| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Confessio Amantis by John Gower: The world fell so that ilke tide,
Which evere hise happes hath diverse,
The grete Soldan thanne of Perse
Ayein the Caliphe of Egipte
A werre, which that him beclipte, 2550
Hath in a Marche costeiant.
And he, which was a poursuiant
Worschipe of armes to atteigne,
This Romein, let anon ordeigne,
That he was redi everydel:
And whan he was arraied wel
Confessio Amantis |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Inaugural Address by John F. Kennedy: the same solemn oath our forbears prescribed nearly a century
and three-quarters ago.
The world is very different now, for man holds in his mortal hands
the power to abolish all forms of human poverty and all forms of human life.
And yet the same revolutionary beliefs for which our forbears fought
are still at issue around the globe. . .the belief that the rights of man
come not from the generosity of the state but from the hand of God.
We dare not forget today that we are the heirs of that first revolution.
Let the word go forth from this time and place. . .to friend and foe alike. . .
that the torch has been passed to a new generation of Americans. . .
born in this century, tempered by war, disciplined by a hard and bitter peace,
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Complete Poems of Longfellow by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: Nor wilt thou hear, amid thy troubled dreams,
Thy children crying for thee in the night!
THE MOTHER.
O Death, that stretchest thy white hands to me,
I fear them not, but press them to my lips,
That are as white as thine; for I am Death,
Nay, am the Mother of Death, seeing these sons
All lying lifeless.--Kiss me, Sirion.
ACT III.
The Battle-field of Beth-horon.
SCENE I. -- JUDAS MACCABAEUS in armor before his tent.
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