Emily Dickinson -- This is Immensity

Sometimes I feel like I've spent months of my life immersed in Dickinson. At the most I think it's been two weeks in another American Literature class, but there's nothing quite like two weeks straight of Dickinson capped with a ten page research paper that requires another week of reading about her poetry to convince you that you never want to read another Dickinson poem as long as you live.

Or at least for another semester.

Despite the almost ridiculous number of Dickinson's poems that I've read in the past year, there are a few that no matter how many times I read them catch me by surprise over and over again. This seems to happen more often than not particularly with her two or three line poems (none of which we covered in class, so a lot of this blog may seem a little bit extraneous).

I find 1548 in The Poems of Emily Dickinson particularly striking.

All things swept away
This - is immensity -

I'm not sure whether I love the irony of the concept confined to such a brief piece (read it out loud and then think about it for a few moments -- it's pretty mind-boggling) or the power that Dickinson manages to pack into seven words more, but I feel like there's no denying that the simplicity and complexity of the poem all wrapped up together is nothing short of brilliant. The idea of complete nothingness is incredibly disturbing, and it's striking that we feel such a need to consider it.



For those who care where I'm pulling my poems from, here's a citation:
Dickinson, Emily, and R. Franklin. The Poems of Emily Dickinson. Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP, 1999. Print.

Harriet Beacher Stowe -- The Cabin that Started a War

All right, maybe that's a bit of a dramatic statement. However, the sun's shining and I'm feeling a bit presumptuous today, so there you have it.

The cynic in me dislikes Uncle Tom's Cabin a little more than is probably necessary. The idealist in me falls all over itself in happiness about once every two chapters or so during particularly beautifully-strung passages. My difficulty in reading this book, prior thoughts taken into considering, is reconciling the two feelings without compromising the novels goals.

Every time I read this book I spend the majority of my time arguing with myself over whether it's worth the time I've spent arguing with myself about it or not, and honestly I still haven't come to a decision that makes both Cynictasia and Idealisttasia content, and probably never will. The novel tends to leave me feeling a bit juvenile (one would think after reading the same novel at least two times it would be more or less easy to form solid opinions about it), partly because I spend so much time complaining to myself about it. Which is silly, but there you have it.

On almost every point I'm torn pretty irrevocably one way or another, both loving and hating the novel all at once. The language is often stunning, and I'm a sucker for breathtaking description. Take Stowe's description of night on the river, for example, for example --

Night came on,--night calm, unmoved, and glorious, shining down with her innumerable and solemn angel eyes, twinkling, beautiful, but silent. (Stowe, 111)

Ridiculously potent in so many ways, most interestingly from my perspective that the imagery I find most striking in Stowe's writing involves her description and personification of the landscape rather than description of the same sort about people. Her treatment of the human element in Uncle Tom's produces almost the reverse effect on me. Her descriptions of Eva in the "The Grass Withereth," for instance.

Has there ever been a child like Eva? Yes, there have been; but their names are always on grave-stones, and their sweet smiles, their heavenly eyes, their singular words and ways, are among the buried treasures of yearning hearts. In how many families do you hear the legend that all the goodness and graces of the living are nothing to the peculiar charms of one who is not. (Stowe, 222)

That bit isn't as frustrating as the passage the describes Eva's interactions with Topsy before she dies, which I'm going to include only in part for time (and my sanity)'s sake.

"O, Topsy, poor child, I love you!" said Eva, with a sudden burst of feeling, and laying her little thin, white hand on Topsy's shoulder; "I love you, because you haven't had any father, or mother, or friends;--because you've been a poor, abused child! I love you, and I want you to be good. I am very unwell, Topsy, and I think I shan't live a great while; and it really grieves me, to have you be so naughty. I wish you would try to be good, for my sake;--it's only a little while I shan't be with you."

The round, keen eyes of the black child were overcast with tears;--large, bright drops rolled heavily down, one by one, and fell on the little white hand. Yes, in that moment, a ray of real belief, a ray of heavenly love, had penetrated the darkness of her heathen soul! she laid her head down between her knees, and wept and sobbed,--while the beautiful child, bending over her, looked like the picture of some bright angel stooping to reclaim a sinner.

I mean, really, Ms. Stowe? Really? Not only does the forced depth of description make me feel a little bit stupid (if she has to explain this relationship so very clearly she apparently expects that I may otherwise have missed the subtleties in contrast...), but the idealization and cliche are a little bit insulting.

