Question
Updated on
25 Dec 2018
- Portuguese (Brazil)
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English (UK)
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Italian
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Welsh
Question about English (UK)
Please, could someone explain to me the meaning of 'not to know (that)' from A Christmas Carol by Dickens? I can't figure it out !! Would it be the same as ''needless to say that...'', ''it's obvious that..."?
"Oh! captive, bound, and double-ironed," cried the phantom, "not to know, that ages of incessant labour, by immortal creatures, for this earth must pass into eternity before the good of which it is susceptible is all developed. Not to know that any Christian spirit working kindly in its little sphere, whatever it may be, will find its mortal life too short for its vast means of usefulness. Not to know that no space of regret can make amends for one life's opportunity misused! Yet such was I! Oh! such was I! "
Please, could someone explain to me the meaning of 'not to know (that)' from A Christmas Carol by Dickens? I can't figure it out !! Would it be the same as ''needless to say that...'', ''it's obvious that..."?
"Oh! captive, bound, and double-ironed," cried the phantom, "not to know, that ages of incessant labour, by immortal creatures, for this earth must pass into eternity before the good of which it is susceptible is all developed. Not to know that any Christian spirit working kindly in its little sphere, whatever it may be, will find its mortal life too short for its vast means of usefulness. Not to know that no space of regret can make amends for one life's opportunity misused! Yet such was I! Oh! such was I! "
"Oh! captive, bound, and double-ironed," cried the phantom, "not to know, that ages of incessant labour, by immortal creatures, for this earth must pass into eternity before the good of which it is susceptible is all developed. Not to know that any Christian spirit working kindly in its little sphere, whatever it may be, will find its mortal life too short for its vast means of usefulness. Not to know that no space of regret can make amends for one life's opportunity misused! Yet such was I! Oh! such was I! "
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- English (US)
He is talking about what Scrooge doesn't know/realize, followed by the comma. After the comma is what he doesn't understand.
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