| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Enemies of Books by William Blades: gives all the warmth and ventilation of a common fire without any of
its annoyances; and to any one who loves to be independent of servants,
and to know that, however deeply he may sleep over his "copy," his fire
will not fail to keep awake, an asbestos stove is invaluable.
It is a mistake also to imagine that keeping the best bound
volumes in a glass doored book-case is a preservative.
The damp air will certainly penetrate, and as the absence
of ventilation will assist the formation of mould, the books
will be worse off than if they had been placed in open shelves.
If security be desirable, by all means abolish the glass
and place ornamental brass wire-work in its stead.
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Dead Souls by Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol: money which ought to have gone towards the rehabilitation of his affairs.
Possibly the author may also incur censure at the hands of those
so-called "patriots" who sit quietly in corners, and become
capitalists through making fortunes at the expense of others. Yes, let
but something which they conceive to be derogatory to their country
occur--for instance, let there be published some book which voices the
bitter truth--and out they will come from their hiding-places like a
spider which perceives a fly to be caught in its web. "Is it well to
proclaim this to the world, and to set folk talking about it?" they
will cry. "What you have described touches US, is OUR affair. Is
conduct of that kind right? What will foreigners say? Does any one
Dead Souls |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Symposium by Plato: the Silenus, or outward man, has now to be exhibited. The description of
Socrates follows immediately after the speech of Socrates; one is the
complement of the other. At the height of divine inspiration, when the
force of nature can no further go, by way of contrast to this extreme
idealism, Alcibiades, accompanied by a troop of revellers and a flute-girl,
staggers in, and being drunk is able to tell of things which he would have
been ashamed to make known if he had been sober. The state of his
affections towards Socrates, unintelligible to us and perverted as they
appear, affords an illustration of the power ascribed to the loves of man
in the speech of Pausanias. He does not suppose his feelings to be
peculiar to himself: there are several other persons in the company who
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