| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Seraphita by Honore de Balzac: the facts were facts and the idea is indeed an idea, then he resumes
his wonted bearing, thinks of his worldly interests, obeys some envoy
of death and of oblivion whose dusky mantle covers like a pall an
ancient Humanity of which the moderns retain no memory. Man never
pauses; he goes his round, he vegetates until the appointed day when
his Axe falls. If this wave force, this pressure of bitter waters
prevents all progress, no doubt it also warns of death. Spirits
prepared by faith among the higher souls of earth can alone perceive
the mystic ladder of Jacob.
After listening to Seraphita's answer in which (being earnestly
questioned) she unrolled before their eyes a Divine Perspective,--as
Seraphita |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Critias by Plato: about such matters, we do not examine or analyze the painting; all that is
required is a sort of indistinct and deceptive mode of shadowing them
forth. But when a person endeavours to paint the human form we are quick
at finding out defects, and our familiar knowledge makes us severe judges
of any one who does not render every point of similarity. And we may
observe the same thing to happen in discourse; we are satisfied with a
picture of divine and heavenly things which has very little likeness to
them; but we are more precise in our criticism of mortal and human things.
Wherefore if at the moment of speaking I cannot suitably express my
meaning, you must excuse me, considering that to form approved likenesses
of human things is the reverse of easy. This is what I want to suggest to
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Resurrection by Leo Tolstoy: clattering of the chains became louder, and the convoy soldiers,
dressed in white blouses and carrying guns, came out into the
street and took their places in a large, exact circle in front of
the gate; this was evidently a usual, often-practised manoeuvre.
Then another command was given, and the prisoners began coming
out in couples, with flat, pancake-shaped caps on their shaved
heads and sacks over their shoulders, dragging their chained legs
and swinging one arm, while the other held up a sack.
First came the men condemned to hard labour, all dressed alike in
grey trousers and cloaks with marks on the back. All of
them--young and old, thin and fat, pale and red, dark and bearded
Resurrection |
