This part of the book plays a crucial role in Hucks self-discovery. Huck is thinking about things that happened in the past, things that are happenning presently and what his life will be like in the future. Huck is helping Jim escape from slavery. Back in Huck's times you could go to jail or be hung for helping a slave escape from the south. He has the opportunity to turn Jim in to Miss Watson, Jim's owner. Huck has no idea what to do. So he tries to pray and see if God will give him the awnser, but when he tried to pray the words wouldn't come out. " So I was full of trouble, full as I could be; and didn't know what to do. At last I had an idea; and I says I"ll go and write the letter - and then see if I can pray. (205)" When Huck wrote the letter his conscience felt clean and he felt releived. " I felt so good and all washed clean of sin for the first time I had ever felt so in my life, and I knowed I could pray now." Huck has a very difficult time with this situation because religion played a big part in everyone's life. If you commited a sin you would rot in the firey pits of hell for all of eternity. If you asked for forgiveness for the little sins you would be forgiven and you could go to heaven. That's what people back then believed anyway. Huck is commiting this crime, this sin, by helping Jim find his family and escape from slavery. He can't decide if he will be a bad person if he sends the letter or if he tears it up. He knows that sending the letter is the right thing to do, but he can't think of any reason to send the letter other than the fact that he's breaking the law. Huck discovers that it would be wrong, in his heart, for him to send the letter. This is a life changing decision to Huck because he knows that he will go to hell for this. It helps him to discover who he is as a person. " I shoved the whole thing out of my head, and said I would take up wickedness again, which was in my line, being brung up to it, and the other warn't.
