| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Rivers to the Sea by Sara Teasdale: WHILE I MAY
WIND and hail and veering rain,
Driven mist that veils the day,
Soul's distress and body's pain,
I would bear you while I may.
I would love you if I might,
For so soon my life will be
Buried in a lasting night,
Even pain denied to me.
DEBT
WHAT do I owe to you
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from King Lear by William Shakespeare: That minces virtue, and does shake the head
To hear of pleasure's name.
The fitchew nor the soiled horse goes to't
With a more riotous appetite.
Down from the waist they are Centaurs,
Though women all above.
But to the girdle do the gods inherit,
Beneath is all the fiend's.
There's hell, there's darkness, there's the sulphurous pit;
burning, scalding, stench, consumption. Fie, fie, fie! pah,
pah!
 King Lear |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Apology by Plato: that 'to suffer is better than to do evil;' and the art of rhetoric is
described as only useful for the purpose of self-accusation. The
parallelisms which occur in the so-called Apology of Xenophon are not worth
noticing, because the writing in which they are contained is manifestly
spurious. The statements of the Memorabilia respecting the trial and death
of Socrates agree generally with Plato; but they have lost the flavour of
Socratic irony in the narrative of Xenophon.
The Apology or Platonic defence of Socrates is divided into three parts:
1st. The defence properly so called; 2nd. The shorter address in mitigation
of the penalty; 3rd. The last words of prophetic rebuke and exhortation.
The first part commences with an apology for his colloquial style; he is,
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