| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Charmides by Plato: to be measured by the standard of utilitarianism or any other modern
philosophical system. He is the poet or maker of ideas, satisfying the
wants of his own age, providing the instruments of thought for future
generations. He is no dreamer, but a great philosophical genius struggling
with the unequal conditions of light and knowledge under which he is
living. He may be illustrated by the writings of moderns, but he must be
interpreted by his own, and by his place in the history of philosophy. We
are not concerned to determine what is the residuum of truth which remains
for ourselves. His truth may not be our truth, and nevertheless may have
an extraordinary value and interest for us.
I cannot agree with Mr. Grote in admitting as genuine all the writings
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Faraday as a Discoverer by John Tyndall: eminences, in nearly all cases lifted others to an almost equal
height. And so it is with the discoveries of Faraday. As a general
rule, the dominant result does not stand alone, but forms the
culminating point of a vast and varied mass of inquiry. In this
way, round about his great discovery of Magneto-electric Induction,
other weighty labours group themselves. His investigations on the
Extra Current; on the Polar and other Condition of Diamagnetic
Bodies; on Lines of Magnetic Force, their definite character and
distribution; on the employment of the Induced Magneto-electric
Current as a measure and test of Magnetic Action; on the Revulsive
Phenomena of the magnetic field, are all, notwithstanding the
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Poems by T. S. Eliot: In a life composed so much, so much of odds and ends,
(For indeed I do not love it ... you knew? you are not blind!
How keen you are!)
To find a friend who has these qualities,
Who has, and gives
Those qualities upon which friendship lives.
How much it means that I say this to you--
Without these friendships--life, what cauchemar!"
Among the windings of the violins
And the ariettes
Of cracked cornets
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