| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Charmides by Plato: abiding in you or not, tell me, I said, what, in your opinion, is
Temperance?
At first he hesitated, and was very unwilling to answer: then he said that
he thought temperance was doing things orderly and quietly, such things for
example as walking in the streets, and talking, or anything else of that
nature. In a word, he said, I should answer that, in my opinion,
temperance is quietness.
Are you right, Charmides? I said. No doubt some would affirm that the
quiet are the temperate; but let us see whether these words have any
meaning; and first tell me whether you would not acknowledge temperance to
be of the class of the noble and good?
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Travels of Sir John Mandeville by Sir John Mandeville: kingdom of Media, and from the great Armenia and toward the
Septentrion to the sea of Caspian and toward the south to the land
of Ind. That is also a good land and a plenteous, and it hath
three great principal cities - Messabor, Saphon, and Sarmassan.
And then after is Armenia, in the which were wont to be four
kingdoms; that is a noble country and full of goods. And it
beginneth at Persia and stretcheth toward the west in length unto
Turkey. And in largeness it dureth to the city of Alexandria, that
now is clept the Gate of Hell, that I spake of before, under the
kingdom of Media. In this Armenia be full many good cities, but
Taurizo is most of name.
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Barnaby Rudge by Charles Dickens: this period, upon the notice of thousands of people, who had
mingled in active life during the whole interval, and who, without
being deaf or blind to passing events, had scarcely ever thought of
him before.
'My lord,' said Gashford in his ear, as he drew the curtains of his
bed betimes; 'my lord!'
'Yes--who's that? What is it?'
'The clock has struck nine,' returned the secretary, with meekly
folded hands. 'You have slept well? I hope you have slept well?
If my prayers are heard, you are refreshed indeed.'
'To say the truth, I have slept so soundly,' said Lord George,
Barnaby Rudge |
