Mason and Dixon

[davemarc]

> From: Thomas Eckhardt <uzs7lz at uni-bonn.de>
> 
> davemarc wrote:
> 
> >If it is one, don't you think that it's a relatively mysterious one, a
> >little like a koan?
> 
> Then it would have to be paradoxical, no? What would that mysterious,
> paradoxical quality be? Or, perhaps better, how would you attemmpt to
> describe it?
> 
I can accept it as family lore, recounting something that might or might
not have happened.  It puts Dixon in a good light, though under scrutiny
the story turns out to be not as simple as "One day, Dixon rebuked a
slaveowner and saved slaves."  Within its context, the moral gist of the
story seems balanced by the arguable futility of Dixon's gesture:  Dixon
helps to set slaves "free" in a setting where they would not be able to
escape recapture and punishment.  As a koan-like puzzler, perhaps it'd be
something like "Can one set slaves free when they are bound to be enslaved
again?"

d.