| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Euthydemus by Plato: and give and sacrifice to any god whom you pleased, to be your own, and
that which you could not give or sell or sacrifice you would think not to
be in your own power?
Yes, I said (for I was certain that something good would come out of the
questions, which I was impatient to hear); yes, such things, and such
things only are mine.
Yes, he said, and you would mean by animals living beings?
Yes, I said.
You agree then, that those animals only are yours with which you have the
power to do all these things which I was just naming?
I agree.
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Secret Agent by Joseph Conrad: got to go too, to make room for the Future of the Proletariat. A
howl from all these intellectual idiots is bound to help forward
the labours of the Milan Conference. They will be writing to the
papers. Their indignation would be above suspicion, no material
interests being openly at stake, and it will alarm every
selfishness of the class which should be impressed. They believe
that in some mysterious way science is at the source of their
material prosperity. They do. And the absurd ferocity of such a
demonstration will affect them more profoundly than the mangling of
a whole street - or theatre - full of their own kind. To that last
they can always say: `Oh! it's mere class hate.' But what is one
The Secret Agent |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Crito by Plato: but of men. But if you go forth, returning evil for evil, and injury for
injury, breaking the covenants and agreements which you have made with us,
and wronging those whom you ought least of all to wrong, that is to say,
yourself, your friends, your country, and us, we shall be angry with you
while you live, and our brethren, the laws in the world below, will receive
you as an enemy; for they will know that you have done your best to destroy
us. Listen, then, to us and not to Crito.'
This, dear Crito, is the voice which I seem to hear murmuring in my ears,
like the sound of the flute in the ears of the mystic; that voice, I say,
is humming in my ears, and prevents me from hearing any other. And I know
that anything more which you may say will be vain. Yet speak, if you have
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