The Walking Proverb

Those of you who are familiar with my competitive side will appreciate that I recently lost a rousing game of the card game "Hand-foot." Not only did I lose, I lost hard, and it hurt. Like a punch to the gut. Let me explain why.
The goal of the game of Hand-foot is to score 1,000 points. This is usually done over the course of several rounds of play, with scores varying greatly, from -200 to 400. Yeah, 400 tops.
We played a practice round, followed by a real round. I was solidly middle of the pack with aspirations of domination (as per usual). And then came the never-ending round.
One player, Cassy, was very close to "going out" which would end the round. In an effort to prevent this, several players (myself included) talked her into "picking up the pile." If you don't know how to play the game, this meant that she got a whole lot of points, both negative and positive, and bought us more desperate players some time to go out before her. I accomplished this persuasion with a bit of rhetoric that included the vow to name, not my daughter, not my firstborn, not just the girls, but all of my children after her if she were to acquire 1,000 points in one round. Yes, I would surely alienate my firstborn son, Cassandra, if she did this. I was confident that she would not, for surely someone would go out before her.
Nobody went out before her.
And all of my children now have to be named Cassy.

Luther From His Death Bed

"No one can understand Virgil's Georgics unless he has been a farmer for five years. No one can understand Cicero's letters unless he has busied himself in the affairs of a great empire for twenty-five years. No one can presume to have indulged in Holy Scriptures sufficiently unless he were in charge of all the churches for one hundred years with the prophets Elijah and Elisha, John the Baptist, Christ, and the Apostles. Do not seize hold of this divine Aeneid, but adore its tracks with humility. We are beggars, this is true."

-Martin Luther