I deeply appreciate the sentiments behind Stowe's characters, particularly in the dichotomies between them. The contrasts in the relationships between George and Eliza, Cassy and Emmeline, St. Clare and and his brother, and Eva and Topsy (as well as many others -- the list goes on and on) are cleverly executed and present a clarity and depth of understanding that Uncle Tom's would lack were they nonexistent. At the same time however the contrasts between ideals are often pressed to the point of ridiculousness--I've already referenced the above passage, which is a prime example. I want to appreciate the novel's sentiments so badly, but at the same time I have difficulty grounding myself in these themes simply because everything is so over-exaggerated. The novel is, for instance, one long series of foreshadowing of the last few chapters. I deeply appreciate this on one level, but at the same time it's a large part of one of my greatest critiques of the novel's form. I as a reader appreciate a certain amount of subtlety, and Uncle Tom's Cabin is anything but. Every instance of death it seemed that six or so pages before there was at least a paragraph discussing the probability of that death (i.e. Tom and Eva's discussion of heaven on the shore of the lake, Miss Ophelia pressing St. Clare to make provisions for his servants in the case of his death, etc.). These instances would not be a problem, generally speaking, if Stowe did not insist on pointing out that she's heavily foreshadowed everything. In case you've even missed her little hints, she's even pointedly named an entire chapter "Foreshadowings."

Yet again, this makes me feel like an idiot. I wrote beneath that particularly helpful chapter heading "thanks for the info." Because really, how should I ever have guessed otherwise? Thank you, Ms. Stowe, for heading off any sense of confusion or ambiguity that I may possibly have had.

All in all, I can't help but be frustrated with Uncle Tom's Cabin. There's so much overwhelmingly good about it, style and themewise, but at the same time so much that makes me want to shut my head in a door. I've read the thing through in its entirety about three times now, and if anything the more I read it the more confused I become. Do I think it ought to be dismissed from the canon of American Literature? Absolutely not. But I think it's a more troublesome book in many ways (many of which I simply don't have time to cover) than it's often presented to be.

Edgar Allen Poe -- Shall Be Lifted Nevermore

There has always been a particularly soft space in my heart for Poe. My mom still quotes Annabell Lee sporadically from when she memorized it as a child, and its opposingly optimistic and haunting lines are some of my first memories of poetry. My perception of The Raven will be forever tainted by the memory of Robert Davison's croaking of "Nevermore" in eighth grade, and The Fall of the House of Usher has made me almost ridiculously suspicious of any minor crack in the plaster walls of our farmhouse.

Questions of the author's mental stability aside, Poe remains an emblematic figure in the American literary canon. If anything, his alcoholism and severe bouts with depression and misfortune make his body of work all the more stunning--he was, if anything, writing out of adversity. It makes me a little bit sad that his personal choices so often taint our understanding of his work as the works of a fellow perhaps a little more than mad, but it is rather these tones madness and downright insanity that make the vast majority of his writing so interesting, so I suppose I can't complain too much.

Carnivalin'

Since I'm a few days late posting this post and therefore feel as though my classmates have more than adequately covered the classes general feelings as far as The Scarlet Letter is concerned, I thought I'd look back a little further into the past month and tackle rather our readings of Emerson and Thoreau, in order not to be ridiculously redundant.

In general we as a class seemed to be more or less uncomfortable with both the content and presentation of Emerson's American Scholar and Nature, both relatively philosophical in nature. Despite a general dislike and frustration, many of my classmates managed to find bits and pieces of good sense. Emerson's deep appreciation of nature and his concept of its role in our understanding of ourselves. Many also struggled with Emerson's concept of the spiritual -- Kiera mentions in particular the tones of Eastern religions that pervade his writings, which are particularly interesting in relation to his prior role as a protestant minister.

We seemed to appreciate Thoreau's presentation of Emerson's philosophy a great deal more, as a group, in particular his initiative in immersing himself in nature. His elegant language was also appealing to the group in general. A few of our classmates, however, found him to fall a little short of his ultimate goal of separating himself from the necessities of society and secluding himself in nature, Walden being, instead of an exposition of an idealistic existence becomes more of an artistic representation of a less-than-idealistic reality.

