| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Madame Firmiani by Honore de Balzac: farther. Love, to a woman, means boundless confidence, united to a
need of reverencing, of esteeming, the being to whom she belongs.
I have never conceived of love otherwise than as a fire in which
all noble feelings are purified still more,--a fire which develops
them.
"'I have but one thing else to say: come to me poor, and my love
shall be redoubled. If not, renounce it. Should I see you no more,
I shall know what it means.
"'But I do not wish, understand me, that you should make
restitution because I urge it. Consult your own conscience. An act
of justice such as that ought not to be a sacrifice made to love.
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from On Horsemanship by Xenophon: the smooth bit, the effect of which is to make him open his mouth, and
drop the mouthpiece. It is possible to make the rough bit of every
degree of roughness by keeping it slack or taut.
[4] See Morgan, op. cit. p. 144 foll.
But, whatever the type of bit may be, let it in any case be flexible.
If it be stiff, at whatever point the horse seizes it he must take it
up bodily against his jaws; just as it does not matter at what point a
man takes hold of a bar of iron,[5] he lifts it as a whole. The other
flexibly constructed type acts like a chain (only the single point at
which you hold it remains stiff, the rest hangs loose); and while
perpetually hunting for the portion which escapes him, he lets the
On Horsemanship |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Devil's Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce: as commonly interpreted, the right to vote for the man of another
man's choice, and is highly prized. Refusal to do so has the bad name
of "incivism." The incivilian, however, cannot be properly arraigned
for his crime, for there is no legitimate accuser. If the accuser is
himself guilty he has no standing in the court of opinion; if not, he
profits by the crime, for A's abstention from voting gives greater
weight to the vote of B. By female suffrage is meant the right of a
woman to vote as some man tells her to. It is based on female
responsibility, which is somewhat limited. The woman most eager to
jump out of her petticoat to assert her rights is first to jump back
into it when threatened with a switching for misusing them.
The Devil's Dictionary |
