| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Sesame and Lilies by John Ruskin: our own flesh, to the death, as the sea-monsters are, and the rock-
eagles. And there is hope for a nation while this can be still said
of it. As long as it holds its life in its hand, ready to give it
for its honour (though a foolish honour), for its love (though a
selfish love), and for its business (though a base business), there
is hope for it. But hope only; for this instinctive, reckless
virtue cannot last. No nation can last, which has made a mob of
itself, however generous at heart. It must discipline its passions,
and direct them, or they will discipline it, one day, with scorpion
whips. Above all, a nation cannot last as a money-making mob: it
cannot with impunity,--it cannot with existence,--go on despising
|
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from House of Seven Gables by Nathaniel Hawthorne: Hepzibah's question. "But I was schoolmistress for the little
children in our district last summer, and might have been so still."
"Ah! 'tis all very well!" observed the maiden lady, drawing herself
up. "But these things must have come to you with your mother's
blood. I never knew a Pyncheon that had any turn for them."
It is very queer, but not the less true, that people are generally
quite as vain, or even more so, of their deficiencies than of their
available gifts; as was Hepzibah of this native inapplicability,
so to speak, of the Pyncheons to any useful purpose. She regarded
it as an hereditary trait; and so, perhaps, it was, but unfortunately
a morbid one, such as is often generated in families that remain
House of Seven Gables |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Inaugural Address by John F. Kennedy: support any friend, oppose any foe, to assure the survival and
the success of liberty. This much we pledge. . .and more.
To those old allies whose cultural and spiritual origins we share:
we pledge the loyalty of faithful friends. United. . .there is
little we cannot do in a host of co-operative ventures.
Divided. . .there is little we can do. . .for we dare not meet
a powerful challenge, at odds, and split asunder.
To those new states whom we welcome to the ranks of the free:
we pledge our word that one form of colonial control shall not
have passed away merely to be replaced by a far more iron tyranny.
We shall not always expect to find them supporting our view.
|
