| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from My Bondage and My Freedom by Frederick Douglass: were wholly extemporaneous, and I may not always have been so
guarded in my expressions, as I otherwise should have been. I
was ten years younger then than now, and only seven years from
slavery. I cannot give the reader a better idea of the nature of
my discourses, than by republishing one of them, delivered in
Finsbury chapel, London, to an audience of about two thousand
persons, and which was published in the _London Universe_, at the
time.[9]
Those in the United States who may regard this speech as being
harsh in its spirit and unjust in its statements, because
delivered before an audience supposed to be anti-republican in
My Bondage and My Freedom |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The School For Scandal by Richard Brinsley Sheridan: modern clipped captains are, but enveloped in wig and regimentals,
as a general should be. What do you bid?
SIR OLIVER. [Aside to Moses.] Bid him speak.
MOSES. Mr. Premium would have you speak.
CHARLES. Why, then, he shall have him for ten pounds, and I'm sure
that's not dear for a staff-officer.
SIR OLIVER. [Aside.] Heaven deliver me! his famous uncle Richard
for ten pounds!--[Aloud.] Very well, sir, I take him at that.
CHARLES. Careless, knock down my uncle Richard.--Here, now,
is a maiden sister of his, my great-aunt Deborah, done by Kneller,
in his best manner, and esteemed a very formidable likeness.
|
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Of The Nature of Things by Lucretius: As small affair can for a vaster serve,
And by example put thee on the spoor
Of knowledge. For this reason too 'tis fit
Thou turn thy mind the more unto these bodies
Which here are witnessed tumbling in the light:
Namely, because such tumblings are a sign
That motions also of the primal stuff
Secret and viewless lurk beneath, behind.
For thou wilt mark here many a speck, impelled
By viewless blows, to change its little course,
And beaten backwards to return again,
Of The Nature of Things |
