked in him that he was
like several different men rolled into one. When he had exhausted
himself in the character of the most pugnacious, aggressive, and
sanguine of reformers, he rested himself as a Pessimist and
Ninanist. In The Ring the quietism of Brynhild's "Rest, rest,
thou God" is sublime in its deep conviction; but you have only to
turn back the pages to find the irrepressible bustle of Siegfried
and the revelry of the clansmen expressed with equal zest. Wagner
was not a Schopenhaurite every day in the week, nor even a
Wagnerite. His mind changes as often as his mood. On Monday
nothing will ever induce him to return to quilldriving: on
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from A Second Home by Honore de Balzac: supported by the Count and her rival, whom she instinctively pushed
away with a gesture of contempt. Mademoiselle de Bellefeuille rose to
withdraw.
"You are at home, madame," said Granville, taking Caroline by the arm.
"Stay."
The Judge took up his wife in his arms, carried her to the carriage,
and got into it with her.
"Who is it that has brought you to the point of wishing me dead, of
resolving to fly?" asked the Countess, looking at her husband with
grief mingled with indignation. "Was I not young? you thought me
pretty--what fault have you to find with me? Have I been false to you?
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