You may use any online or other sources in preparing this "exam."  My goal is to get you in the first part to comment on key passages and moments in the readings in your own language; in the second part, to build on argument using all reading at your disposal, including the class "lectures" in Course Documents and other items.

There is no time limit.  If you are perplexed, you should definitely get in touch with me: I’ll be here to advise you all weekend. This is due midnight on Monday, unless there is a persuasive reason for submitting it later, and it should be submitted to Digital Drop Box.

Please answer six  of the following questions. You may use any source available to you in writing your response.  Each answer should be at least 50 words long, preferably not much longer.

1.  Why is property so important for Locke?

2. How is political power different from paternal power?

3. Locke and Wordsworth both describe an early state of being, before the present day. I’ve used the adjective "Edenic" to describe both of these: but are they similar, or different? In what ways?

4. How does Locke justify slavery?

5. In chapter 5, what big change takes place in the history of mankind, as Locke describes it? What are the effects of this change?
 
6. Describe how "acorns" are important for Locke?

7. When are men justified in seeking the "dissolution" of government, how is "dissolution" different from "revolution," and what makes dissolution a rare event?

8. In what ways was Locke influential on the early settlers of Philadelphia?

9. What sorts of irony do you detect in Blake’s "The Chimney Sweeper"?

10. How is the "child the father to the man" in Wordsworth?

Here are two pieces of writing that could be called "typical" of their eras (though the second is in some ways "later" than much Romantic verse.  Discuss each of these works in relation to the works we have read so far this term, trying to find ways in which Wollstonecraft is typical of the Enlightenment (Locke), and Whitman of the Romantics (especially  Wordsworth and Keats).    You may use all notes, lectures on Blackboard, and other sources as you create your essays.

Each essay should be at least 250-300 words.

It will take a bit of time to work through these.  I recommend readiing them over now and thinking for a bit.

1.  An except from chapter 2 of Mary Wollstonecraft, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman.  1792.

Mary Wollstonecraft is often called the first feminist, but she is very much also a product of her time.  In this passage, she discusses the role of love in marriage.  I’ve used square brackets, [ ] to add some notes to the text.

This is an obvious truth, and the cause not lying deep, will not elude a slight glance of inquiry.

Love, the common passion, in which chance and sensation take place of choice and reason, is, in some degree, felt by the mass of mankind; for it is not necessary to speak, at present, of the emotions that rise above or sink below love. This passion, naturally increased by suspense and difficulties, draws the mind out of its accustomed state, and exalts the affections; but the security of marriage allowing the fever of love to subside, a healthy temperature is thought insipid, only by those who have not sufficient intellect to substitute the calm tenderness of friendship, the confidence of respect, [for] blind admiration, and the sensual emotions of fondness.

This is, must be, the course of nature: friendship or indifference inevitably succeeds love.  And this constitution seems perfectly to harmonize with the system of government which prevails in the moral world. Passions are spurs to action, and open the mind; but they sink into mere appetites, become a personal and momentary gratification, when the object is gained, and the satisfied mind rests in enjoyment. The man who had some virtue whilst he was struggling for a crown, often becomes a voluptuous tyrant when it graces his brow; and, when the lover is not lost in the husband, the dotard, a prey to childish caprices, and fond jealousies, neglects the serious duties of life,  and the caresses which should excite confidence in his children are lavished on the overgrown child, his wife.
 
In order to fulfil the duties of life, and to be able to pursue with  vigour the various employments which form the moral character, a master and mistress of a family ought not to continue to love each other with passion. I mean to say, that they ought not to indulge those emotions which disturb the order of society, and engross the thoughts that should be otherwise employed. The mind that has never been engrossed by one object wants vigour—if it can long be so, it is weak.

A mistaken education, a narrow, uncultivated mind, and many sexual prejudices, tend to make women more constant than men; but, for the present, I shall not touch on this branch of the subject. I will go still further, and advance, without dreaming of a paradox, that an unhappy marriage is often very advantageous to a family, and that the neglected wife is, in general, the best mother. And this would almost always be the consequence if the female mind were more enlarged: for it seems to be the common dispensation of Providence, that what we gain in present enjoyment should be deducted from the treasure of life, experience; and that when we are gathering the flowers of the day and reveling in pleasure, the solid fruit of toil and wisdom should not be caught at the same time. The way lies before us, we must turn to the right or left; and he who will pass life away in bounding from one pleasure to another, must not complain if he neither acquires wisdom nor respectability of character.

Supposing, for a moment, that the soul is not immortal, and that man was only created for the present scene, I think we should have reason to complain that love, infantine fondness, ever grew insipid and pallid upon the sense. "Let us eat, drink, and love, for to-morrow we die," would be, in fact, the language of reason, the morality of life; and who but a fool would part with a reality for a fleeting shadow?   But, if awed by observing the improvable powers of the mind, we disdain to confine our wishes or thoughts to such a comparatively mean field of action; that only appears grand and important, as it is connected with a boundless prospect and sublime hopes, what necessity is there for falsehood in conduct, and why must the sacred majesty of truth be violated to detain a deceitful good that saps the very foundation of virtue? Why must the female mind be tainted by coquettish arts to gratify the sensualist, and prevent love from subsiding into friendship, or compassionate tenderness, when there are not qualities on which friendship can be built? Let the honest heart show itself, and reason teach passion to submit to necessity; or, let the dignified pursuit of virtue and knowledge raise the mind above those emotions which rather embitter than sweeten the cup of life, when they are not restrained within due bounds.

2.   Whitman, When Lilacs Last In The Dooryard Bloom'd, 1865

8

55   O western orb sailing the heaven,
56   Now I know what you must have meant as a month since I walk'd,
57   As I walk'd in silence the transparent shadowy night,
58   As I saw you had something to tell as you bent to me night after night,
59   As you droop'd from the sky low down as if to my side, (while the other stars all look'd on,)
60   As we wander'd together the solemn night, (for something I know not what kept me from sleep,)
61   As the night advanced, and I saw on the rim of the west how full you were of woe,
62   As I stood on the rising ground in the breeze in the cool transparent night,
63   As I watch'd where you pass'd and was lost in the netherward black of the night,
64   As my soul in its trouble dissatisfied sank, as where you sad orb,
65   Concluded, dropt in the night, and was gone.

9

66   Sing on there in the swamp,
67   O singer bashful and tender, I hear your notes, I hear your call,
68   I hear, I come presently, I understand you,
69   But a moment I linger, for the lustrous star has detain'd me,
70   The star my departing comrade holds and detains me.

10

71   O how shall I warble myself for the dead one there I loved?
72   And how shall I deck my song for the large sweet soul that has gone?
73   And what shall my perfume be for the grave of him I love?

74   Sea-winds blown from east and west,
75   Blown from the Eastern sea and blown from the Western sea, till there on the prairies meeting,
76   These and with these and the breath of my chant,
77   I'll perfume the grave of him I love.