| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Lesser Hippias by Plato: HIPPIAS: I would rather have eyes which voluntarily blink.
SOCRATES: Then in your own case you deem that which voluntarily acts ill,
better than that which involuntarily acts ill?
HIPPIAS: Yes, certainly, in cases such as you mention.
SOCRATES: And does not the same hold of ears, nostrils, mouth, and of all
the senses--those which involuntarily act ill are not to be desired, as
being defective; and those which voluntarily act ill are to be desired as
being good?
HIPPIAS: I agree.
SOCRATES: And what would you say of instruments;--which are the better
sort of instruments to have to do with?--those with which a man acts ill
|
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Protagoras by Plato: of ours, and men such as we profess to be, do not require the help of
another's voice, or of the poets whom you cannot interrogate about the
meaning of what they are saying; people who cite them declaring, some that
the poet has one meaning, and others that he has another, and the point
which is in dispute can never be decided. This sort of entertainment they
decline, and prefer to talk with one another, and put one another to the
proof in conversation. And these are the models which I desire that you
and I should imitate. Leaving the poets, and keeping to ourselves, let us
try the mettle of one another and make proof of the truth in conversation.
If you have a mind to ask, I am ready to answer; or if you would rather, do
you answer, and give me the opportunity of resuming and completing our
|
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Melmoth Reconciled by Honore de Balzac: would weary the life out of an angel with complainings, who pray till
(if their prayers are heard in heaven) they must exhaust the patience
of the Almighty, and say everything that is bad of their husbands in
dovelike murmurs over a game of boston with their neighbors. When
Aquilina learned all these troubles she clung still more
affectionately to Castanier, and made him so happy, varying with
woman's ingenuity the pleasures with which she filled his life, that
all unwittingly she was the cause of the cashier's downfall.
Like many women who seem by nature destined to sound all the depths of
love, Mme. de la Garde was disinterested. She asked neither for gold
nor for jewelry, gave no thought to the future, lived entirely for the
|
