Robinson Crusoe

by Daniel Defoe

though I had several times loud calls from my reason and my more composed judgment to go home, yet I had no power to do it. I know not what to call this, nor will I urge that it is a secret overruling decree that hurries us on to be the instruments of our own destruction, even though it be before us, and that we rush upon it with our eyes open.

I was now set up for a Guinea trader; and my friend, to my great misfortune, dying soon after his arrival, I resolved to go the same voyage again, and I embarked in the same vessel with one who was his mate in the former voyage and had now got the command of the ship.

Author sure loves his commas.

After about two years an odd circumstance presented itself, which put the old thought of making some attempt for my liberty again in my head. My patron lying at home longer than usual without fitting out his ship, which, as I heard, was for want of money, he used constantly, once or twice a week, sometimes oftener if the weather was fair, to take the ship’s pinnace and go out into the road a-fishing;

Christ, again with the commas.

he offered me also sixty pieces of eight more for my boy Xury, which I was loath to take, not that I was not willing to let the captain have him but I was very loath to sell the poor boy’s liberty who had assisted me so faithfully in procuring my own. However, when I let him know my reason, he owned it to be just and offered me this medium, that he would give the boy an obligation to set him free in ten years if he turned Christian; upon this, and Xury saying he was willing to go to him, I let the captain have him.

And people were just cool with this?

I believe it is impossible to express to the life what the ecstasies and transports of the soul are when it is so saved, as I may say, out of the very grave; and I do not wonder now at that custom, viz., that when a malefactor who has the halter about his neck is tied up and just going to be turned off, and has a reprieve brought to him: I say, I do not wonder that they bring a surgeon with it, to let him blood that very moment they tell him of it, that the surprise may not drive the animal spirits from the heart, and overwhelm him:

This is a fun one to read as Dick Van Dyke!

I found also that the island I was in was barren and, as I saw good reason to believe, uninhabited, except by wild beasts, of whom, however, I saw none, yet I saw abundance of fowls, but knew not their kind;

Comma, comma, comma, comma, comma chameleon...

I found about thirty-six pounds value in money, some European coin, some Brazil, some pieces of eight, some gold, some silver. I smiled to myself at the sight of this money. “O drug!” said I aloud, “what art thou good for? Thou art not worth to me, no, not the taking off of the ground; one of those knives is worth all this heap; I have no manner of use for thee, e’en remain where thou art and go to the bottom as a creature whose life is not worth saving.”

Really? You said that? Really?

I now began to consider seriously my condition, and the circumstance I was reduced to, and I drew up the state of my affairs in writing, not so much to leave them to any that were to come after me, for I was like to have but few heirs, as to deliver my thoughts from daily poring upon them, and afflicting my mind; and as my reason began now to master my despondency, I began to comfort myself as well as I could and to set the good against the evil, that I might have something to distinguish my case from worse, and I stated it very impartially, like debtor and creditor, the comforts I enjoyed, against the miseries I suffered,

The therapeutic act of journaling. Self-care for the win!

Upon the whole, here was an undoubted testimony that there was scarce any condition in the world so miserable but there was something negative or something positive to be thankful for in it; and let this stand as a direction from the experience of the most miserable of all conditions in this world, that we may always find in it something to comfort ourselves from and to set in the description of good and evil on the credit side of the account.

An attitude of gratitude

it rested upon me with the greater force that it must needs be that God had appointed all this to befall me; that I was brought to this miserable circumstance by His direction, He having the sole power, not of me only, but of everything that happened in the world. Immediately it followed: Why has God done this to me? What have I done to be thus used?

I was very impatient to be at home from whence I had been absent above a month. I cannot express what a satisfaction it was to me to come into my old hutch and lie down in my hammock-bed. This little wandering journey, without settled place of abode, had been so unpleasant to me that my own house, as I called it to myself, was a perfect settlement to me compared to that; and it rendered everything about me so comfortable that I resolved I would never go a great way from it again while it should be my lot to stay on the island.

Some kind of lesson about counting your blessings and such

It might be truly said that now I worked for my bread; ’tis a little wonderful, and what I believe few people have thought much upon, viz., the strange multitude of little things necessary in the providing, producing, curing, dressing, making, and finishing this one article of bread. I, that was reduced to a mere state of nature, found this to my daily discouragement and was made more and more sensible of it every hour,

So i suppose bits like this might be some small virtue that makes this book "worth reading today," as an opportunity to reflect on solitude vs society.

