| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Prince by Nicolo Machiavelli: have been able to accomplish all that is expected from your
illustrious house; and if in so many revolutions in Italy, and in so
many campaigns, it has always appeared as if military virtue were
exhausted, this has happened because the old order of things was not
good, and none of us have known how to find a new one. And nothing
honours a man more than to establish new laws and new ordinances when
he himself was newly risen. Such things when they are well founded and
dignified will make him revered and admired, and in Italy there are
not wanting opportunities to bring such into use in every form.
Here there is great valour in the limbs whilst it fails in the head.
Look attentively at the duels and the hand-to-hand combats, how
The Prince |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Common Sense by Thomas Paine: ye know not what ye do; ye are opening a door to eternal tyranny,
by keeping vacant the seat of government. There are thousands,
and tens of thousands, who would think it glorious
to expel from the continent that barbarous and hellish power,
which hath stirred up the Indians and Negroes to destroy us;
the cruelty hath a double guilt, it is dealing brutally by us,
and treacherously by them.
To talk of friendship with those in whom our reason forbids us
to have faith, and our affections wounded through a thousand pores
instruct us to detest, is madness and folly. Every day wears out
the little remains of kindred between us and them, and can there
Common Sense |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Helen of Troy And Other Poems by Sara Teasdale: Ah, not from Rome but farther still,
Beyond sun-smitten Salamis,
The moment took us, till you stooped
To find the present with a kiss.
Coney Island
Why did you bring me here?
The sand is white with snow,
Over the wooden domes
The winter sea-winds blow --
There is no shelter near,
Come, let us go.
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