Overall more people seemed to feel comfortable tackling the concepts in Thoreau as opposed to those in Emerson, due to the relative simplicity of Walden in comparison with Emerson's more philosophical ramblings. Thoreau is approachable and therefore more practical, despite his downfalls.

Nature

Sometimes I feel like it's almost necessary to get out of nature -- spend some time in a primarily urban environment -- to be able to appreciate how necessary it is to our peace of mind, and also to be able to appreciate the bits of nature that filter in to that urban setting and change our perceptions of the natural and the urban at the same time. Perhaps this idea is what creates for me a disconnect in my reading of Emerson and Thoreau. I love nature. Having spent a fairly ridiculous amount of my life in a tent on the back side of some mountain watching the rain wash away what's left of the evening's campfire, listening to the water hum to itself as it filters through the canopy of trees, I feel like there's a part of me that is insepparable from it. some of my favorite memories, often the images that I remember best and most clearly, are lakes and rivers in Glacier park and the way the sun strikes the water trickling down the sides of Going to the Sun road as the snow begins to melt.

The city, for me, makes these images so much more poignant. There's almost nothing like catching the till of birdsong in a break in traffic, noting the roots of trees pushing and prying at cracks in sidewalks, or watching the first snow fall and blanket the ground, covering everything in a coccoon of white and making it all, in some way, equal. These things, in nature, are not extraordinary. The closeness of society and the contrasts between civilization and the wilderness seem more important to me than simply immersing oneself in on or the other. Their connotations are more powerful when they are juxtaposed one with the other. While I've often wished to lose myself for months in the backwoods of Montana, I suspect those woods would take on the tenors of civilization for me, simply because I've been so steeped in them myself, and carry those ideas and expectations wrapped around my shoulders wherever I go, whether I'm in the city or not. That is to say, I feel that if I were to attempt exist for a time solely in the nature that I love, I already carry too much of what I want to leave behind with me to fully be able to experience that solitude. It is better for me, then, to more or less accept what's here and appreciate it more fully in the knowledge that the two -- the city and the wilderness -- somehow or another coexist.

It seems like this concept is a great deal more Emersonian than it seems on the surface. Emerson understands the need for man to seclude himself, to reach a sort of communion with nature in order to understand his own nature, but he also seems to understand the impossibility of such an ideal existence. Even Thoreau's experience suggests that distancing oneself from society in such an ideal way is difficult, if not impossible. Understanding this dichotomy may allow us to experience life to the fullest.

Henry David Thoreau -- A Little Idealism Never Hurt Anybody

Yeah, so I won't lie. I don't like Thoreau. I haven't since I read Walden the first time somewhere around junior high. Perhaps it's because I really didn't understand him the first time around, or just generally fall into the "there's no possible way this guy could have been that genuine" category because I'm a little too cynical, but I've just never been able to jive with his work. It isn't that I think he's wrong -- he's all too right about a ridiculous number of things.

I mostly just think he appreciated the sound of his own voice a little too much, and could probably have used a week or two on his own in the real wilderness with absolutely no human contact to properly build on the ideals that he touts so eloquently.

So maybe I'm a little too hard on the guy. But really, he says it himself -- he spent a good bit of time literally wandering around doing odd little jobs that didn't particularly need doing, and was pretty well incensed that the city didn't want to pay him to do what he wanted to do. So in a fit of transcendentalist angst he casts aside this prescribed life depending upon possession and status and advancement and secludes himself in "nature." I appreciate in particular that the area he picks out on Walden pond for his humble abode, he specifically points out, is a spot with great economic possibility.

I could probably rant for an hour on why I think Thoreau's overrated, but I'm sure there are better things I could be doing with my time. I also feel like it's equally possible to appreciate and utilize his philosophy without necessarily separating ourselves completely from the life that we're living -- perhaps this haphazard sort of existance helps us to appreciate the little things in nature and the beauty of that outside, solitary sort of life all the more.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

I have no clever titles, today.

First off I'd like to say that most of what I'm going to say in this blog is based on memory from my last reading of Emerson, which was probably.... four or five years ago. I've made it through "American Scholar" and parts of "Nature" (not gonna lie, it was mostly during class. for some reason Emerson keeps putting me to sleep), but I don't know that I'm quite comfortable enough with his ideology to be able to write about it with any confidence.

