"i was never kinder to the old man than during the whole week before i killed him."

is this sentence mean the narrator was kind or not kind to the old man?

the rhetorical technique most used in this excerpt is parallelism. parallelism is a technique which author used in sentence as substitute of repeated synthetical similarities. it is the effect of rhetorical technique.

explanation:

today we'd use social media to quickly spread a controversial idea, but in the eighteenth century, the printed pamphlet was highly effective. and thomas paine took full advantage of it. on january 9, 1776, when paine published his pamphlet, "common sense," he wanted to push the american people toward independence from britain. it ultimately ignite the american revolution. thomas paine argued that the monarchy was evil and should be rejected as a form of government. to underscore his point, he cited the bible to argue his case -- in judges 8: 22-23: "the israelites said to gideon, 'rule over us, you and your son and your ' gideon told them, 'i will not rule over you. the lord will rule over you'" (nrsv).