| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Gorgias by Plato: choose the one and avoid the other. But this, as Socrates observes, is a
return to the old doctrine of himself and Polus, that all things should be
done for the sake of the good.
Callicles assents to this, and Socrates, finding that they are agreed in
distinguishing pleasure from good, returns to his old division of empirical
habits, or shams, or flatteries, which study pleasure only, and the arts
which are concerned with the higher interests of soul and body. Does
Callicles agree to this division? Callicles will agree to anything, in
order that he may get through the argument. Which of the arts then are
flatteries? Flute-playing, harp-playing, choral exhibitions, the
dithyrambics of Cinesias are all equally condemned on the ground that they
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Black Dwarf by Walter Scott: Elliots hae been lang kend a gentle race."
"Hence! begone!" reiterated the Dwarf; "may the same evil luck
attend thee that thou hast left behind with me! If I go not with
you myself, see if you can escape what my attendants, Wrath and
Misery, have brought to thy threshold before thee."
"I wish ye wadna speak that gate," said Hobbie. "Ye ken
yoursell, Elshie, naebody judges you to be ower canny; now, I'll
tell ye just ae word for a'--ye hae spoken as muckle as wussing
ill to me and mine; now, if ony mischance happen to Grace, which
God forbid, or to mysell; or to the poor dumb tyke; or if I be
skaithed and injured in body, gudes, or gear, I'll no forget wha
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Travels with a Donkey in the Cevenne by Robert Louis Stevenson: collection of curiosities, and another a gallery of rabbits. For
in a Trappist monastery each monk has an occupation of his own
choice, apart from his religious duties and the general labours of
the house. Each must sing in the choir, if he has a voice and ear,
and join in the haymaking if he has a hand to stir; but in his
private hours, although he must be occupied, he may be occupied on
what he likes. Thus I was told that one brother was engaged with
literature; while Father Apollinaris busies himself in making
roads, and the Abbot employs himself in binding books. It is not
so long since this Abbot was consecrated, by the way; and on that
occasion, by a special grace, his mother was permitted to enter the
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