Samuel Beckett
Digital Manuscript Project
Molloy

MS-WU-MSS008-3-50-1

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Segment 1

[1434] periolous too but sweet to him who knows it, who can open to it like the
flower to the sun, who himself is night, day and night.
[1435] No, there is not
much to be said for the night either, but compared to the day there is
much to be saied for it, and notably compared to the morning there is
everything to be said for it.
[1436] For the night purge is in the hands of
technicians, for the most part.

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Segment 2

[1437] They do nothing else, the bulk of the
population have no part in it, preferring their warm beds, all things
considered.
[1438] Day is the time for lynching, for sleep is sacred, and
escpecially the morning, between breakfast and lunch.
[1439] My first care
then, after a few miles in the desert dawn, was to look for a place
to sleep, for sleep too is a kind of protection, strange as it may seem.

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Segment 3

[1440] For sleep, if it excites the lust to capture, seems to appease the lust
to kill, there and then and bloodily, any hunter will tell you that.
[1441] For the monster on the move, or on the watch, lurking in his lair, there
is no mercy, whereas he taken unawares, in his sleep, may sometimes get
the bnenefit of blander []milder feelings, which deflect the barrel, sheathe the
kris.

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Segment 4

[1442] For the hunter is weak at heart and sentimental, overflowing with
repressed treasures of mildness []gentleness and compassion.
[1443] And it is thanks to this
sweet sleep of terror or exhaustion that many a foul beast, and worthy
of extermination, can live on till he dies in the peace and quiet of our
zoological gardens, broken only by the innocent laughter, the experienced knowing
laughter, of children and their parents []elders, on Sundays and Bank Holidays.

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Segment 5

[1444] And I for my part have always preferred slavery to death, I mean being
put to death.
[1445] For death is a condition I have never been able to
conceive to my satisfaction and which therefore cannot go down in the
ledger of good []weal and ill []woe.
[1446] Whereas my notions on putting []being put to death inspired
me with confidence, rightly or wrongly, and I felt I was entitled to act
on them, in certain emergencies.
[1447] Oh they weren't notions like yours,
they were notions like mine, nothing but []all spasm, sweat and trembling,

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