| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Phaedrus by Plato: inappropriateness of the characters of Plato. (Else, perhaps, it might be
further argued that, judging from their extant remains, insipid rhetoric is
far more characteristic of Isocrates than of Lysias.) But Plato makes use
of names which have often hardly any connection with the historical
characters to whom they belong. In this instance the comparative favour
shown to Isocrates may possibly be accounted for by the circumstance of his
belonging to the aristocratical, as Lysias to the democratical party.
Few persons will be inclined to suppose, in the superficial manner of some
ancient critics, that a dialogue which treats of love must necessarily have
been written in youth. As little weight can be attached to the argument
that Plato must have visited Egypt before he wrote the story of Theuth and
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Philosophy 4 by Owen Wister: In the hours of trial they would often express their education thus.
"Philosophers I have met," murmured Billy, with scorn And they ate
silently for some time.
"There's one thing that's valuable," said Bertie next. "When they
spring those tricks on you about the flying arrow not moving, and all
the rest, and prove it all right by logic, you learn what pure logic
amounts to when it cuts loose from common sense. And Oscar thinks it's
immense. We shocked him."
"He's found the Bird-in-Hand!" cried Billy, quite suddenly.
"Oscar?" said Bertie, with an equal shout.
"No, John. John has. Came home last night and waked me up and told
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from In Darkest England and The Way Out by General William Booth: Darkest England, like Darkest Africa, reeks with malaria. The foul and
fetid breath of our slums is almost as poisonous as that of the African
swamp. Fever is almost as chronic there as on the Equator. Every year
thousands of children are killed off by what is called defects of our
sanitary system. They are in reality starved and poisoned, and all
that can be said is that, in many cases, it is better for them that
they were taken away from the trouble to come.
Just as in Darkest Africa it is only a part of the evil and misery that
comes from the superior race who invade the forest to enslave and
massacre its miserable inhabitants, so with us, much of the misery of
those whose lot we are considering arises from their own habits.
In Darkest England and The Way Out |
