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Read these lines: "If these shadows remain unaltered by the Future, none other of my race will find him here. What then? If he be like to die, he had better do it, and decrease the surplus population. Scrooge hung his head to hear his own words quoted by the Spirit, and was overcome with penitence and grief." Why does he hang his head?
ABecause the Spirit has refused to answer him
BBecause he blames the family for their poverty
CBecause he cannot hear what the Spirit has said
DBecause his own hard saying is turned back on him
Answer & Solution
Correct answer: D. Because his own hard saying is turned back on him
1. The Spirit says the child will die if nothing changes.
2. It then adds that he had better do it and decrease the surplus population.
3. The narrator states plainly that these are the man's own words, quoted back at him.
4. Hearing a cruel saying applied to a real child he has just met makes it land differently.
5. The narrator names the feeling as penitence and grief, so shame is the cause, option D.
6. The Spirit does answer him, at length, which rules out the first choice.
7. Blaming the family would produce defiance rather than a bowed head.
8. He plainly hears the words, since it is hearing them that overcomes him.
_Source: Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol (1843), Stave III The Second of the Three Spirits_
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