Within doors, that is, when it rained, and I could not go out, I found employment on the following occasions; always observing, that all the while I was at work I diverted myself with talking to my parrot and teaching him to speak, and I quickly learned him to know his own name and at last to speak it out pretty loud, “Poll,” which was the first word I ever heard spoken in the island by any mouth but my own.

Commas!

now I saw, though too late, the folly of beginning a work before we count the cost and before we judge rightly of our own strength to go through with it.

I looked now upon the world as a thing remote, which I had nothing to do with, no expectation from, and, indeed, no desires about. In a word, I had nothing indeed to do with it,

So this is an interesting conclusion, so Buddhist in essence but firmly (fanatically? that seems too harsh) firmly Christian in dogma.

all I could make use of was all that was valuable.

all the good things of this world are no farther good to us than they are for our use; and that whatever we may heap up indeed to give others, we enjoy just as much as we can use, and no more.

I learned to look more upon the bright side of my condition and less upon the dark side and to consider what I enjoyed rather than what I wanted; and this gave me sometimes such secret comforts that I cannot express them;

I like this sentiment. Good chapter!

I cannot but recommend to the reflection of those who are apt in their misery to say, “Is any affliction like mine?” Let them consider how much worse the cases of some people are and their case might have been, if Providence had thought fit.

While I agree ovrrall "You think YOU'VE got it bad?" and "Other people have things worse" are logical but not comforting realizations.

Thus my fear banished all my religious hope; all that former confidence in God, which was founded upon such wonderful experience as I had had of His goodness, now vanished,

Ain't that always how it goes.

fear of danger is ten thousand times more terrifying than danger itself, when apparent to the eyes; and we find the burden of anxiety greater, by much, than the evil which we are anxious about;

I must testify from my experience that a temper of peace, thankfulness, love, and affection is much more the proper frame for prayer than that of terror and discomposure;

There are some secret moving springs in the affections, which when they are set a-going by some object in view, or be it some object, though not in view, yet rendered present to the mind by the power of imagination, that motion carries out the soul by its impetuosity to such violent eager embracings of the object that the absence of it is insupportable.

Sheesh, such cumbersome and unlovely style makes me glad I grew up in a time when authors had had another 200 years of practice.

it was a merry reflection, which I frequently made, how like a king I looked. First of all, the whole country was my own mere property, so that I had an undoubted right of dominion. Secondly, my people were perfectly subjected. I was absolute lord and lawgiver; they all owed their lives to me, and were ready to lay down their lives, if there had been occasion of it, for me.

Robinson Crusoe: insufferable prick

Having now society enough, and our number being sufficient to put us out of fear of the savages, if they had come, unless their number had been very great, we went freely all over the island, wherever we found occasion; and as here we had our escape or deliverance upon our thoughts, it was impossible, at least for me, to have the means of it out of mine; to this purpose,

We call this "padding the word count"

“Look you, sir,” said I, “if I venture upon your deliverance, are you willing to make two conditions with me?” He anticipated my proposals by telling me that both he and the ship, if recovered, should be wholly directed and commanded by me in everything; and if the ship was not recovered, he would live and die with me in what part of the world soever I would send him;

Crusoe's always pulling this -- "I'll help you but only if you become my slave" -- what kind of childish thinking is that?

not being dead, he started up upon his feet, and called eagerly for help to the other; but the captain, stepping to him, told him ’twas too late to cry for help, he should call upon God to forgive his villainy, and with that word knocked him down with the stock of his musket, so that he never spoke more.

18th century badass one liner

When they had all declared their willingness to stay, I then told them I would let them into the story of my living there, and put them into the way of making it easy to them. Accordingly I gave them the whole history of the place and of my coming to it; showed them my fortifications, the way I made my bread, planted my corn, cured my grapes; and in a word, all that was necessary to make them easy.

How is it that people let old-timey books get away with this constant repetition-and-summary BS?

he made me enter my name in a public register, with his affidavit, affirming upon oath that I was alive, and that I was the same person who took up the land for the planting the said plantation at first. This being regularly attested by a notary, and a procuration affixed, he directed me to send it, with a letter of his writing, to a merchant of his acquaintance

Riveting.