| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Proposed Roads To Freedom by Bertrand Russell: largely because he was an artist. And in this he
was not irrational.
It is impossible for art, or any of the higher
creative activities, to flourish under any system which
requires that the artist shall prove his competence to
some body of authorities before he is allowed to follow
his impulse. Any really great artist is almost
sure to be thought incompetent by those among his
seniors who would be generally regarded as best
qualified to form an opinion. And the mere fact of
having to produce work which will please older men
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Dynamiter by Robert Louis Stevenson and Fanny Van De Grift Stevenson: impressed me most favourably; but how are you to prefer your
opinion before that of my uncle, an ex-minister of state, a
man with the ear of the Queen, and of a long political
experience? If I am mad, is he? And you must allow me,
besides, a special claim upon your help. Strange as you may
think my story, you know that much of it is true; and if you
who heard the explosion and saw the Mormon at Victoria,
refuse to credit and assist me, to whom am I to turn?'
'He gave you money then?' asked Challoner, who had been
dwelling singly on that fact.
'I begin to interest you,' she cried. 'But, frankly, you are
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Perfect Wagnerite: A Commentary on the Niblung's Ring by George Bernard Shaw: the notable new creeds of the eighteenth and nineteenth
centuries.
The weak place which experience finds out in the Anarchist theory
is its reliance on the progress already achieved by "Man." There
is no such thing as Man in the world: what we have to deal with
is a multitude of men, some of them great rascals, some of them
greet statesmen, others both, with a vast majority capable of
managing their personal affairs, but not of comprehending social
organization, or grappling with the problems created by their
association in enormous numbers. If "Man" means this majority,
then "Man" has made no progress: he has, on the contrary,
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