You can start by repeating the question like if it was "where does water come from?" then you ask: where does water come from so add a little introduction and answer and it becomes: Where does water come from? water comes from this and that and that and this but also this and that and it all does this and that while that and this is happening
The sentence is missing a subject.
Answer:
He's reading to try to distract himself from the grief of losing a "rare and radiant maiden" named Lenore. ... Perhaps the gentle knocking on the door causes him to hope that it's Lenore, and he has to tell himself otherwise in order to quell the likely disappointment that reality will bring him.
Answer:
The answer to Part A would be Ignorant, as the author goes on to state that his youthful understanding had struggled in vain. If someone is ignorant of something, yet they do not take the time to actually go research or learn about that thing, then they would be struggling in vain because they are selfish and not taking time to research what it is that the other person is saying that they do not understand.
For the answer to Part B, I would say that (Frederick) Douglass' new awareness of how owners maintain control over slaves allows him to better understand how to improve his situation. I say this because he seems to have an awakening/epiphany in the very last line: "I now understood what had been to me a most perplexing difficulty".
Explanation:
I hope this helps!