| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Twenty Years After by Alexandre Dumas: be avoided."
Mazarin bit his lips; the blow was direct and he replied
rather dryly:
"All this appears to me to be ill conceived, disjointed,
gentlemen; for if I satisfy some I shall displease others.
If I stay in Paris I cannot go to Rome; if I became pope I
could not continue to be prime minister; and it is only by
continuing prime minister that I can make Monsieur
d'Artagnan a captain and Monsieur du Vallon a baron."
"True"" said Aramis, "so, as I am in a minority, I withdraw
my proposition, so far as it relates to the voyage to Rome
Twenty Years After |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from A Modest Proposal by Jonathan Swift: something of that kind shall be advanced in contradiction to my
scheme, and offering a better, I desire the author or authors
will be pleased maturely to consider two points. First, As things
now stand, how they will be able to find food and raiment for a
hundred thousand useless mouths and backs. And secondly, There
being a round million of creatures in humane figure throughout
this kingdom, whose whole subsistence put into a common stock,
would leave them in debt two million of pounds sterling, adding
those who are beggars by profession, to the bulk of farmers,
cottagers and labourers, with their wives and children, who are
beggars in effect; I desire those politicians who dislike my
A Modest Proposal |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Timaeus by Plato: relegated the world to the sphere of not-being, he admits creation to have
an existence which is real and even eternal, although dependent on the will
of the creator. Instead of maintaining the doctrine that the void has a
necessary place in the existence of the world, he rather affirms the modern
thesis that nature abhors a vacuum, as in the Sophist he also denies the
reality of not-being (Aristot. Metaph.). But though in these respects he
differs from them, he is deeply penetrated by the spirit of their
philosophy; he differs from them with reluctance, and gladly recognizes the
'generous depth' of Parmenides (Theaet.).
There is a similarity between the Timaeus and the fragments of Philolaus,
which by some has been thought to be so great as to create a suspicion that
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