| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Protagoras by Plato: with the rational interpretation of the rest of the poem. The opposition
of (Greek) and (Greek) seems also intended to express the rival doctrines
of Socrates and Protagoras, and is a facetious commentary on their
differences. (4) The general treatment in Plato both of the Poets and the
Sophists, who are their interpreters, and whom he delights to identify with
them. (5) The depreciating spirit in which Socrates speaks of the
introduction of the poets as a substitute for original conversation, which
is intended to contrast with Protagoras' exaltation of the study of them--
this again is hardly consistent with the serious defence of Simonides. (6)
the marked approval of Hippias, who is supposed at once to catch the
familiar sound, just as in the previous conversation Prodicus is
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Land that Time Forgot by Edgar Rice Burroughs: was entirely free from dangerous reptiles, because, as I later
discovered, they became immediately dormant when subjected to a much
lower temperature than 70 degrees Fahrenheit. They dislike cold water
and keep as far away from it as possible. There were countless
brook-trout here, and deep holes that invited us to bathe, and along
the bank of the stream were trees bearing a close resemblance to
ash and beech and oak, their characteristics evidently induced by
the lower temperature of the air above the cold water and by the
fact that their roots were watered by the water from the stream
rather than from the warm springs which we afterward found in such
abundance elsewhere.
The Land that Time Forgot |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Eryxias by Platonic Imitator: definition.
SOCRATES: Then now we have to consider, What is money? Or else later on
we shall be found to differ about the question. For instance, the
Carthaginians use money of this sort. Something which is about the size of
a stater is tied up in a small piece of leather: what it is, no one knows
but the makers. A seal is next set upon the leather, which then passes
into circulation, and he who has the largest number of such pieces is
esteemed the richest and best off. And yet if any one among us had a mass
of such coins he would be no wealthier than if he had so many pebbles from
the mountain. At Lacedaemon, again, they use iron by weight which has been
rendered useless: and he who has the greatest mass of such iron is thought
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