Friday, September 21, 2007

The Clarity of Night Primer

I've written about The New England Primer before and my fascination with it. First published in 1690, it was part religious message, part English text book, and part Puritan ruler-whacking goodness. It employed little rhyming couplets not only as mnemonics to memorize the alphabet, but also to teach moral (and religious) lessons.



Since I've got this wacky fascination and love to philosophize, I thought it would fun to create a new, "Clarity of Night Primer" for my own children. I'll do it in groups of three letters from time to time.

Care to try your hand at your own morality poems? Maybe when we're done, we can compile a set (is anyone an illustrator?) and put it out there to compete with the dusty old Puritans!

A

Always think before you play
For you may lose the game you made.

B

Look for the Beast in what other's do
But don't condemn, he lives in you.

C

A quiet forest Carries sound
The rush of living tends to drown.

10 comments:

SzélsőFa said...

My attempt at 'D'

Do your best at your own Deed
Perfect work is what we need.

(Is it very lame?)

AngelConradie said...

hhhmmm... lemme sleep on it...

Anonymous said...

Szelsofa, not lame at all! Maybe "perfect" is too high a standard, though. Is there another closure you can think of for the second line?

Angel, no pressure. Have a restful night.

Vesper said...

Wonderful ABC, Jason!

I tagged you for a meme on my blog. If you're in the mood, take a look at it - I think it would suit you well.

So many posts on your blog since I've last been able to visit! Oh, I have to catch up! :-)

Ello - Ellen Oh said...

This is real cute! Very nice... but where is Part 9? I wanna know what happens next! Patience is not a virtue of mine...

Chris Eldin said...

For "M"

A Monster likes to Munch on you
It does much more than just say boo



For "N"

Never go outside at night
Lurking things cause such a fright


For "P"
Pray to God for a nice warm puppy
If you're a brat, you'll get a guppy


For "R"

Rip and roar and roll downhill
Watch the rock or you might be killed


For "S"
Satan has such evil ways
Slithering snakes are not okay

Terri said...

Am I the only one who's now afraid of Church Lady..? ;-)

SzélsőFa said...

How about replacing perfect with a synonym like flawless?

Do your best at your own Deed
Flawless job(?) is what we need.

In fact I love the word 'deed' and I can't think of anything else to rhyme with it than 'need'.

(And yes, Church Lady does frightens me, a bit.)

Anonymous said...

Vesper, the meme sounds fun! I'll give it a try.

Ello, part 9 (the final part) will be up on Wednesday. :)

Church Lady, awesome! Some of them remind me of Adam Sandler's kind of humor. :D Slithering snakes are not okay...ha.

Terri, just getting in the mood for Halloween, I'm sure. ;)

Szelsofa, how about:

Do your best at your own Deeds
Help to meet the World's needs.

SzélsőFa said...

I see that the sentence itself is a better one, but I'm sorry to note that the number of syllables do not match now.