| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Symposium by Plato: mortality is always taking the place of the old. This is the reason why
parents love their children--for the sake of immortality; and this is why
men love the immortality of fame. For the creative soul creates not
children, but conceptions of wisdom and virtue, such as poets and other
creators have invented. And the noblest creations of all are those of
legislators, in honour of whom temples have been raised. Who would not
sooner have these children of the mind than the ordinary human ones?
(Compare Bacon's Essays, 8:--'Certainly the best works and of greatest
merit for the public have proceeded from the unmarried or childless men;
which both in affection and means have married and endowed the public.')
I will now initiate you, she said, into the greater mysteries; for he who
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Second Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling: he was a solitary wolf, fending for himself, his mate, and his
cubs in some lonely lair, as do many wolves in the south.
Won-tolla means an Outlier--one who lies out from any Pack.
Then he panted, and they could see his heart-beats shake him
backward and forward.
"What moves?" said Phao, for that is the question all the Jungle
asks after the pheeal cries.
"The dhole, the dhole of the Dekkan--Red Dog, the Killer!
They came north from the south saying the Dekkan was empty and
killing out by the way. When this moon was new there were four
to me--my mate and three cubs. She would teach them to kill on
The Second Jungle Book |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Duchess of Padua by Oscar Wilde: Madam, I wait.
DUCHESS
No, no, you cannot: you do not understand,
I have less power in Padua to-night
Than any common woman; they will kill you.
I saw the scaffold as I crossed the square,
Already the low rabble throng about it
With fearful jests, and horrid merriment,
As though it were a morris-dancer's platform,
And not Death's sable throne. O Guido, Guido,
You must escape!
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