| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Republic by Plato: Here follows a rustic picture of their way of life. They spend their days
in houses which they have built for themselves; they make their own clothes
and produce their own corn and wine. Their principal food is meal and
flour, and they drink in moderation. They live on the best of terms with
each other, and take care not to have too many children. 'But,' said
Glaucon, interposing, 'are they not to have a relish?' Certainly; they
will have salt and olives and cheese, vegetables and fruits, and chestnuts
to roast at the fire. ''Tis a city of pigs, Socrates.' Why, I replied,
what do you want more? 'Only the comforts of life,--sofas and tables, also
sauces and sweets.' I see; you want not only a State, but a luxurious
State; and possibly in the more complex frame we may sooner find justice
The Republic |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Helen of Troy And Other Poems by Sara Teasdale: Against the fate that made men love my mouth
And left their spirits all too deaf to hear
The little songs that echoed through my soul.
I have no anger now. The dreams are done;
Yet since the Greeks and Trojans would not see
Aught but my body's fairness, till the end,
In all the islands set in all the seas,
And all the lands that lie beneath the sun,
Till light turn darkness, and till time shall sleep,
Men's lives shall waste with longing after me,
For I shall be the sum of their desire,
|
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Illustrious Gaudissart by Honore de Balzac: barbarism succeeding the saturnalia of popular thought and the last
struggles of those civilizations which accumulated the treasures of
the world in one direction?
The commercial traveller! Is he not to the realm of ideas what our
stage-coaches are to men and things? He is their vehicle; he sets them
going, carries them along, rubs them up with one another. He takes
from the luminous centre a handful of light, and scatters it broadcast
among the drowsy populations of the duller regions. This human
pyrotechnic is a scholar without learning, a juggler hoaxed by
himself, an unbelieving priest of mysteries and dogmas, which he
expounds all the better for his want of faith. Curious being! He has
|
