| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Memorabilia by Xenophon: youth had not as yet set foot in the agora,[4] but if he had anything
to transact, his habit was to seat himself in a saddler's shop hard
by. Accordingly to this same saddler's shop Socrates betook himself
with some of those who were with him. And first the question was
started by some one: "Was it through consorting with the wise,[5] or
by his own unaided talent, that Themistocles came so to surpass his
fellow-citizens that when the services of a capable man were needed
the eyes of the whole community instinctively turned to him?"
Socrates, with a view to stirring[6] Euthydemus, answered: There was
certainly an ingenuous simplicity in the belief that superiority in
arts of comparatively little worth could only be attained by aid of
The Memorabilia |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Enoch Arden, &c. by Alfred Tennyson: Not first, and third, which are a riper first?
Too ripe, too late! they come too late for use.
Ah love, there surely lives in man and beast
Something divine to warn them of their foes:
And such a sense, when first I fronted him,
Said, "trust him not;" but after, when I came
To know him more, I lost it, knew him less;
Fought with what seem'd my own uncharity;
Sat at his table; drank his costly wines;
Made more and more allowance for his talk;
Went further, fool! and trusted him with all,
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Camille by Alexandre Dumas: even reaches the limit of his income, talked with Mme. M., one of
our wittiest story-tellers, who from time to time writes what she
says and signs what she writes, while at the same time he
exchanged confidential glances with Mme. de N., a fair ornament
of the Champs-Elysees, almost always dressed in pink or blue, and
driving two big black horses which Tony had sold her for 10,000
francs, and for which she had paid, after her fashion; finally,
Mlle. R., who makes by her mere talent twice what the women of
the world make by their dot and three times as much as the others
make by their amours, had come, in spite of the cold, to make
some purchases, and was not the least looked at among the crowd.
Camille |
