| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Dark Lady of the Sonnets by George Bernard Shaw: sonnets addressed to Pembroke, extravagant as it now seems, is the
language of compliment and fashion, transfigured no doubt by
Shakespear's verbal magic, and hyperbolical, as Shakespear always
seems to people who cannot conceive so vividly as he, but still
unmistakable for anything else than the expression of a friendship
delicate enough to be wounded, and a manly loyalty deep enough to be
outraged. But the language of the sonnets to the Dark Lady is the
language of passion: their cruelty shews it. There is no evidence
that Shakespear was capable of being unkind in cold blood. But in his
revulsions from love, he was bitter, wounding, even ferocious; sparing
neither himself nor the unfortunate woman whose only offence was that
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Damnation of Theron Ware by Harold Frederic: I should have been such an ignorant and unimaginative clod
of earth, content with such petty ambitions and actually
proud of my limitations."
"And you have larger ambitions now?" asked the other.
"Pray let me help you to some potatoes. I am afraid
that ambitions only get in our way and trip us up.
We clergymen are like street-car horses. The more
steadily we jog along between the rails, the better it is
for us."
"Oh, I don't intend to remain in the ministry,"
declared Theron. The statement seemed to him a little bald,
The Damnation of Theron Ware |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Crito by Plato: administer the state, and still remains, has entered into an implied
contract that he will do as we command him. And he who disobeys us is, as
we maintain, thrice wrong: first, because in disobeying us he is
disobeying his parents; secondly, because we are the authors of his
education; thirdly, because he has made an agreement with us that he will
duly obey our commands; and he neither obeys them nor convinces us that our
commands are unjust; and we do not rudely impose them, but give him the
alternative of obeying or convincing us;--that is what we offer, and he
does neither.
'These are the sort of accusations to which, as we were saying, you,
Socrates, will be exposed if you accomplish your intentions; you, above all
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