|
The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from Main Street by Sinclair Lewis: It is an unimaginatively standardized background, a
sluggishness of speech and manners, a rigid ruling of the spirit
by the desire to appear respectable. It is contentment. . .
the contentment of the quiet dead, who are scornful of the
living for their restless walking. It is negation canonized
as the one positive virtue. It is the prohibition of happiness.
It is slavery self-sought and self-defended. It is dullness
made God.
A savorless people, gulping tasteless food, and sitting
afterward, coatless and thoughtless, in rocking-chairs prickly with
inane decorations, listening to mechanical music, saying
|