| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Pivot of Civilization by Margaret Sanger: point of graduation, and only one had gone to high school. These
large families migrated to the beet-fields in early spring. Seventy-
two per cent. of them are retarded. When we realize that feeble-
mindedness is arrested development and retardation, we see that these
``beet children'' are artificially retarded in their growth, and that
the tendency is to reduce their intelligence to the level of the
congenital imbecile.
Nor must it be concluded that these large ``beet'' families are always
the ``ignorant foreigner'' so despised by our respectable press. The
following case throws some light on this matter, reported in the same
pamphlet: ``An American family, considered a prize by the agent
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Secret Places of the Heart by H. G. Wells: American for some time. I want to know very badly what you
think you are up to with the world,--our world. "
"I'm equally anxious to know what England thinks she is
doing. Her ways recently have been a little difficult to
understand. On any hypothesis-that is honourable to her."
"H'm," said Sir Richmond.
"I assure you we don't like it. This Irish business. We feel
a sort of ownership in England. It's like finding your
dearest aunt torturing the cat."
"We must talk of that," said Sir Richmond.
"I wish you would."
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe: "But why didn't you free your slaves?"
"Well, I wasn't up to that. To hold them as tools for money-making,
I could not;--have them to help spend money, you know, didn't
look quite so ugly to me. Some of them were old house-servants,
to whom I was much attached; and the younger ones were children
to the old. All were well satisfied to be as they were." He paused,
and walked reflectively up and down the room.
"There was," said St. Clare, "a time in my life when I had
plans and hopes of doing something in this world, more than to
float and drift. I had vague, indistinct yearnings to be a sort
of emancipator,--to free my native land from this spot and stain.
Uncle Tom's Cabin |
