| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Lay Morals by Robert Louis Stevenson: nuisances of the society they affect. They try to cover
their absence of matter by an unwholesome vitality of
delivery. They look triumphantly round the room, as if
courting applause, after a torrent of diluted truism. They
talk in a circle, harping on the same dull round of argument,
and returning again and again to the same remark with the
same sprightliness, the same irritating appearance of
novelty.
After this set, any one is tolerable; so we shall merely hint
at a few other varieties. There is your man who is pre-
eminently conscientious, whose face beams with sincerity as
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Psychology of Revolution by Gustave le Bon: beginning to speak loudly, to make threats, and even to indulge
in strikes, such as that of the postmen, which was quickly
followed by that of the Government railway employees. The
administrative power thus forms a little State within the State,
and if its present rate of revolution continues it will soon
constitute the only power in the State. Under a Socialist
Government there would be no other power. All our revolutions
would then have resulted in stripping the king of his powers and
his throne in order to bestow them upon the irresponsible,
anonymous and despotic class of Government clerks.
To foresee the issue of all the conflicts which threaten to cloud
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Walden by Henry David Thoreau: adversary's front, and through all the tumblings on that field never
for an instant ceased to gnaw at one of his feelers near the root,
having already caused the other to go by the board; while the
stronger black one dashed him from side to side, and, as I saw on
looking nearer, had already divested him of several of his members.
They fought with more pertinacity than bulldogs. Neither manifested
the least disposition to retreat. It was evident that their
battle-cry was "Conquer or die." In the meanwhile there came along
a single red ant on the hillside of this valley, evidently full of
excitement, who either had despatched his foe, or had not yet taken
part in the battle; probably the latter, for he had lost none of his
Walden |
