| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Unseen World and Other Essays by John Fiske: value, can be profitably undertaken. But it must at least be
said, as the net result of our impressions derived both from
previous study of the score and from hearing, the performance at
Portland, that Mr. Paine's oratorio has fairly earned for itself
the right to be judged by the same high standard which we apply
to these noble works of Mendelssohn and Handel.
In our limited space we can give only the briefest description of
the general structure of the work. The founding of Christianity,
as illustrated in four principal scenes of the life of St. Peter,
supplies the material for the dramatic development of the
subject. The overture, beginning with an adagio movement in
The Unseen World and Other Essays |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Study of a Woman by Honore de Balzac: all blanch before her. She has conquered the right to converse as long
and as often as she chooses with the men who seem to her agreeable,
without being entered on the tablets of gossip. Certain coquettish
women are capable of following a plan of this kind for seven years in
order to gratify their fancies later; but to suppose any such
reservations in the Marquise de Listomere would be to calumniate her.
I have had the happiness of knowing this phoenix. She talks well; I
know how to listen; consequently I please her, and I go to her
parties. That, in fact, was the object of my ambition.
Neither plain nor pretty, Madame de Listomere has white teeth, a
dazzling skin, and very red lips; she is tall and well-made; her foot
|
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Polity of Athenians and Lacedaemonians by Xenophon: off the altar and leads the way to the boundaries of the land. Here
for the second time the king does sacrifice[6] to Zeus and Athena; and
as soon as the offerings are accepted by those two divinities he steps
across the boundaries of the land. And all the while the fire from
those sacrifices leads the way, and is never suffered to go out.
Behind follow beasts for sacrifice of every sort.
[4] Lit. reading {kai oi sun auto}, after L. Dindorf, "he and those
with him."
[5] Lit. "the Purphuros." See Nic. Damasc. ap. Stob. "Fl." 44, 41;
Hesych. ap. Schneider, n. ad loc.
[6] These are the {diabateria}, so often mentioned in the "Hellenica."
|
