| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Prince by Nicolo Machiavelli: In translating "The Prince" my aim has been to achieve at all costs an
exact literal rendering of the original, rather than a fluent
paraphrase adapted to the modern notions of style and expression.
Machiavelli was no facile phrasemonger; the conditions under which he
wrote obliged him to weigh every word; his themes were lofty, his
substance grave, his manner nobly plain and serious. "Quis eo fuit
unquam in partiundis rebus, in definiendis, in explanandis pressior?"
In "The Prince," it may be truly said, there is reason assignable, not
only for every word, but for the position of every word. To an
Englishman of Shakespeare's time the translation of such a treatise
was in some ways a comparatively easy task, for in those times the
The Prince |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Fanny Herself by Edna Ferber: suit and furs, everything but the idea that was clamoring to
be born. She sat at her desk, her fingers folding and
unfolding a bit of paper, her face all light and animation
as she talked.
"My idea is to have a person known as a selector for each
important department. It would mean a boiling down of the
products of every manufacturer we deal with, and skimming
the cream off the top. As it is now a department buyer has
to do the selecting and buying too. He can't do both and
get results. We ought to set aside an entire floor for the
display of manufacturers' samples. The selector would make
Fanny Herself |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Plutarch's Lives by A. H. Clough: established against Agesilaus, he thought it advisable to expose
both him and it, by showing what manner of a citizen he had been
whilst he lived. To that end, finding among his writings all
oration, composed by Cleon the Halicarnassean, but to have been
spoken by Lysander in a public assembly, to excite the people to
innovations and changes in the government, he resolved to publish
it, as an evidence of Lysander's practices. But one of the Elders
having the perusal of it, and finding it powerfully written,
advised him to have a care of digging up Lysander again, and rather
bury that oration in the grave with him; and this advice he wisely
hearkened to, and hushed the whole thing up; and ever after forbore
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