| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Hiero by Xenophon: wonderment. Now, I know it all too plainly from my own experience,
Simonides, and I assure you, the tyrant is one who has the smallest
share of life's blessings, whilst of its greater miseries he possesses
most.
[4] Lit. "the majority of things"; al. "the thousand details of a
thing."
For instance, if peace is held to be a mighty blessing to mankind,
then of peace despotic monarchs are scant sharers. Or is war a curse?
If so, of this particular pest your monarch shares the largest moiety.
For, look you, the private citizen, unless his city-state should
chance to be engaged in some common war,[5] is free to travel
|
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Middlemarch by George Eliot: walking-stick.
"Dagley, my good fellow," began Mr. Brooke, conscious that he
was going to be very friendly about the boy.
"Oh, ay, I'm a good feller, am I? Thank ye, sir, thank ye,"
said Dagley, with a loud snarling irony which made Fag the sheep-dog
stir from his seat and prick his ears; but seeing Monk enter
the yard after some outside loitering, Fag seated himself again
in an attitude of observation. "I'm glad to hear I'm a good feller."
Mr. Brooke reflected that it was market-day, and that his worthy
tenant had probably been dining, but saw no reason why he should
not go on, since he could take the precaution of repeating what he
Middlemarch |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from A Simple Soul by Gustave Flaubert: He could not follow any profession as he was absorbed in drinking. His
mother paid his debts and he made fresh ones; and the sighs that she
heaved while she knitted at the window reached the ears of Felicite
who was spinning in the kitchen.
They walked in the garden together, always speaking of Virginia, and
asking each other if such and such a thing would have pleased her, and
what she would probably have said on this or that occasion.
All her little belongings were put away in a closet of the room which
held the two little beds. But Madame Aubain looked them over as little
as possible. One summer day, however, she resigned herself to the task
and when she opened the closet the moths flew out.
A Simple Soul |
