Due to spam and off-topic content, these forums are being phased out and replaced with new great books forums. Please join us! Ahoy fellow book lovers!

The former post was removed as it violated our user agreement, or it did not add to the "Great Books" conversation in a constructive manner.

The new Golf Chat Forum may be found at http://killdevilhill.com/golfchat/wwwboard.html .

To foster quality discussion forums, from now on only registered members may post. Spam will not be tolerated. If you would like to help moderate, please contact "jolly roger ship @ yahoo . com".

To post please register at http://jollyrogerwest.com.

We prefer deep reflections on Philosophy, Shakespearean Sonnets, and tender musings along the lines of:

XCVII

How like a winter hath my absence been
From thee, the pleasure of the fleeting year!
What freezings have I felt, what dark days seen!
What old December's bareness everywhere! 
And yet this time removed was summer's time;
The teeming autumn, big with rich increase,
Bearing the wanton burden of the prime,
Like widow'd wombs after their lords' decease:
Yet this abundant issue seem'd to me
But hope of orphans, and unfather'd fruit;
For summer and his pleasures wait on thee,
And, thou away, the very birds are mute:
  Or, if they sing, 'tis with so dull a cheer,
  That leaves look pale, dreading the winter's near.
 	--William Shakespeare

It is not sufficient to see and to know the beauty of a work. We must feel and be affected by it. -Voltaire, Taste, 1764

It is our continuing goal to foster the world's greatest converstation.

In the future, please register and make all posts to http://jollyrogerwest.com,

and/or join the forums at Great Books & Philosophy Forums @ jollyroger.com/greatbooksforums.

My gaze on Beatrice, hers on Heaven, In less time than an arrow strikes the mark, Flies through the air, loosed from its catch, I found myself in some place where a wondrous thing. Absorbed all of my mind, and then my lady, From whom I could not keep my thirst to know, turned toward me as joyful as her beauty: Direct your mind and gratitude, she said, To God, who raised us up to His first star. -Dante, The Divine Comedy: Paradise

All The Best,

William Einstein Shakespeare :)

CXLII

Love is my sin, and thy dear virtue hate,
Hate of my sin, grounded on sinful loving:
O! but with mine compare thou thine own state,
And thou shalt find it merits not reproving;
Or, if it do, not from those lips of thine, 
That have profan'd their scarlet ornaments
And seal'd false bonds of love as oft as mine,
Robb'd others' beds' revenues of their rents.
Be it lawful I love thee, as thou lov'st those
Whom thine eyes woo as mine importune thee:
Root pity in thy heart, that, when it grows,
Thy pity may deserve to pitied be.
  If thou dost seek to have what thou dost hide,
  By self-example mayst thou be denied!

CXLIII

Lo, as a careful housewife runs to catch
One of her feather'd creatures broke away,
Sets down her babe, and makes all swift dispatch
In pursuit of the thing she would have stay;
Whilst her neglected child holds her in chase,
Cries to catch her whose busy care is bent
To follow that which flies before her face,
Not prizing her poor infant's discontent;
So runn'st thou after that which flies from thee, 
Whilst I thy babe chase thee afar behind;
But if thou catch thy hope, turn back to me,
And play the mother's part, kiss me, be kind;
  So will I pray that thou mayst have thy 'Will,'
  If thou turn back and my loud crying still.
 	--William Shakespeare