That said, I have a mixed sort of appreciation for Emerson. Having spent a great deal of my life outdoors and in the backwoods of Montana I can honestly understand a great deal of his attraction to nature (because while Emerson defines "nature" as being that outside of man -- the "not me" -- he does seem to make the point that nature is also that outside what is made by man) as a place for reflection and self-understanding. I don't necessarily ascribe to the same connection between man and nature, as Biblically speaking the oneness (or something to that effect) that Emerson describes doesn't seem to jive too well, but a great deal of what he claims seems to descend from a logical progression.

If we are able to separate ourselves from what distracts us (which seems to be in general that which is made by humankind, the works of our hands, etc.) into some place foreign and completely outside of ourselves, it might serve to allow us to better understand who we are, at the core of ourselves.

There is of course the possibility that I'm reading Emerson completely wrong (or not reading him much at all), and he's a bit more of a crackpot than my initial analysis perceives, but I do think I get for the most part where he's coming from and am glad to have gotten to spend more time with his writing.

Washington Irving -- What a Good Night's Rest Can Do for Your Country

I mean, seriously. Rip Van Winkle wanders off into the woods for some peace and quiet and maybe to shoot an innocent woodland creature or two, gets slammed with some ancient Dutchmen, and wakes up twenty years later to the advent of an entirely new nation. Go figure.

While Irving's short story relates especially to the development of a new American Literature, it also speaks to the relative speed with which the nation itself developed, as well as the mythology surrounding that development. I remember reading the story for the first time in its entirety as a sophomore in high school and for the most part disregarding it as nonsense: I was still a little too enamored by European Literature to be too impressed with what I considered a canon far less important to me in my literary discovery. It's strange how perspectives can change so greatly. While I'm still not as in love with Irving as I am with Chaucer or Boccacio or Dante (all deeply influential in the development of literature in Europe, and thereby influential in the development of an American literature by default) I can see his influence in the later literature of the Americas -- short stories, in particular -- and appreciate the form of his writing a great deal more.

His work also provides a commentary on personality and humanity as a whole. Rip Van Winkle, Irving's less-that-exemplary layabout protagonist, nevertheless personifies the development of an American literary tradition more or less outside of the umbrella of Europe and particularly Great Britain. He's well-liked despite his numerous flaws (we would certainly critique his family management and personal discipline, or complete lack thereof) and somehow manages to maintain a particular and fairly important role in his society. What that role says about the role of American literature is debatable -- Rip is essentially socially useless. But it does own to the fact that, despite his uselessness, he is cherished. Perhaps this is what Irving wished for his new nations developing literature.

Olaudah Equiano -- Other Perspectives

Equiano's narrative was and is fascinating to me for many reasons. It was especially interesting to read a slave narrative from such an early period -- I'd never read this particular exposition before, and in comparison with works from authors such as Douglass and Jacobs, who were writing much later, much of the information and descriptions were very new to me.

Equiano's descriptions of his relationships with the various men and women who came to be in possession of him were particularly interesting to me. Perhaps because he was enslaved in Europe for a longish period of time and not often limited to the shore when in the Americas his narrative displays a kinship with his captors that is decisively lacking in other slave narratives (at least, in those that I am familiar with). He certainly strikes me as a man cut from a much different cloth than Douglass. He was no stranger to adversity, but he met his slavery and in particular his bid for freedom from a much different perspective. Douglass's Narrative portrays an entirely self-made man, reliant for the most part not on outside help for his freedom (and those times he admits to help he refuses to name they who came to his aid on the idea that were he to name them they might meet adversity due to the Fugitive Slave law, etc.). Equiano, on the other hand, works on the side to make the proper amount of money to purchase his freedom from his master. Both are certainly self-made, but in a different manner quite probably due to outside forces as well as environment.

All things considered, Equiano seems to have had a much better time of the slave trade than the authors of any other slave narrative I've read. We do often hear about benevolent masters, but not as often from the perspective of the enslaved. Equiano's narrative, while not painting slavery in any sort of positive light does however manage to maintain the Enlightenment concepts of morality and the overall goodness of man -- a fact which is both inspiring and downright confusing, in light of the subject matter. I should very much like the read his narrative in its entirety, as I'm not exactly sure what to make of it from the excerpts that we read. It definitely begs a great deal more thought.

