| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Philebus by Plato: classes, you may leave the further consideration of individuals. But you
must not pass at once either from unity to infinity, or from infinity to
unity. In music, for example, you may begin with the most general notion,
but this alone will not make you a musician: you must know also the number
and nature of the intervals, and the systems which are framed out of them,
and the rhythms of the dance which correspond to them. And when you have a
similar knowledge of any other subject, you may be said to know that
subject. In speech again there are infinite varieties of sound, and some
one who was a wise man, or more than man, comprehended them all in the
classes of mutes, vowels, and semivowels, and gave to each of them a name,
and assigned them to the art of grammar.
|
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge by Ambrose Bierce: them with a new interest as first one and then the other
pounced upon the noose at his neck. They tore it away and
thrust it fiercely aside, its undulations resembling those of
a water snake. "Put it back, put it back!" He thought he
shouted these words to his hands, for the undoing of the
noose had been succeeded by the direst pang that he had yet
experienced. His neck ached horribly; his brain was on fire,
his heart, which had been fluttering faintly, gave a great
leap, trying to force itself out at his mouth. His whole
body was racked and wrenched with an insupportable anguish!
But his disobedient hands gave no heed to the command. They
An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from On Horsemanship by Xenophon: good plan first to drag the foeman towards oneself, and then on a
sudden to thrust him off; that is a device to bring him to the
ground.[11] The correct plan for the man so dragged is to press his
horse forward: by which action the man who is being dragged is more
likely to unhorse his assailant than to be brought to the ground
himself.
[9] {ippota}. A poetic word; "cavaliers."
[10] Or, "manipulated."
[11] Or, "that may be spoken off as the 'purl trick'"; "it will
unhorse him if anything."
If it ever happens that you have an enemy's camp in front, and cavalry
On Horsemanship |
