| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Euthydemus by Plato: Answer then, he said.
Ask, I said, and I will answer.
Do you know something, Socrates, or nothing?
Something, I said.
And do you know with what you know, or with something else?
With what I know; and I suppose that you mean with my soul?
Are you not ashamed, Socrates, of asking a question when you are asked one?
Well, I said; but then what am I to do? for I will do whatever you bid;
when I do not know what you are asking, you tell me to answer nevertheless,
and not to ask again.
Why, you surely have some notion of my meaning, he said.
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Plutarch's Lives by A. H. Clough: merciful or gentle disposition, who treated the Athenians that were made
his prize in a proud and cruel manner. Also Aristotle himself, in the
account that he gives of the form of government of the Bottiaeans, is
manifestly of opinion that the youths were not slain by Minos, but spent
the remainder of their days in slavery in Crete; that the Cretans, in
former times, to acquit themselves of an ancient vow which they had
made, were used to send an offering of the first-fruits of their men to
Delphi, and that some descendants of these Athenian slaves were mingled
with them and sent amongst them, and, unable to get their living there,
removed from thence, first into Italy, and settled about Japygia; from
thence again, that they removed to Thrace, and were named Bottiaeans
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Aeneid by Virgil: Where, with religious their common gods they place.
In purest white the priests their heads attire;
And living waters bear, and holy fire;
And, o'er their linen hoods and shaded hair,
Long twisted wreaths of sacred veryain wear,
In order issuing from the town appears
The Latin legion, arm'd with pointed spears;
And from the fields, advancing on a line,
The Trojan and the Tuscan forces join:
Their various arms afford a pleasing sight;
A peaceful train they seem, in peace prepar'd for fight.
Aeneid |