John Adams -- Something to Hold on to

I won't lie: I meant to post this something like two weeks ago when it was fresh in my mind, but completely forgot to come back and edit my draft. Then when I was going to write about someone else and sporadically decided to delete any unfinished drafts out of a strange fit of organization (if you don't know me, these happen rarely if ever), and happened upon John Adams. I also realized that I no longer really had anything to say, but I liked my title so much that I couldn't delete it.

Personal vanity aside, I rather enjoyed the correspondence between John Adams and his wife, Abigail. There's just something about reading the personal communication between two (almost ridiculously) close people that is refreshing in a day and age where communication is so easy and long-distance communication so common place that such committment to writing letters blows my mind a bit. I know for myself I can't imagine having the presence of mind to write consistently to someone a continent away (I rarely remember to call my family when I'm at school for six months at a time, and they're only something like three states apart -- and really, how difficult is it to pick up a phone?) and then deal with the impatience of waiting for a reply.

The context of America's bid for independence from Britain and the subsequent development of a nation is also fascinating, but beyond the political scope John's letters to Abigail betray a relationship very much defined by love, and perhaps more striking because of that context. They reveal a humanity that we tend to forget when we consider the founding of this nation, and while the literary importance of these letters may still stand in contention, the profound depth of love and friendship between these two people does not.

Jonathan Edwards -- By Grace Alone

It's a little bit strange to me that our overall reaction to Jonathan Edwards as a class is one of distrust (as it relates to the dramatic, firey language of his well-known sermon), perhaps because it is not so difficult for me to reconcile the Edwards of "Sinners" to the Edwards of his Personal Narrative as it seems to be for some others.

While Edwards' "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" is certainly a controversial piece of doctrinal analyses and may perhaps dwell too much on the fire-and-brimstone aspects of Christianity, Edwards makes and intellectually and spiritually sound case for the peril of mankind. The almost single-mindedness of the language belies Edwards' sincere repect for and reliance on the grace of God -- it is this grace and restraint alone that separate the sinner from the fires of hell, and in light of the anger and sovereignty of God as outlined by Edwards this grace is all the more profound.

God's grace is the foundation of Christianity. Without the understanding and beneficence of that grace our feeble attempts at holiness amount to nothing and result in eternal damnation. This idea is uncomfortable -- we like the idea that some things we do in life give us a leg up on the general goodness scale, and the concept that anything we do and do not do in life, whether for good or for evil, ultimately does not matter is terrifying. Due to this mindset Edwards' sermon seems to be mere condemnation, but at closer inspection it is rather a plea to those outside of god's grace to step within it, rather than relying on self for an empty salvation. he strives to portray the anger, power, and sovereignty of God in order to better understand the nature of and need for His grace.

Despite its overtly Calvinist tones of predestination "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" is theologically sound. It's message is based in the very foundations of Christianity. I believe the difficulty that we have in appreciating that message comes from a latent self-interest, for one. As we discussed in class, America is at its heart a nation composed of consumers -- if we don't hear the message we want to hear at all times then we're prone to either giving up on that message entirely or simply finding a different translation of the same message that perhaps panders to our personal perceptions of how life and God should be.

We are quick to condemn Edwards based on the overt tones of cynicism when it comes to the human condition and his lack of sympathy in the deliverance of a message of hope, but we base that condemnation almost solely on a message that was written for a different audience during a different time, and often choose to disregard the truth in favor of a cushier, gentler faith.

Edward Taylor -- Mixed Feelings

As much as Taylor was inarguably (in light of his poetry) a man of profound faith in God, I have very mixed feelings about some of the imagery he employs. I found the overarching simile in Meditation 150 nothing short of disturbing.

While it's common to compare Christ's relationship with his church to the relationship between bridegroom and bride, I personally find the depth of Taylor's physical description to take that relationship more than one step too far. Even in light of his inspiration (Song of Solomon 7.3 "Thy two breasts are like the two young Roes that are twins.") this poem is difficult to reconcile with his other work. The first stanza or so reads like much of his other poetry, but he falls into a great deal of almost deprecating physical description that reads a great deal like many of the secular "love" poems of the period (I think of Marvell's To His Coy Mistress). I think however that including language such as that found in Meditation's third stanza --

Lord put these nibbles then my mouth into
And suckle me therewith I humbly pray,
Then with this milk they Spiritual Babe I'st grow,
And these two milk pails shall themselves display
Like to these pretty twins in pairs round neat
And shall sing forth thy praise over this meat.

is demeaning and inappropriate to his subject matter, for obvious reasons.

