| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Laches by Plato: confession, have been ill-educated, as is further shown by the circumstance
that Lysimachus, the friend of Sophroniscus, has never heard of the fame of
Socrates, his son; they belong to different circles. In the Meno their
want of education in all but the arts of riding and wrestling is adduced as
a proof that virtue cannot be taught. The recognition of Socrates by
Lysimachus is extremely graceful; and his military exploits naturally
connect him with the two generals, of whom one has witnessed them. The
characters of Nicias and Laches are indicated by their opinions on the
exhibition of the man fighting in heavy armour. The more enlightened
Nicias is quite ready to accept the new art, which Laches treats with
ridicule, seeming to think that this, or any other military question, may
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Father Damien by Robert Louis Stevenson: every inch of length in the pipe of an organ, deepens the note of
the impression; for what daunts the onlooker is that monstrous sum
of human suffering by which he stands surrounded. Lastly, no
doctor or nurse is called upon to enter once for all the doors of
that gehenna; they do not say farewell, they need not abandon hope,
on its sad threshold; they but go for a time to their high calling,
and can look forward as they go to relief, to recreation, and to
rest. But Damien shut-to with his own hand the doors of his own
sepulchre.
I shall now extract three passages from my diary at Kalawao.
A. "Damien is dead and already somewhat ungratefully remembered in
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Market-Place by Harold Frederic: These were chiefly of a sprightly nature, and when Julia
laughed over them he felt that she was very near to him indeed.
Thus they saw Paris together--where Thorpe did relinquish
some of the multiplied glories of the Louvre to sit
in front of a cafe by the Opera House and see the funny
people go past--and thence, by Bruges and Antwerp,
to Holland, where nobody could have imagined there were
as many pictures as Thorpe saw with his own weary eyes.
There were wonderful old buildings at Lubeck for Julia's
eyes to glisten over, and pictures at Berlin, Dresden,
and Dusseldorf for Alfred.
The Market-Place |
