| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Seraphita by Honore de Balzac: "Yes, I have seen the causes," said Seraphitus, lowing his large
eyelids.
"By what power?" asked the curious Minna.
"I have the gift of Specialism," he answered. "Specialism is an inward
sight which can penetrate all things; you will only understand its
full meaning through a comparison. In the great cities of Europe where
works are produced by which the human Hand seeks to represent the
effects of the moral nature was well as those of the physical nature,
there are glorious men who express ideas in marble. The sculptor acts
on the stone; he fashions it; he puts a realm of ideas into it. There
are statues which the hand of man has endowed with the faculty of
Seraphita |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Meno by Plato: perfect holiness. 'For in the ninth year Persephone sends the souls of
those from whom she has received the penalty of ancient crime back again
from beneath into the light of the sun above, and these are they who become
noble kings and mighty men and great in wisdom and are called saintly
heroes in after ages.' The soul, then, as being immortal, and having been
born again many times, and having seen all things that exist, whether in
this world or in the world below, has knowledge of them all; and it is no
wonder that she should be able to call to remembrance all that she ever
knew about virtue, and about everything; for as all nature is akin, and the
soul has learned all things; there is no difficulty in her eliciting or as
men say learning, out of a single recollection all the rest, if a man is
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Little Rivers by Henry van Dyke: in Love again, (which is a great Passion, and therefore, I hope, I
have done with it,) it would be, I think, with Prettiness, rather
than with Majestical Beauty. I would neither wish that my
Mistress, nor my Fortune, should be a Bona Roba, as Homer uses to
describe his Beauties, like a daughter of great Jupiter for the
stateliness and largeness of her Person, but as Lucretius says:
'Parvula, pumilio, [Greek text omitted], tota merum sal.'"
Now in talking about women it is prudent to disguise a prejudice
like this, in the security of a dead language, and to intrench it
behind a fortress of reputable authority. But in lowlier and less
dangerous matters, such as we are now concerned with, one may dare
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