I have no idea how to read this poem and for me it detracts from the greater body of Taylor's work, which I would like to appreciate for its spirituality and appreciation for the relationship between God and man but can't full based on this single poem.

----------------------------------

Links to the full poems mentioned in this entry::
To His Coy Mistress by Andrew Marvell
I couldn't find Meditation 150, but I assume most of the readers of this blog will have read it for class. if not, maybe your googleing will bring you better luck.

Anne Bradstreet -- Public and Private

Bradstreet is a poet that I struggle with. While I enjoy her poetry a great deal I tend to find myself overwhelmed if I read more than three or four poems at a time. I can't decide whether it's the content or presentation of her work that I don't connect with on a personal level, but either way I can honestly say that while I do appreciate the cleverness and intellect apparent in her poetry I have never been moved to rush out and buy a volume of Anne Bradstreet poems as I have been after reading other poets.

My struggle with connecting to Bradstreet perhaps lies in the almost paradoxical nature of her poetry. I love how ironically she handles between poet and audience, and in particular the relationship between female poet and audience. She is well aware of the supposed limitations on woman's poetic license, and exploits them masterfully in poems such as The Prologue and The Author to Her Book. In The Prologue she asserts her inability to express her thought in words fitting "to sing of wars, of captains, and of kings," but continuously drops classical allusions that betray her capability in exactly these directions in poems such as In Honor of That High and Mighty Princess Queen Elizabeth of Happy Memory and A Dialogue between Old England and New.

She also blurs the lines between the private and public spheres in ways that in poetry and other literature of the period are often surprising. While the majority of her poetry is essentially domestic she often dabbles in the political realm, as well. The poetry she writes to her husband is quite personal, as well as the lines she pens in Before the Birth of Her Children, In Memory of My Dear Grandchild Elizabeth Bradstreet, Who Deceased August 1665, Being A Year and a Half Old, and Here Follows Some Verses Upon the Burning of Our House, July 10th, 1666, to name only a few. These poems deal with very domestic concerns -- birth and death both take place in the home, which is essentially the realm of the woman, as opposed to politics and business etc. which take place in the public realm of man. Bradstreet's entrance into this realm at all is commendable, though at times I feel like she'd have liked to stretch her wings a bit more, and wish she might have let loose and fly.

John Smith and John Winthrop -- The Diversity of Opinion Concerning the Settlement of the New World

I suppose I should probably introduce this in some way before diving straight into literary commentary. I've never been much for writing online (something about typing as opposed to physically writing the words takes the inspiration out of the experience, or something to that effect), so these entries will be taken for the most part verbatim from my reading journal. Most of them will have something or other to do with American Literature, as the purpose of this blog dictates, but I'll probably add other considerations as I go, depending on how I'm feeling. Anyway. The following entry is dated 2/9/10 and continues through 2/10/10, written after reading excerpts from The General History of Virginia, New England, and the Summer Isles by John Smith, and A Model of Christian Charity by John Winthrop.

---

John Smith is as fascinating a character in his own estimation as his reputation (via historical accounts and works of fiction regarding the illustrious captain) makes him out to be. This is perhaps due in part to the embellished nature of his personal accomplishments in contrast with his descriptions of other noteworthy men working alongside him (or almost alarming lack thereof). Aside from Smith's preoccupation with his own prowess, his writing does give us a great deal of insight into the mindset of the early settlers. America, Jamestown in particular, was first and foremost a British colony, and its settlers English at heart. John Smith certainly was not bent on settling the New World out of any separatist agenda, but rather in order to in some sense glorify and prosper England through the prosperity of her colonies. Smith glorifies the lifestyle of the colonists in order to gain the manpower to make expansion possible.

Winthrop, on the other hand, is not concerned so much for the monetary and class opportunities available in the New World as Smith is -- quite the contrary, really. He is concerned primarily with the building of a society and or commonwealth in which each man and woman functions in his or her own station to the best of his or her ability for the common good. The individual is not responsible for his or her station in society so much as for fulfilling his or her duties within that station. Society is not as flexible for Winthrop as it is for Smith. The rich will be rich and the poor will be poor.

Testing...

yep, it works.