Page 74
By Jack Joseph Smith
By Jack Joseph Smith
Original Scan
AI Interpretation
This page treats hatred of one's own as a deeper sin than open enemies, and it frames that hatred as spiritually and physically destructive.
The restored ending makes the warning more public and bodily: the speaker advises leaving while others laugh at blood, then writes `They will MAKE there choise` before the final release into letting go.
'Sin' defines the worst evil not by doctrine but by inward betrayal: 'The worst of all evils, no matter of Dante, / and turning against a friend, is hating your / own.' The speaker claims hard-won authority -- 'Alone, / I have received both; / so I know' -- and watches hatred 'festering, ... among men that I / know it, and am sure can happen among women too.' His remedy is self-subtraction: 'while removel of thyself within the struggle, / shifts the world,' and the counsel to retreat -- 'try not to kill, help yourself as a ghost with a crutch, / limp away.' The restored handwritten continuation makes the ending public and bodily: 'Inside And out, LET THEM LAUGH / AT your Blood / About Licking up / you'll find your honor, / They will MAKE there choise / you'll find the wind in letting go.' The handwritten 'AT your Blood' and 'About Licking up' sit at the right margin with uncertain insertion points, and a crossed duplicate 'wind' line was omitted in favor of the final uncrossed one. Spellings 'begining', 'removel', and 'there choise' are kept as written.