| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Soul of the Far East by Percival Lowell: present at the beginnings of human conversation. As it is now, our
linguistic learning is with most of us limited to a knowledge of
Aryan tongues, and in consequence we not only fall into the mistake
of thinking our way the only way, which is bad enough, but, what is
far worse, by not perceiving the other possible paths we quite fail
to appreciate the advantages or disadvantages of following our own.
We are the blind votaries of a species of ancestral language-worship,
which, with all its erudition, tends to narrow our linguistic scope.
A study of Japanese would free us from the fetters of any such
family infatuation. The inviolable rules and regulations of our
mother-tongue would be found to be of relative application only.
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Adam Bede by George Eliot: way he rolled from a rich deep forte into a melancholy cadence,
subsiding, at the end of the last word, into a sort of faint
resonance, like the lingering vibrations of a fine violoncello, I
can compare to nothing for its strong calm melancholy but the rush
and cadence of the wind among the autumn boughs. This may seem a
strange mode of speaking about the reading of a parish clerk--a
man in rusty spectacles, with stubbly hair, a large occiput, and a
prominent crown. But that is Nature's way: she will allow a
gentleman of splendid physiognomy and poetic aspirations to sing
woefully out of tune, and not give him the slightest hint of it;
and takes care that some narrow-browed fellow, trolling a ballad
Adam Bede |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Idylls of the King by Alfred Tennyson: Or whether it be the maiden's fantasy,
And whether she be mad, or else the King,
Or both or neither, or thyself be mad,
I ask not: but thou strikest a strong stroke,
For strong thou art and goodly therewithal,
And saver of my life; and therefore now,
For here be mighty men to joust with, weigh
Whether thou wilt not with thy damsel back
To crave again Sir Lancelot of the King.
Thy pardon; I but speak for thine avail,
The saver of my life.'
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