| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Familiar Studies of Men and Books by Robert Louis Stevenson: grown accustomed to his faults. Until you are content to
pick poetry out of his pages almost as you must pick it out
of a Greek play in Bohn's translation, your gravity will be
continually upset, your ears perpetually disappointed, and
the whole book will be no more to you than a particularly
flagrant production by the Poet Close.
A writer of this uncertain quality was, perhaps, unfortunate
in taking for thesis the beauty of the world as it now is,
not only on the hill-tops but in the factory; not only by the
harbour full of stately ships, but in the magazine of the
hopelessly prosaic hatter. To show beauty in common things
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Michael Strogoff by Jules Verne: "That amuses you," sharply answered the merchant, who
had little relish for that sort of joke.
"Well, if you tear your hair, or if you throw ashes on
your head," replied the traveler, "will that change the
course of events? No; no more than the course of the
Exchange."
"One can easily see that you are not a merchant," ob-
served the little Jew.
"Faith, no, worthy son of Abraham! I sell neither
hops, nor eider-down, nor honey, nor wax, nor hemp-seed,
nor salt meat, nor caviare, nor wood, nor wool, nor ribbons,
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Ion by Plato: always to wear fine clothes, and to look as beautiful as you can is a part
of your art. Then, again, you are obliged to be continually in the company
of many good poets; and especially of Homer, who is the best and most
divine of them; and to understand him, and not merely learn his words by
rote, is a thing greatly to be envied. And no man can be a rhapsode who
does not understand the meaning of the poet. For the rhapsode ought to
interpret the mind of the poet to his hearers, but how can he interpret him
well unless he knows what he means? All this is greatly to be envied.
ION: Very true, Socrates; interpretation has certainly been the most
laborious part of my art; and I believe myself able to speak about Homer
better than any man; and that neither Metrodorus of Lampsacus, nor
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