| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from A Voyage to Arcturus by David Lindsay: "This seems. to me a terrible valley, in which anything may happen."
"Don't torment yourself about Digrung. The valleys belong by right
to the phaens - the men here are interlopers. It is a good work to
remove them."
Maskull continued thoughtful. "I say no more, but I see I will have
to be cautious. What did you mean about my helping you with my
luck?"
"Your luck is fast weakening, but it may still be strong enough to
serve me. Together we will search for Threal."
"Search for Threal - why, is it so hard to find?"
"I have told you that my whole life has been spent in the quest."
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Art of Writing by Robert Louis Stevenson: pitched in London, on the sea-coast of Bohemia, or away on
the mountains of Beulah. And by an odd and luminous
accident, if there is any page of literature calculated to
awake the envy of M. Zola, it must be that TROILUS AND
CRESSIDA which Shakespeare, in a spasm of unmanly anger with
the world, grafted on the heroic story of the siege of Troy.
This question of realism, let it then be clearly understood,
regards not in the least degree the fundamental truth, but
only the technical method, of a work of art. Be as ideal or
as abstract as you please, you will be none the less
veracious; but if you be weak, you run the risk of being
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Agesilaus by Xenophon: bear away the palm of victory in conquests noble and magnificent;
living and in death to him belongs transcendent fame.
[9] I.e. "for the games."
[10] I.e. "at Olympia." Cynisca, according to Pausanias (iii. 8), was
the first woman who won a prize at Olympia. See also Plut. "Ages."
xx. (Clough, iv. p. 23).
X
It is as possessiong qualities such as these that I praise Agesilaus.
And in these matters he was not like a man who chances upon a treasure
and thereby becomes wealthier, albeit none the more skilful in
economy; nor yet like him who, when a plague has fallen upon an enemy,
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