| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Elixir of Life by Honore de Balzac: sculpture, burned in the excess of light like the fantastic
figures in the red heart of a brazier. At the further end of the
church, above that blazing sea, rose the high altar like a
splendid dawn. All the glories of the golden lamps and silver
candlesticks, of banners and tassels, of the shrines of the
saints and votive offerings, paled before the gorgeous brightness
of the reliquary in which Don Juan lay. The blasphemer's body
sparkled with gems, and flowers, and crystal, with diamonds and
gold, and plumes white as the wings of seraphim; they had set it
up on the altar, where the pictures of Christ had stood. All
about him blazed a host of tall candles; the air quivered in the
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Wheels of Chance by H. G. Wells: had nipped it in the bud by a series of lessons in art. However,
our principal character figured about quite happily in old
corners of Guildford, and once the other man in brown, looking
out of the bay window of the Earl of Kent, saw him standing in a
corner by a gateway, note-book in hand, busily sketching the
Earl's imposing features. At which sight the other man in brown
started back from the centre of the window, so as to be hidden
from him, and crouching slightly, watched him intently through
the interstices of the lace curtains.
OMISSIONS
XI
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Charmides by Plato: give the reasons why I differ from so eminent an authority. Reserving the
fuller discussion of the question for another place, I will shortly defend
my opinion by the following arguments:--
(a) Because almost all epistles purporting to be of the classical age of
Greek literature are forgeries. (Compare Bentley's Works (Dyce's
Edition).) Of all documents this class are the least likely to be
preserved and the most likely to be invented. The ancient world swarmed
with them; the great libraries stimulated the demand for them; and at a
time when there was no regular publication of books, they easily crept into
the world.
(b) When one epistle out of a number is spurious, the remainder of the
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