| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from A Second Home by Honore de Balzac: the "Black Gentleman," on whom she had hitherto smiled with a sort of
benevolent servility. Never before had she complained so bitterly of
being compelled, at her age, to do the cooking; never had her catarrh
and her rheumatism wrung so many groans from her; finally, she could
not, this winter, promise so many ells of net as Caroline had hitherto
been able to count on.
Under these circumstances, and towards the end of December, at the
time when bread was dearest, and that dearth of corn was beginning to
be felt which made the year 1816 so hard on the poor, the stranger
observed on the features of the girl whose name was still unknown to
him, the painful traces of a secret sorrow which his kindest smiles
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Gorgias by Plato: only, commenced in the Timaeus and continued in the Critias: (3) the much
less artistic fiction of the foundation of the Cretan colony which is
introduced in the preface to the Laws, but soon falls into the background:
(4) the beautiful but rather artificial tale of Prometheus and Epimetheus
narrated in his rhetorical manner by Protagoras in the dialogue called
after him: (5) the speech at the beginning of the Phaedrus, which is a
parody of the orator Lysias; the rival speech of Socrates and the
recantation of it. To these may be added (6) the tale of the grasshoppers,
and (7) the tale of Thamus and of Theuth, both in the Phaedrus: (8) the
parable of the Cave (Republic), in which the previous argument is
recapitulated, and the nature and degrees of knowledge having been
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Divine Comedy (translated by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow) by Dante Alighieri: Thus Plutus with his clucking voice began;
And that benignant Sage, who all things knew,
Said, to encourage me: "Let not thy fear
Harm thee; for any power that he may have
Shall not prevent thy going down this crag."
Then he turned round unto that bloated lip,
And said: "Be silent, thou accursed wolf;
Consume within thyself with thine own rage.
Not causeless is this journey to the abyss;
Thus is it willed on high, where Michael wrought
Vengeance upon the proud adultery."
The Divine Comedy (translated by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow) |
