| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Eryxias by Platonic Imitator: ERASISTRATUS: He does.
SOCRATES: And are not the healthy richer than the sick, since health is a
possession more valuable than riches to the sick? Surely there is no one
who would not prefer to be poor and well, rather than to have all the King
of Persia's wealth and to be ill. And this proves that men set health
above wealth, else they would never choose the one in preference to the
other.
ERASISTRATUS: True.
SOCRATES: And if anything appeared to be more valuable than health, he
would be the richest who possessed it?
ERASISTRATUS: He would.
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Somebody's Little Girl by Martha Young: drift away--and to so nearly get lost, living only in dimming
memory.
These little girls in all sorts of clothes were real, and sure-
enough, and nobody could ever say of them, ``There are no such
little girls in the world,'' because sometimes when Bessie Bell would
get to thinking, and thinking about the strangeness of them, she
would almost wonder if she did not just remember them. When she
would give one just a little pinch to see if that one was a real
sure-enough little girl, why that little girl would say, ``Don't.''
She would say ``Don't!'' just the same as a little girl in the row of
little girls all with blue checked aprons would say ``Don't,'' if you
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Sesame and Lilies by John Ruskin: to strive to promote the one, and to conquer the other, with as
hearty endeavour as if there were, indeed, no other world than this.
Above all, get quit of the absurd idea that Heaven will interfere to
correct great errors, while allowing its laws to take their course
in punishing small ones. If you prepare a dish of food carelessly,
you do not expect Providence to make it palatable; neither if,
through years of folly, you misguide your own life, need you expect
Divine interference to bring round everything at last for the best.
I tell you, positively, the world is not so constituted: the
consequences of great mistakes are just as sure as those of small
ones, and the happiness of your whole life, and of all the lives
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