| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Bickerstaff-Partridge Papers by Jonathan Swift: compass of the ensuing year; and peremptorily fixes the month,
day, and hour of our deaths: This, I think, is sporting with
great men, and publick spirits, to the scandal of religion, and
reproach of power; and if sovereign princes and astrologers must
make diversion for the vulgar ---- why then farewel, say I, to
all governments, ecclesiastical and civil. But, I thank my better
stars, I am alive to confront this false and audacious predictor,
and to make him rue the hour he ever affronted a man of science
and resentment. The Cardinal may take what measures he pleases
with him; as his excellency is a foreigner, and a papist, he has
no reason to rely on me for his justification; I shall only
|
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Pellucidar by Edgar Rice Burroughs: was something of a simplified language that had no
need for aught but nouns and verbs, but such words as
it included were the same as those of the human beings
of Pellucidar. It was amplified by many gestures which
filled in the speech-gaps.
I asked them what they intended doing with me; but,
like our own North American Indians when questioned
by a white man, they pretended not to understand me.
One of them swung me to his shoulder as lightly as if I
had been a shoat. He was a huge creature, as were his
fellows, standing fully seven feet upon his short legs and
Pellucidar |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Protagoras by Plato: foolish and worthless sons. Virtue, as we were saying, is not the private
possession of any man, but is shared by all, only however to the extent of
which each individual is by nature capable. And, as a matter of fact, even
the worst of civilized mankind will appear virtuous and just, if we compare
them with savages. (5) The error of Socrates lies in supposing that there
are no teachers of virtue, whereas all men are teachers in a degree. Some,
like Protagoras, are better than others, and with this result we ought to
be satisfied.
Socrates is highly delighted with the explanation of Protagoras. But he
has still a doubt lingering in his mind. Protagoras has spoken of the
virtues: are they many, or one? are they parts of a whole, or different
|
