| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Ion by Plato: for a similar reason some rhapsodes, like Ion, are the interpreters of
single poets.
Ion is delighted at the notion of being inspired, and acknowledges that he
is beside himself when he is performing;--his eyes rain tears and his hair
stands on end. Socrates is of opinion that a man must be mad who behaves
in this way at a festival when he is surrounded by his friends and there is
nothing to trouble him. Ion is confident that Socrates would never think
him mad if he could only hear his embellishments of Homer. Socrates asks
whether he can speak well about everything in Homer. 'Yes, indeed he can.'
'What about things of which he has no knowledge?' Ion answers that he can
interpret anything in Homer. But, rejoins Socrates, when Homer speaks of
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Alcibiades I by Plato: would then be of different minds in successive instants?
ALCIBIADES: I begin to distrust myself, but still I do not suppose that I
should.
SOCRATES: You would feel no doubt; and for this reason--because you would
know?
ALCIBIADES: I suppose so.
SOCRATES: And the reason why you involuntarily contradict yourself is
clearly that you are ignorant?
ALCIBIADES: Very likely.
SOCRATES: And if you are perplexed in answering about just and unjust,
honourable and dishonourable, good and evil, expedient and inexpedient, the
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Tarzan the Untamed by Edgar Rice Burroughs: that the beast above him was Numa of the Wamabo pit.
Thus reassured, the ape-man spoke to the lion and at the
same time made a motion as though he would arise. Immedi-
ately Numa stepped from above him. As Tarzan raised his
head, he saw that he still lay where he had fallen before the
opening of the cliff where the girl had been sleeping and that
Numa, backed against the cliffside, was apparently defending
him from two other lions who paced to and fro a short
distance from their intended victim.
And then Tarzan turned his eyes into the cave and saw that
the girl and Smith-Oldwick were gone.
 Tarzan the Untamed |