THE CRISIS: Fever Chart

Somewhere, but I knew not where—somehow, but I knew not how—by some beings, but I knew not by whom—a battle, a strife, an agony . . . was evolving. . . . I had the power, and yet had not the power, to decide it. ... I had the power, if I could raise myself to will it; and yet ... I lay inactive. . . .

So De Quincey described his sensations when he had taken too much opium. He might also have been describing the sensations of many a U.S. citizen last...

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