| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Jungle Tales of Tarzan by Edgar Rice Burroughs: of discovering the Supreme Being, the Creator of all things.
As he traveled he reviewed, mentally, his armament--the
condition of his hunting knife, the number of his arrows,
the newness of the gut which strung his bow--he hefted
the war spear which had once been the pride of some black
warrior of Mbonga's tribe.
If he met God, Tarzan would be prepared. One could never
tell whether a grass rope, a war spear, or a poisoned arrow
would be most efficacious against an unfamiliar foe.
Tarzan of the Apes was quite content--if God wished to fight,
the ape-man had no doubt as to the outcome of the struggle.
The Jungle Tales of Tarzan |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Statesman by Plato: fellow-worker, Athene, seeds and plants by others. From these is derived
all that has helped to frame human life; since the care of the Gods, as I
was saying, had now failed men, and they had to order their course of life
for themselves, and were their own masters, just like the universal
creature whom they imitate and follow, ever changing, as he changes, and
ever living and growing, at one time in one manner, and at another time in
another. Enough of the story, which may be of use in showing us how
greatly we erred in the delineation of the king and the statesman in our
previous discourse.
YOUNG SOCRATES: What was this great error of which you speak?
STRANGER: There were two; the first a lesser one, the other was an error
Statesman |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Lily of the Valley by Honore de Balzac: account the dislikes and the affinities which result from the
diversity of organisms, and which sooner or later break all ties
between those who have not fully tried each other; if you add to this
the mistakes arising from the hopes of those who live more
particularly either by their minds, or by their hearts, or by action,
who either think, or feel, or act, and whose tendency is misunderstood
in the close association in which two persons, equal counterparts,
find themselves, you will have great indulgence for sorrows to which
the world is pitiless. Well, Lady Dudley gratified the instincts,
organs, appetites, the vices and virtues of the subtile matter of
which we are made; she was the mistress of the body; Madame de
The Lily of the Valley |
