| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Seraphita by Honore de Balzac: the faculties of that Life; they could have only faint and confused
perceptions of it, suited to their weakness.
Were it not so, the thunder of the LIVING WORD, whose far-off tones
now reached their ears, and whose meaning entered their souls as life
unites with body,--one echo of that Word would have consumed their
being as a whirlwind of fire laps up a fragile straw.
Therefore they saw only that which their nature, sustained by the
strength of the SPIRIT, permitted them to see; they heard that only
which they were able to hear.
And yet, though thus protected, they shuddered when the Voice of the
anguished soul broke forth above them--the prayer of the SPIRIT
Seraphita |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Hermione's Little Group of Serious Thinkers by Don Marquis: I don't really LIKE discussions of Sex any more
than Mamma does. No really nice girl does.
But we advanced thinkers owe a duty to the race.
Not that the race is grateful. Especially the
lower classes.
It was only last week that I was endeavoring to
introduce the cook to some advanced ideas -- for her
own good, you know, and because one owes a spir-
itual duty to one's servants -- and she got angry and
gave notice.
The servant problem is frightful. It will have to
|
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Divine Comedy (translated by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow) by Dante Alighieri: So that as far as charity extends,
O'er it increases the eternal valour.
And the more people thitherward aspire,
More are there to love well, and more they love there,
And, as a mirror, one reflects the other.
And if my reasoning appease thee not,
Thou shalt see Beatrice; and she will fully
Take from thee this and every other longing.
Endeavour, then, that soon may be extinct,
As are the two already, the five wounds
That close themselves again by being painful."
The Divine Comedy (translated by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow) |
