The former post was removed because it was off topic, and thus a violation of our Great Books & Classics spirit. We are migrating to
registration-only forums at href=http://jollyrogerwest.com>jollyrogerwest.com Great Books forums,
Philosophy Forums,
and booksliterature.com Great Books forums. These are Great Books sites, and we prefer posts along the following
lines:

Too many of us look upon Americans as dollar chasers. This is a cruel
libel, even if it is reiterated thoughtlessly by the Americans
themselves. --Albert EinsteinWe know too much, and are convinced of too little. Our literature is a substitute for religion, and so is our religion.
T. S. Eliot

LXXXIV



Who is it that says most, which can say more,

Than this rich praise,--that you alone, are you?

In whose confine immured is the store

Which should example where your equal grew.

Lean penury within that pen doth dwell

That to his subject lends not some small glory;

But he that writes of you, if he can tell

That you are you, so dignifies his story,

Let him but copy what in you is writ,

Not making worse what nature made so clear,

And such a counterpart shall fame his wit,

Making his style admired every where.

  You to your beauteous blessings add a curse,

  Being fond on praise, which makes your praises worse.

 	--William Shakespeare

XII



When I do count the clock that tells the time,

And see the brave day sunk in hideous night;

When I behold the violet past prime,

And sable curls, all silvered o\'er with white; 

When lofty trees I see barren of leaves,

Which erst from heat did canopy the herd,

And summer\'s green all girded up in sheaves,

Borne on the bier with white and bristly beard,

Then of thy beauty do I question make,

That thou among the wastes of time must go,

Since sweets and beauties do themselves forsake

And die as fast as they see others grow;

  And nothing \'gainst Time\'s scythe can make defence

  Save breed, to brave him when he takes thee hence.

 	--William Shakespeare