| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Philebus by Plato: will await us': i.e. if we assert mind to be the author of nature. Let us
note the remarkable words, 'That in the divine nature of Zeus there is the
soul and mind of a King, because there is in him the power of the cause,' a
saying in which theology and philosophy are blended and reconciled; not
omitting to observe the deep insight into human nature which is shown by
the repetition of the same thought 'All philosophers are agreed that mind
is the king of heaven and earth' with the ironical addition, 'in this way
truly they magnify themselves.' Nor let us pass unheeded the indignation
felt by the generous youth at the 'blasphemy' of those who say that Chaos
and Chance Medley created the world; or the significance of the words
'those who said of old time that mind rules the universe'; or the pregnant
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Silverado Squatters by Robert Louis Stevenson: sky declined from its first bewildering splendour into the
appearance of a common night. Slowly this change proceeded,
and still there was no sign of any cause. Then a whiteness
like mist was thrown over the spurs of the mountain. Yet a
while, and, as we turned a corner, a great leap of silver
light and net of forest shadows fell across the road and upon
our wondering waggonful; and, swimming low among the trees,
we beheld a strange, misshapen, waning moon, half-tilted on
her back.
"Where are ye when the moon appears?" so the old poet sang,
half-taunting, to the stars, bent upon a courtly purpose.
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The First Men In The Moon by H. G. Wells: still paved in places, starts like an arrow to the north. I used to stand
on the hill and think of it all, the galleys and legions, the captives and
officials, the women and traders, the speculators like myself, all the
swarm and tumult that came clanking in and out of the harbour. And now
just a few lumps of rubble on a grassy slope, and a sheep or two - and me
And where the port had been were the levels of the marsh, sweeping round
in a broad curve to distant Jungeness, and dotted here and there with tree
clumps and the church towers of old medical towns that are following
Lemanus now towards extinction.
That outlook on the marsh was, indeed, one of the finest views I have ever
seen. I suppose Jungeness was fifteen miles away; it lay like a raft on
The First Men In The Moon |
