| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from A Modest Proposal by Jonathan Swift: among us, sacrificing the poor innocent babes, I doubt, more to
avoid the expence than the shame, which would move tears and pity
in the most savage and inhuman breast.
The number of souls in this kingdom being usually reckoned one
million and a half, of these I calculate there may be about two
hundred thousand couple whose wives are breeders; from which
number I subtract thirty thousand couple, who are able to
maintain their own children, (although I apprehend there cannot
be so many, under the present distresses of the kingdom) but this
being granted, there will remain an hundred and seventy thousand
breeders. I again subtract fifty thousand, for those women who
A Modest Proposal |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Golden Sayings of Epictetus by Epictetus: to you so small a thing and worthless, to be a good man, and
happy therein?
CXXVII
It befits thee not to be unhappy by reason of any, but
rather to be happy by reason of all men, and especially by reason
of God, who formed us to this end.
CXXVIII
What, did Diogenes love no man, he that was so gentle, so
true a friend to men as cheerfully to endure such bodily
hardships for the common weal of all mankind? But how loved he
them? As behoved a minister of the Supreme God, alike caring for
The Golden Sayings of Epictetus |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Three Taverns by Edwin Arlington Robinson: And wondered if they found in mine
Compassion that I might regret.
Pity, I learned, was not the least
Of time's offending benefits
That had now for so long impugned
The conservation of his wits:
Rather it was that I should yield,
Alone, the fealty that presents
The tribute of a tempered ear
To an untempered eloquence.
Before I pondered long enough
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