The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Give Me Liberty Or Give Me Death by Patrick Henry: its purpose be not to force us to submission? Can gentlemen assign any other
possible motive for it? Has Great Britain any enemy, in this quarter of
the world, to call for all this accumulation of navies and armies? No, sir,
she has none. They are meant for us: they can be meant for no other.
They are sent over to bind and rivet upon us those chains which the British
ministry have been so long forging. And what have we to oppose to them?
Shall we try argument? Sir, we have been trying that for the last ten years.
Have we anything new to offer upon the subject? Nothing. We have held the
subject up in every light of which it is capable; but it has been all in vain.
Shall we resort to entreaty and humble supplication? What terms shall we
find which have not been already exhausted? Let us not, I beseech you, sir,
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from An International Episode by Henry James: You see, I admit our drawbacks. But I must confess I think Newport
is an ideal place. I don't know anything like it anywhere.
Captain Littledale told me he didn't know anything like it anywhere.
It's entirely different from most watering places;
it's a most charming life. I must say I think that when one
goes to a foreign country one ought to enjoy the differences.
Of course there are differences, otherwise what did one come
abroad for? Look for your pleasure in the differences,
Lord Lambeth; that's the way to do it; and then I am sure
you will find American society--at least Newport society--
most charming and most interesting. I wish very much my
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Hellenica by Xenophon: condition that the Mantineans would suffer themselves to be broken up
and distributed into villages. They, looking the necessity in the
face, consented to do even that. The sympathisers with Argos among
them, and the leaders of their democracy, thought their fate was
sealed. Then the father treated with the son, Pausanias with
Agesipolis, on their behalf, and obtained immunity for them--sixty in
number--on condition that they should quit the city. The Lacedaemonian
troops stood lining the road on both sides, beginning from the gates,
and watched the outgoers; and with their spears in their hands, in
spite of bitter hatred, kept aloof from them with less difficulty than
the Mantineans of the better classes themselves--a weighty testimony
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