| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Master of the World by Jules Verne: apparently he could have traversed in three days. Did he then intend
to make only America the scene of his exploits? Ought we to conclude
from this that he was an American?
Let me insist upon this point. It seemed clear that the submarine
might easily have crossed the vast sea which separates the New and
the Old World. Not only would its amazing speed have made its voyage
short, in comparison to that of the swiftest steamship, but also it
would have escaped all the storms that make the voyage dangerous.
Tempests did not exist for it. It had but to abandon the surface of
the waves, and it could find absolute calm a few score feet beneath.
But the inventor had not crossed the Atlantic, and if he were to be
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Sophist by Plato: STRANGER: Under all things, I include you and me, and also animals and
trees.
THEAETETUS: What do you mean?
STRANGER: Suppose a person to say that he will make you and me, and all
creatures.
THEAETETUS: What would he mean by 'making'? He cannot be a husbandman;--
for you said that he is a maker of animals.
STRANGER: Yes; and I say that he is also the maker of the sea, and the
earth, and the heavens, and the gods, and of all other things; and,
further, that he can make them in no time, and sell them for a few pence.
THEAETETUS: That must be a jest.
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Lamentable Tragedy of Locrine and Mucedorus by William Shakespeare: Her palace, burnst with all devouring flames,
Her fifty sons and daughters fresh of hue
Murthered by wicked Pirrhus' bloody sword,
Shed such sad tears as I for Albanact.
CAMBER.
The grief of Niobe, fair Athen's queen,
For her seven sons, magnanimous in field,
For her seven daughters, fairer than the fairest,
Is not to be compared with my laments.
CORINEIUS.
In vain you sorrow for the slaughtered prince,
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