| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Lesser Hippias by Plato: transferred by accident to the more celebrated name of Plato, or of some
Platonist in the next generation who aspired to imitate his master. Not
that on grounds either of language or philosophy we should lightly reject
them. Some difference of style, or inferiority of execution, or
inconsistency of thought, can hardly be considered decisive of their
spurious character. For who always does justice to himself, or who writes
with equal care at all times? Certainly not Plato, who exhibits the
greatest differences in dramatic power, in the formation of sentences, and
in the use of words, if his earlier writings are compared with his later
ones, say the Protagoras or Phaedrus with the Laws. Or who can be expected
to think in the same manner during a period of authorship extending over
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Tom Sawyer Abroad by Mark Twain: "Well, the minute people knows it's genuwyne sand
from the genuwyne Desert of Sahara, they'll just be in
a perfect state of mind to git hold of some of it to
keep on the what-not in a vial with a label on it for a
curiosity. All we got to do is to put it up in vials and
float around all over the United States and peddle them
out at ten cents apiece. We've got all of ten thousand
dollars' worth of sand in this boat."
Me and Jim went all to pieces with joy, and begun
to shout whoopjamboreehoo, and Tom says:
"And we can keep on coming back and fetching
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Just Folks by Edgar A. Guest: Her words in my ears are ringing yet:
"Tell me, my boy, if your feet are wet."
The Blue Flannel Shirt
I am eager once more to feel easy,
I'm weary of thinking of dress;
I'm heartily sick of stiff collars,
And trousers the tailor must press.
I'm eagerly waiting the glad days--
When fashion will cease to assert
What I must put on every morning--
The days of the blue flannel shirt.
Just Folks |
