| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Symposium by Plato: must honestly confess that he is not a good at all: for love is of the
good, and no man can desire that which he has. This piece of dialectics is
ascribed to Diotima, who has already urged upon Socrates the argument which
he urges against Agathon. That the distinction is a fallacy is obvious; it
is almost acknowledged to be so by Socrates himself. For he who has beauty
or good may desire more of them; and he who has beauty or good in himself
may desire beauty and good in others. The fallacy seems to arise out of a
confusion between the abstract ideas of good and beauty, which do not admit
of degrees, and their partial realization in individuals.
But Diotima, the prophetess of Mantineia, whose sacred and superhuman
character raises her above the ordinary proprieties of women, has taught
|
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Falk by Joseph Conrad: he had been terribly hungry for food.
Don't be shocked if I declare that in my belief
it was the same need, the same pain, the same tor-
ture. We are in his case allowed to contemplate
the foundation of all the emotions--that one joy
which is to live, and the one sadness at the root of
the innumerable torments. It was made plain by
the way he talked. He had never suffered so. It
was gnawing, it was fire; it was there, like this!
And after pointing below his breastbone, he made
a hard wringing motion with his hands. And I as-
Falk |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Soul of the Far East by Percival Lowell: "This is a man" was conventionally implied by a few scratches
bearing a very distant relationship to the real thing. Gradually,
owing to human vanity and a growing taste, pictures improved.
Combinations were tried, a bit from one place with a piece from
another; a sort of mosaic requiring but a slight amount of
imagination. Not that imagination of a higher order has not been
called into play, although even now pictures are often happy
adaptations rather than creations proper. Some masters have been
imaginative; others, unfortunately for themselves and still more for
the public, have not. For that the art may attain a high degree of
excellence for itself and much distinction for its professors,
|
