| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Phantasmagoria and Other Poems by Lewis Carroll: practised writer, with the slightest ear for rhythm, could compose,
for hours together, in the easy running metre of 'The Song of
Hiawatha.' Having, then, distinctly stated that I challenge no
attention in the following little poem to its merely verbal jingle,
I must beg the candid reader to confine his criticism to its
treatment of the subject.]
FROM his shoulder Hiawatha
Took the camera of rosewood,
Made of sliding, folding rosewood;
Neatly put it all together.
In its case it lay compactly,
|
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Menexenus by Plato: possible, and not to condole with one another; for they have sorrows
enough, and will not need any one to stir them up. While we gently heal
their wounds, let us remind them that the Gods have heard the chief part of
their prayers; for they prayed, not that their children might live for
ever, but that they might be brave and renowned. And this, which is the
greatest good, they have attained. A mortal man cannot expect to have
everything in his own life turning out according to his will; and they, if
they bear their misfortunes bravely, will be truly deemed brave fathers of
the brave. But if they give way to their sorrows, either they will be
suspected of not being our parents, or we of not being such as our
panegyrists declare. Let not either of the two alternatives happen, but
|
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Great God Pan by Arthur Machen: should have thought a page of small type, but I was cut short by
a beggar who had come behind me, and was making the usual
appeals. Of course I looked round, and this beggar turned out
to be what was left of an old friend of mine, a man named
Herbert. I asked him how he had come to such a wretched pass,
and he told me. We walked up and down one of those long and
dark Soho streets, and there I listened to his story. He said
he had married a beautiful girl, some years younger than
himself, and, as he put it, she had corrupted him body and
soul. He wouldn't go into details; he said he dare not, that
what he had seen and heard haunted him by night and day, and
The Great God Pan |
