| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Apology by Plato: of learning about mind and nature, he shows a less kindly feeling, which is
also the feeling of Plato in other passages (Laws). But Anaxagoras had
been dead thirty years, and was beyond the reach of persecution.
It has been remarked that the prophecy of a new generation of teachers who
would rebuke and exhort the Athenian people in harsher and more violent
terms was, as far as we know, never fulfilled. No inference can be drawn
from this circumstance as to the probability of the words attributed to him
having been actually uttered. They express the aspiration of the first
martyr of philosophy, that he would leave behind him many followers,
accompanied by the not unnatural feeling that they would be fiercer and
more inconsiderate in their words when emancipated from his control.
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Gambara by Honore de Balzac: satisfied with love? Then, through his lamentation, by a transition to
the key of E flat, /allegro/, common time, we hear the cries of the
epileptic lover, his fury and certain warlike phrases, for the mighty
charms of the one and only woman give him the impulse to multiplied
loves which strikes us in /Don Giovanni/. Now, as you hear these
themes, do you not catch a glimpse of Mahomet's Paradise?
"And next we have a /cantabile/ (A flat major, six-eight time), that
might expand the soul that is least susceptible to music. Kadijah has
understood Mahomet! Then Kadijah announces to the populace the
Prophet's interviews with the Angel Gabriel (/maestoso sostenuto/ in F
Major). The magistrates and priests, power and religion, feeling
Gambara |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from An Historical Mystery by Honore de Balzac: slim and wiry, Adrien d'Hauteserre gave an impression of strength;
whereas Robert, who was tall, pale and fair, seemed weakly. Adrien,
nervous in temperament, was stronger in soul; while his brother though
lymphatic, was fonder of bodily exercise. Families often present these
singularities of contrast, the causes of which it might be interesting
to examine; but they are mentioned here merely to explain how it was
that Adrien was not likely to find a rival in his brother. Robert's
affection for Laurence was that of a relation, the respect of a noble
for a girl of his own caste. In matters of sentiment the elder
d'Hauteserre belonged to the class of men who consider woman as an
appendage to man, limiting her sphere to the physical duties of
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