How we cite our quotes: (Part.Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #1
When, at about that time, I perceived that others did not have their leavings weighed so, it made a great impression upon me; and I had an even greater sense of my mysterious importance in this murky scheme, the unaccountable preciousness of everything I did to those who strove to watch over me. (1.7.6)
This is one of those moments when you're not sure if you're supposed to laugh at Octavian or if you're supposed to cry for him. Octavian's basically telling us that he used to think he was hot shmoop for getting his poop weighed everyday (on a gold plate no less)—after all, no one else got that kind of treatment.
Of course, we know it's just because young Octavian is like a lab rat to the scholars, and especially to Mr. Gitney. Yeah he's special—because he's a scientific experiment to them. But young Octavian's just too naive at this point to know any better.
Quote #2
He said, "You can—this once—start crying." I moved not a hair. He said, "That will be the last time in your life when you're free." (1.10.41-43)
Bono's just finished telling Octavian the real deal about Octavian and Cassiopeia's arrival in Boston, basically dropping the truth bomb on him that they're slaves. This is the first time that Octavian totally appreciates this fact, which is why Bono tells him that he's allowed to cry because how Octavian was before—totally oblivious to his slave status—gave him a false freedom. Now that Octavian knows the truth, there just ain't no going back to feeling free again.
Quote #3
In the days that followed this conversation with Bono, I began to look about me with new eyes—that is to say, with eyes from which the scales had new-fallen, where bedazzlement was harsh and all about me; and I saw for the first time and understood that in our house and the houses we visited, there were black and white, bonded, freed, free-born, indentured, enslaved, and hired. (1.11.1)
Octavian's all grown up now, even though he's still a boy. He can't un-see what he now knows to be true—that not only is he a slave, but so are many of the black and white people around him. Or if they're not slaves, they're "hired" help for the white scholars they serve.