| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Sophist by Plato: determinations of thought, or 'categories' as they may be termed, have been
handed down to us, really different from that in which other words have
come down to us? Have they not been equally subject to accident, and are
they not often used by Hegel himself in senses which would have been quite
unintelligible to their original inventors--as for example, when he speaks
of the 'ground' of Leibnitz ('Everything has a sufficient ground') as
identical with his own doctrine of the 'notion' (Wallace's Hegel), or the
'Being and Not-being' of Heracleitus as the same with his own 'Becoming'?
As the historical order of thought has been adapted to the logical, so we
have reason for suspecting that the Hegelian logic has been in some degree
adapted to the order of thought in history. There is unfortunately no
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Koran: to! God elects for Himself whom He pleases and guides unto Himself him
who turns repentant.
But they did not part into sects until after the knowledge had
come to them, through mutual envy; and had it not been for thy
Lord's word already passed for an appointed time, it would surely have
been decided between them; but, verily, those who have been given
the Book as an inheritance after them, are in hesitating doubt
concerning it.
Wherefore call thou, and go straight on as thou art bidden, and
follow not their lusts; and say, 'I believe in the Book which God
has sent down; and I am bidden to judge justly between you. God is our
The Koran |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Laches by Plato: say you of the matter of which we were beginning to speak--the art of
fighting in armour? Is that a practice in which the lads may be
advantageously instructed?
SOCRATES: I will endeavour to advise you, Lysimachus, as far as I can in
this matter, and also in every way will comply with your wishes; but as I
am younger and not so experienced, I think that I ought certainly to hear
first what my elders have to say, and to learn of them, and if I have
anything to add, then I may venture to give my opinion to them as well as
to you. Suppose, Nicias, that one or other of you begin.
NICIAS: I have no objection, Socrates; and my opinion is that the
acquirement of this art is in many ways useful to young men. It is an
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