| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson:
Treasure Island |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Prince by Nicolo Machiavelli: chalk in their hands, to mark up their lodgings, rather than with
swords to fight."
I wish to demonstrate further the infelicity of these arms. The
mercenary captains are either capable men or they are not; if they
are, you cannot trust them, because they always aspire to their own
greatness, either by oppressing you, who are their master, or others
contrary to your intentions; but if the captain is not skilful, you
are ruined in the usual way.
And if it be urged that whoever is armed will act in the same way,
whether mercenary or not, I reply that when arms have to be resorted
to, either by a prince or a republic, then the prince ought to go in
The Prince |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe: affecting us, still the analysis of this power lies among
considerations beyond our depth. It was possible, I reflected,
that a mere different arrangement of the particulars of the
scene, of the details of the picture, would be sufficient to
modify, or perhaps to annihilate its capacity for sorrowful
impression; and, acting upon this idea, I reined my horse
to the precipitous brink of a black and lurid tarn that lay in
unruffled lustre by the dwelling, and gazed down--but with a
shudder even more thrilling than before--upon the remodelled and
inverted images of the grey sedge, and the ghastly tree-stems,
and the vacant and eye-like windows.
The Fall of the House of Usher |
