| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from A Personal Record by Joseph Conrad: wants an officer who can speak French fluently, and that's not so
easy to find. I do not know anybody myself but you. It's a
second officer's berth and, of course, you would not care . . .
would you now? I know that it isn't what you are looking for."
It was not. I had given myself up to the idleness of a haunted
man who looks for nothing but words wherein to capture his
visions. But I admit that outwardly I resembled sufficiently a
man who could make a second officer for a steamer chartered by a
French company. I showed no sign of being haunted by the fate of
Nina and by the murmurs of tropical forests; and even my intimate
intercourse with Almayer (a person of weak character) had not put
A Personal Record |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from What is Man? by Mark Twain: that any Nelson, or Drake, or Cook ever examined his seamanship
and said it showed profound and accurate familiarity with that
art; I don't remember that any king or prince or duke has ever
testified that Shakespeare was letter-perfect in his handling of
royal court-manners and the talk and manners of aristocracies; I
don't remember that any illustrious Latinist or Grecian or
Frenchman or Spaniard or Italian has proclaimed him a past-master
in those languages; I don't remember--well, I don't remember that
there is TESTIMONY--great testimony--imposing testimony--
unanswerable and unattackable testimony as to any of
Shakespeare's hundred specialties, except one--the law.
What is Man? |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Cratylus by Plato: word copies all your qualities, and places them by you in another form;
would you say that this was Cratylus and the image of Cratylus, or that
there were two Cratyluses?
CRATYLUS: I should say that there were two Cratyluses.
SOCRATES: Then you see, my friend, that we must find some other principle
of truth in images, and also in names; and not insist that an image is no
longer an image when something is added or subtracted. Do you not perceive
that images are very far from having qualities which are the exact
counterpart of the realities which they represent?
CRATYLUS: Yes, I see.
SOCRATES: But then how ridiculous would be the effect of names on things,
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