| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Charmides by Plato: In this Dialogue may be noted (1) The Greek ideal of beauty and goodness,
the vision of the fair soul in the fair body, realised in the beautiful
Charmides; (2) The true conception of medicine as a science of the whole as
well as the parts, and of the mind as well as the body, which is playfully
intimated in the story of the Thracian; (3) The tendency of the age to
verbal distinctions, which here, as in the Protagoras and Cratylus, are
ascribed to the ingenuity of Prodicus; and to interpretations or rather
parodies of Homer or Hesiod, which are eminently characteristic of Plato
and his contemporaries; (4) The germ of an ethical principle contained in
the notion that temperance is 'doing one's own business,' which in the
Republic (such is the shifting character of the Platonic philosophy) is
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Phaedo by Plato: child within us to whom death is a sort of hobgoblin; him too we must
persuade not to be afraid when he is alone in the dark.
Socrates said: Let the voice of the charmer be applied daily until you
have charmed away the fear.
And where shall we find a good charmer of our fears, Socrates, when you are
gone?
Hellas, he replied, is a large place, Cebes, and has many good men, and
there are barbarous races not a few: seek for him among them all, far and
wide, sparing neither pains nor money; for there is no better way of
spending your money. And you must seek among yourselves too; for you will
not find others better able to make the search.
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from A Hero of Our Time by M.Y. Lermontov: it was a memorable year to me. He gave me a
great deal of trouble -- but there, let bygones be
bygones! . . . You see, it is true enough, there
are people like that, fated from birth to have all
sorts of strange things happening to them!"
"Strange?" I exclaimed, with an air of
curiosity, as I poured out some tea.
CHAPTER III
"WELL, then, I'll tell you," said Maksim
Maksimych. "About six versts from the
fortress there lived a certain 'friendly' prince.
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