| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Art of War by Sun Tzu: circumstances. This shakes the confidence of the soldiers.
[I follow Mei Yao-ch`en here. The other commentators refer
not to the ruler, as in SS. 13, 14, but to the officers he
employs. Thus Tu Yu says: "If a general is ignorant of the
principle of adaptability, he must not be entrusted with a
position of authority." Tu Mu quotes: "The skillful employer of
men will employ the wise man, the brave man, the covetous man,
and the stupid man. For the wise man delights in establishing
his merit, the brave man likes to show his courage in action, the
covetous man is quick at seizing advantages, and the stupid man
has no fear of death."]
The Art of War |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Ivanhoe by Walter Scott: _Two Gentlemen of Verona._
The apartment to which the Lady Rowena had
been introduced was fitted up with some rude attempts
at ornament and magnificence, and her being
placed there might be considered as a peculiar
mark of respect not offered to the other prisoners.
But the wife of Front-de-Buf, for whom it had
been originally furnished, was long dead, and decay
and neglect had impaired the few ornaments
with which her taste had adorned it. The tapestry
hung down from the walls in many places, and in
Ivanhoe |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Adam Bede by George Eliot: and so is my uncle, I'm sure, now he's heard it, but he was gone
out to Rosseter all yesterday. They'll look for you there as soon
as you've got time to go, for there's nobody round that hearth but
what's glad to see you."
Dinah, with her sympathetic divination, knew quite well that Adam
was longing to hear if Hetty had said anything about their
trouble; she was too rigorously truthful for benevolent invention,
but she had contrived to say something in which Hetty was tacitly
included. Love has a way of cheating itself consciously, like a
child who plays at solitary hide-and-seek; it is pleased with
assurances that it all the while disbelieves. Adam liked what
Adam Bede |
