| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Sophist by Plato: a likeness is really unreal, and essentially not. Here is a pretty
complication of being and not-being, in which the many-headed Sophist has
entangled us. He will at once point out that he is compelling us to
contradict ourselves, by affirming being of not-being. I think that we
must cease to look for him in the class of imitators.
But ought we to give him up? 'I should say, certainly not.' Then I fear
that I must lay hands on my father Parmenides; but do not call me a
parricide; for there is no way out of the difficulty except to show that in
some sense not-being is; and if this is not admitted, no one can speak of
falsehood, or false opinion, or imitation, without falling into a
contradiction. You observe how unwilling I am to undertake the task; for I
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Travels with a Donkey in the Cevenne by Robert Louis Stevenson: natural features, but moved into the territory of a different race.
These people, as they hurriedly despatched their viands in an
intricate sword-play of knives, questioned and answered me with a
degree of intelligence which excelled all that I had met, except
among the railway folk at Chasserades. They had open telling
faces, and were lively both in speech and manner. They not only
entered thoroughly into the spirit of my little trip, but more than
one declared, if he were rich enough, he would like to set forth on
such another.
Even physically there was a pleasant change. I had not seen a
pretty woman since I left Monastier, and there but one. Now of the
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Coxon Fund by Henry James: called on her after my dinner in the Regent's Park, but I had
neither seen her nor seen Miss Anvoy. I forget to-day the exact
order in which, at this period, sundry incidents occurred and the
particular stage at which it suddenly struck me, making me catch my
breath a little, that the progression, the acceleration, was for
all the world that of fine drama. This was probably rather late in
the day, and the exact order doesn't signify. What had already
occurred was some accident determining a more patient wait. George
Gravener, whom I met again, in fact told me as much, but without
signs of perturbation. Lady Coxon had to be constantly attended
to, and there were other good reasons as well. Lady Coxon had to
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