| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Critias by Plato: things that are and move therein, and further, that knowing nothing precise
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
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from What is Man? by Mark Twain: O.M. Different results of the one Master Impulse: the
necessity of securing one's self approval. They wear diverse
clothes and are subject to diverse moods, but in whatsoever ways
they masquerade they are the SAME PERSON all the time. To change
the figure, the COMPULSION that moves a man--and there is but the
one--is the necessity of securing the contentment of his own
spirit. When it stops, the man is dead.
Y.M. That is foolishness. Love--
O.M. Why, love is that impulse, that law, in its most
uncompromising form. It will squander life and everything else
on its object. Not PRIMARILY for the object's sake, but for ITS
What is Man? |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne: pulling down by the other. Then the exercise would go on again _ad
infinitum_.
"Now," said my uncle, after having completed these preparations, "now
let us look to our loads. I will divide them into three lots; each of
us will strap one upon his back. I mean only fragile articles."
Of course, we were not included under that head.
"Hans," said he, "will take charge of the tools and a portion of the
provisions; you, Axel, will take another third of the provisions, and
the arms; and I will take the rest of the provisions and the delicate
instruments."
"But," said I, "the clothes, and that mass of ladders and ropes, what
Journey to the Center of the Earth |
