Interpretation: A Journal of Political Philosophy

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224 Interpretation the money. I know the way of ghosts, and so do you." Tom begins to have doubts too. That the ghost would stick to the treasure seemed eminently reasonable. But once more inspiration comes to Tom. "Looky-here, Huck, what fools we're making of ourselves! Injun Joe's ghost ain't a-going to come around where there's a cross!" And so the sacred symbol performs the function that wiU now be characteristic in the order over which Tom is to preside. It wUl point the way to the new salvation and keep the air pure and free of evil spirits for the votaries of the faith. Huck and Tom return to St. Petersburg. As they enter the town, the Welshman sees them and tells them they are wanted at the Widow Douglas's. Their wagon appears to him to be loaded with old metal. As they reach the widow's it appears that something the people of consequence in the town are there. The boys are quickly great is in progress. All sent aside for scrubbing and dressing. Huck wants to find a rope and drop out the window and escape. But Tom senses another scene of grandeur and won't miss it for anything. The celebration is a setting for the supposed grand revelation by the Welshman of how Huck had risked his life that Saturday night to save the widow. Huck had earlier sworn the Welshman to secrecy, but the death of Injun Joe evidently has con vinced the Welshman but not Huck that the oath is no longer binding. Huck stiU feared that Joe might have some friends around. But the secret had already leaked out, and the surprise lacked some of its supposed force. When the widow responded by saying that she meant to give Huck a home, have him educated, and start him in business some day, "Tom's chance was come. He said:: 'Huck don't need it, Huck's rich.'" And so the long trail of successes winds its way to the triumph to end * The exact cause of the break with the return path is not easy to state precisely. Tom had made two smoke marks for future guidance before they were attacked by the bats. To escape, Tom leads Becky hastily down a corridor, just as Becky's candle is put out. The flight continues for some time, down a succession of corridors entered at random. Is the pathway broken at this point? Tom does not think of returning for some time, still impelled by his search for novelties to brag about later. He then tells Becky he reckons he could find the way back, but fears encountering the bats again. He insists upon searching for a new way. His fear of the bats appears to govern him at this point, just as his fear of Injun Joe does a little later. But the bats are a largely imaginary danger. A resolute attempt to protect the candle, at least until they reached the smoke marks or the staircase might have succeeded. Even if they failed, they would have remained at a point in the cave where they might easily have been rescued. In fact, had they bats, they remained near the might have followed them out of the cave when night came, and the bats emerged in their quest for food. If it is true, as we are told, that Tom knew the ways of bats, his behavior becomes even more unreasonable. But Tom is ever dominated by the passion of the moment. He never acts reasonably. It is in his defiance of reason, and the cunning of his passion, that his virtu consists. His way is irreversibly downwards, and he emerges not from the top, but from the bottom of the cave. One can hardly imagine a more apt symbol of the replacement of Platonic by Machiavellian republicanism.
Tom Sawyer: Hero of Middle America 225 all triumphs. Once more Tom is the little child in a drama that has all the glory of the millennium. The whitewashing of the fence, the prize winning in the Sunday school, the return from the dead, the revelation in the courtroom, all pale into insignificance beside the twelve thousand dollars in gold coins that now transfix the assembled magnates of St. Petersburg. Tom's glory will now endure. The Lord has shown him to be truly of the elect. He has shown him the light of salvation in his hour of sorest need. His cross has pointed him the way to the treasure. And the treasure the cross has revealed and protected is such as neither moth nor rust can corrupt, or other thieves can steal. Tom Sawyer's Gang is set upon the path to greatness and immortality such as no faith can assure so well, either in this world or the next, as a large capital.
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a journal of political philosophy p
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ABOUT PLATO'S PHILEBUS * Jacob Klei
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About Plato's Philebus 1 59 of plea
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About Plato's Philebus 161 Socrates
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About Plato's Philebus 163 Protarch
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About Plato's Philebus 165 to be ne
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About Plato's Philebus 167 geograph
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About Plato's Philebus 169 and prod
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About Plato's Philebus 171 "What yo
Page 19 and 20: About Plato's Philebus 173 empty an
Page 21 and 22: About Plato's Philebus 175 Socrates
Page 23 and 24: About Plato's Philebus 111 straight
Page 25 and 26: About Plato's Philebus 179 thinking
Page 27 and 28: About Plato's Philebus 181 profitab
Page 29 and 30: ON CORNEILLE'S HORACE Dain A. Traft
Page 31 and 32: On Corneille's Horace 185 silenced
Page 33 and 34: through clearly enough. "You have a
Page 35 and 36: On Corneille's Horace 189 Contre qu
Page 37 and 38: On Corneille's Horace 191 That Hora
Page 39 and 40: On Corneille's Horace 193 Corneille
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Page 73 and 74: The Dependence of Fact upon "Value"
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