E. M. Forster

Name: Pharos and Pharillon — Pharos
Author: E. M. Forster

Pharos and Pharillon — Pharos (1923)

Summary

“Pharos and Pharillon — Pharos”, published in 1923, is a work by E. M. Forster. It explores elements such as Pharos, Alexandria and lighthouse.

Quotes from Pharos and Pharillon — Pharos (E. M. Forster)

E. M. Forster, Pharos and Pharillon — Pharos (1923)

“ There really were crabs at Alexandria, but of copper, quite small, and standing under Cleopatra's Needle; America possesses one to-day. Oriental imagination mixed two monuments into one, and caused a Moorish army to invade the Pharos and to ride through its three hundred rooms. The entrance gate vanished, and they could not find their way out, but ever descending the spirals came at last to the glass crab, slipped through a crack in its back and were drowned. Happier, though equally obscure, was the fate of another visitor, the poet El Deraoui. ”

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Source: Wikisource

E. M. Forster, Pharos and Pharillon — Pharos (1923)

“ Peter's was to be identified with Rome, so, to the imagination of contemporaries, "The Pharos" became Alexandria and Alexandria the Pharos. Never, in the history of architecture, has a secular building been thus worshipped and taken on a spiritual life of its own. It beaconed to the imagination, not only to ships, and long after its light was extinguished memories of it glowed in the minds of men. ”

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Source: Wikisource

E. M. Forster, Pharos and Pharillon — Pharos (1923)

“ The visitor to Alexandria receives nothing in the way of hospitality except some water and a description of Pompey's Pillar.
Those who make a special effort sometimes give him a little fresh air too, and tell him where the Pharos is, adding a sketch of the sea and its waves and an account of the large Greek ships.
The visitor need not aspire to receive any bread, for to an application of this type there is no reply.
As a rule, life in its shadow is an earthly ecstasy that may even touch heaven. ”

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Source: Wikisource

E. M. Forster, Pharos and Pharillon — Pharos (1923)

“ But it is not clear whether a divine madness also seized the builders, whether they deliberately winged engineering with poetry, and tried to add a wonder to the world. At all events they succeeded, and the arts combined with science to praise their triumph. ”

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Source: Wikisource

E. M. Forster, Pharos and Pharillon — Pharos (1923)

“ Though Pharos was not to be Greek it was not to be Hebrew either. A more impartial power dominated it. Five hundred feet above all shrines and huts, Science had already raised her throne.
II
A lighthouse was a necessity. The coast of Egypt is, in its western section, both flat and rocky, and ships needed a landmark to show them where Alexandria lay, and a guide through the reefs that block her harbours. Pharos was the obvious site, because it stood in front of the city; and on Pharos the eastern promontory, because it commanded the more important of the two harbours—the Royal. ”

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Source: Wikisource

E. M. Forster, Pharos and Pharillon — Pharos (1923)

“ As for the mysteries of God they knew them not, neither hoped they for the wages of righteousness nor discerned a reward for blameless souls.
For God created man to be immortal, and made him to be the image of his own eternity. ”

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Source: Wikisource

E. M. Forster, Pharos and Pharillon — Pharos (1923)

“ It was left to later generations to pry into Jehovah's scholarship and to deduce that the Septuagint translation must have extended over a long period and not have reached completion till 100 B.C. The Jews of Alexandria knew no such doubts. Every year they made holiday on Pharos in remembrance of the miracle, and built little booths along the beaches where Helen had once shuddered at the seals. The island became a second Sinai whose moderate thunders thrilled the philosophic world. A translation, even when it is the work of God, is never as intimidating as an original ”

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Source: Wikisource

E. M. Forster, Pharos and Pharillon — Pharos (1923)

“ Then came the lantern. The lantern is a puzzle, because a bonfire and delicate scientific instruments appear to have shared its narrow area. Visitors speak, for instance, of a mysterious "mirror" up there, which was even more wonderful than the building itself. ”

E. M. Forster

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Quotes from Pharos and Pharillon — Pharos (E. M. Forster)

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