A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce As a test for calibration of this site; will be removed

It could not be a wall; but there could be a thin thin line there all [390]      round everything. It was very big to think about everything and [391]      everywhere. Only God could do that. He tried to think what a big [392]      thought that must be; but he could only think of God. God was God’s [393]      name just as his name was Stephen. DIEU was the French for God and that [394]      was God’s name too; and when anyone prayed to God and said DIEU then [395]      God knew at once that it was a French person that was praying. But, [396]      though there were different names for God in all the different [397]      languages in the world and God understood what all the people who [398]      prayed said in their different languages, still God remained always the [399]      same God and God’s real name was God. [400] [401]      It made him very tired to think that way. It made him feel his head [402]      very big. He turned over the flyleaf and looked wearily at the green [403]      round earth in the middle of the maroon clouds. He wondered which was [404]      right, to be for the green or for the maroon, because Dante had ripped [405]      the green velvet back off the brush that was for Parnell one day with [406]      her scissors and had told him that Parnell was a bad man. He wondered [407]      if they were arguing at home about that. That was called politics.
[408]      There were two sides in it: Dante was on one side and his father and Mr
[409]      Casey were on the other side but his mother and uncle Charles were on
[410]      no side. Every day there was something in the paper about it.
[411]
[412]      It pained him that he did not know well what politics meant and that he
[413]      did not know where the universe ended. He felt small and weak. When
[414]      would he be like the fellows in poetry and rhetoric? They had big
[415]      voices and big boots and they studied trigonometry. That was very far
[416]      away. First came the vacation and then the next term and then vacation
[417]      again and then again another term and then again the vacation. It was
[418]      like a train going in and out of tunnels and that was like the noise of
[419]      the boys eating in the refectory when you opened and closed the flaps
[420]      of the ears. Term, vacation; tunnel, out; noise, stop. How far away it
[421]      was! It was better to go to bed to sleep. Only prayers in the chapel
[422]      and then bed. He shivered and yawned. It would be lovely in bed after
[423]      the sheets got a bit hot. First they were so cold to get into. He
[424]      shivered to think how cold they were first. But then they got hot and
[425]      then he could sleep. It was lovely to be tired. He yawned again. Night
[426]      prayers and then bed: he shivered and wanted to yawn. It would be
[427]      lovely in a few minutes. He felt a warm glow creeping up from the cold
[428]      shivering sheets, warmer and warmer till he felt warm all over, ever so
[429]      warm and yet he shivered a little and still wanted to yawn.
[430]
[431]      The bell rang for night prayers and he filed out of the study hall
[432]      after the others and down the staircase and along the corridors to the
[433]      chapel. The corridors were darkly lit and the chapel was darkly lit.
[434]      Soon all would be dark and sleeping. There was cold night air in the
[435]      chapel and the marbles were the colour the sea was at night. The sea
[436]      was cold day and night: but it was colder at night. It was cold and
[437]      dark under the seawall beside his father’s house. But the kettle would
[438]      be on the hob to make punch.

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