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

The new Epictetus Forum may be found at http://westerncanon.com/bookforums/forumdisplay.php?f=49 .

To foster quality discussion forums throughout Western Canon, 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".

Please register at http://westerncanon.com/bookforums to post in the future.

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

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

LXXX

O! how I faint when I of you do write,
Knowing a better spirit doth use your name,
And in the praise thereof spends all his might,
To make me tongue-tied speaking of your fame!
But since your worth--wide as the ocean is,--
The humble as the proudest sail doth bear,
My saucy bark, inferior far to his,
On your broad main doth wilfully appear.
Your shallowest help will hold me up afloat,
Whilst he upon your soundless deep doth ride;
Or, being wrack'd, I am a worthless boat,
He of tall building, and of goodly pride:
  Then if he thrive and I be cast away,
  The worst was this,--my love was my decay.
 	--William Shakespeare

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

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

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

We fly to Beauty as an asylum from the terrors of finite nature.

All The Best,

William Einstein Shakespeare :)

A human being is a part of a whole, called by us _universe_, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separated from the rest... a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty. --Albert Einstein