| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Crito by Plato: deliberation is over, and there is only one thing to be done, which must be
done this very night, and if we delay at all will be no longer practicable
or possible; I beseech you therefore, Socrates, be persuaded by me, and do
as I say.
SOCRATES: Dear Crito, your zeal is invaluable, if a right one; but if
wrong, the greater the zeal the greater the danger; and therefore we ought
to consider whether I shall or shall not do as you say. For I am and
always have been one of those natures who must be guided by reason,
whatever the reason may be which upon reflection appears to me to be the
best; and now that this chance has befallen me, I cannot repudiate my own
words: the principles which I have hitherto honoured and revered I still
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Song of Hiawatha by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: With reserve he thus made answer:
"Let me first consult the others,
Let me ask the other beavers."
Down he sank into the water,
Heavily sank he, as a stone sinks,
Down among the leaves and branches,
Brown and matted at the bottom.
On the dam stood Pau-Puk-Keewis,
O'er his ankles flowed the streamlet,
Spouted through the chinks below him,
Dashed upon the stones beneath him,
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Cratylus by Plato: anticipating the solution of the mediaeval controversy of Nominalism and
Realism. He is aware too that languages exist in various degrees of
perfection, and that the analysis of them can only be carried to a certain
point. 'If we could always, or almost always, use likenesses, which are
the appropriate expressions, that would be the most perfect state of
language.' These words suggest a question of deeper interest than the
origin of language; viz. what is the ideal of language, how far by any
correction of their usages existing languages might become clearer and more
expressive than they are, more poetical, and also more logical; or whether
they are now finally fixed and have received their last impress from time
and authority.
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