Category: Perspective

In “The Cleaving,” Li-Young Lee presents two contrasting perspectives on eating. The first perspective shows how eating leads to death and separation. The second perspective signals eating’s transformative growth and blending of opposites. Rather than introducing these two ideas in static opposition to each other, the poem explores a progression from the first idea to the second. By employing repetition and Socratic-rhetorical questions throughout the poem, Lee introduces a possible resolution to this binary opposition, where purposeful growth leads to a meaningful death.

The fourth stanza of the poem presents how eating coexists with death, in the form of the narrator eating a piece of duck brain that the butcher cleaved. “I take it gingerly between my fingers and suck it down. I eat my man.” By “eating” his man, the narrator realizes that the food he consumes is a direct result of another creature’s death. The first rhetorical question the author poses, “Did this animal, after all, at the moment its neck broke, image the way his executioner shrinks from his own death?” brings into light that the butcher, narrator, and the duck are connected by death. Through the action of eating, the narrator starts fearing his own death. “Is this how I, too, recoil from my day?” The author continues to use the “Is this how” question structure throughout this stanza. By asking those rhetorical questions, the author strikes the point that eating is the ultimate image of death.

In the seventh stanza, the narrator begins to confront the Chinese stereotypes, exploring possible resolutions to his internal anguishment along the way. The narrator mulls over a fish that he’s holding at the butcher shop. “I hold up an old head from the sea and admire the haughty down-curved mouth that seems to disdain all the eyes are blind to, including me, the eater. Its shape complements the shape of my mind.” The word “shape” is repeated in this context to connect the disdain that the fish has for the narrator to the disdain that the narrator has for the world. The narrator’s disdain for the world can be attributed to the anti-Chinese sentiments in the United States, as well as Lee’s history of living in alienation. However, the sentence immediately after, “I take it as text and evidence of the world’s love for me, and I feel urged to utterance, urged to read the body of the world, urged to say it in human terms,” juxtaposes his disdain with a sarcastic acceptance of anti-Chinese attitudes. The narrator’s repetition of “urged” emphasizes his desire to show society that the stereotypes about him are not true. Up to this point in the poem, the idea of eating leading to death has gradually transitioned into the suggestion that eating leads to a hunger for change.

In the same stanza, the first three repetitions of the phrase “I would eat” follows the narrator as he shifts from eating food items to eating non-food items, such as people and their actions. The following repetition of the phrase is placed in the middle of the sentence, rather than at the beginning. The intentional interruption of the sentence flow lends credence to the significance of the words before and after the “I would eat.” The phrase before the repetition, “The deaths at the sinks, those bodies prepared for eating,” presents a more literal definition and imagery of eating, versus the rest of the sentence where the narrator directly confronts anti-Chinese violence in America. The narrator’s emotions reach a climax in the next line, “I would devour this race to sing it, this race that according to Emerson managed to preserve to a hair for three or four thousand years the ugliest features in the world.” Rather than using the word “eat” in this repetition, Lee replaces “eat” with “devour,” which connotes more of an aggressive and animalistic style of eating. The employment of diction along with repetition clues the reader into the sentence’s importance. By directly quoting Emerson’s published works, he begins a conversation with American culture. Instead of adapting to the white American’s interests, he accepts and takes pride in his own culture’s customs. Eating becomes a metaphor for opening and accepting oneself to whatever is painful and transformative. By eating Emerson, the narrator is triumphing over Emerson and his racist criticisms of the Chinese, not in the form of violence, but in the form of disassociating himself from Emerson’s ideas. With each repetition of “I would eat” throughout the stanza, the narrator is suggesting that positive change requires an embrace between the racialized self and the racist other.

The narrator explores a possible resolution between the two viewpoints of eating at the end of the eighth stanza with the rhetorical question, “What is my eating, rapt as it is, but another shape of going, my immaculate expiration?” The narrator knows that eating prolongs life, but it doesn’t stop death; eating only postpones death. “Shape” is mentioned once again, but this time the narrator wants his body to be transcendent when he dies. In Chinese culture, it is important that the person’s entire body is in whole when dying. In the next stanza, the narrator says, “All of the body’s revisions end in death.” The narrator brings up one last Socratic rhetorical question, “Else what is this violence, this salt, this passion, this heaven?” By now, the narrator realized that the ultimate goal of life is to transform, grow, and change for the better before death. The reality is that all the growth eventually leads to death, but that death can be meaningful for others and society. Although it initially seemed counterintuitive at first, the narrator now sees that the violence against Chinese Americans has some purpose. Without it, there would have been no chance for him to transform as a person and transcend racial barriers. Likewise, without death being the contrast, life is essentially pointless, as well as the concept of heaven.

Books are the sources of knowledge. As libraries are knowledge houses. Reading daily is one of the best habits one can possess. It develops your imagination and provides you with a fortune of knowledge. It is rightly quoted that “Books are your best companions”. Books give you a whole new experience. It is important to read a good book at least for a few minutes each day to stretch the brain muscles for healthy functioning. Reading books develop vivid imagination, knowledge, and vocabulary.

The most important reason for reading is that we gain knowledge. Books are a rich source of information and knowledge. The more knowledge you possess the more wisely you handle various situations in life. Because through this we can learn from other experiences and can improve the things or decision-making in our life. Reading books means a good use of time. It is a perfect way to stay occupied and at the same time learn something and gain knowledge. It is the best to relieve your stress and enhance your mood.

Reading books improves your communication skills. It helps you to express thoughts in a speech that required lots of words in the vocabulary. Not only does it improves your communication but also makes you a better writer. Communication skills are a basic need for us to move in society. And it’s a main role that books play in our life. Good communication results in good dealings with people, and it results in a beneficial lifestyle. Reading is vital for the development of the brain as well as it boosts your thinking and understanding. It makes you eligible to think differently. It enhances your critical thinking and analytical skills. It makes you different from others. There is a special personality difference between readers and non-readers.

“Books are a uniquely portable magic”, as Stephen King noted. Reading takes you to the world of imagination and enhances your creativity. Reading helps you explore life from different perspectives. It makes you think creatively. Books share their ideas and secrets with you. The same book and the same lesson reveal something new to different people. Because people can get things according to their thoughts and aptitudes. Knowledge is required for living good and ethical life. Knowledge is required to know about something. We can get knowledge from different sources, but books are the best sources. Books are around us for seven centuries.

Reading books make a powerful and deep impact on our lives and our personalities. They have the ability to uplift our moods. There are different genres of books. Every day, thousands of books come to market. There is a large variety of books. You can pick any book of your interest. The most beautiful thing is the reading experience from which we pass and which relieves us from our many present stresses. We have travel books, history books, technology books, motivational books, etc. Travel books tell us about the experience of travelers. We can visit different places in the world without moving from our place. History books take us to the old ages from this modern age. They tell us how people lived in the old times. The past and the knowledge about the past have always become a source of curiosity for human beings. We want to know the detail of the time which has passed away or about the coming future. Writer forms a picture in such a way that reader thinks that he is a part of that time.

Mark Haddon once said: “Reading is a conversation. All books talk but a good book listens as well”. Reading creates an invisible relationship between the reader and the writer. They come close to each other by just sharing their ideas. Technological books tell us about different and unique technology and equipment. There are also books related to fashion and lifestyle that can help you to know about the latest trends. Women are mostly attracted to such books. Motivational books help in personality development. They teach us and inspire us. Personality development is the basic need of every human being. It helps us to move easily in society with confidence. We get good knowledge about personality development from motivational books. Fictional books are the most interesting type of books. They are based on the writer’s imagination, and the reader understands it in his own way. We all want to live a life of fantasy. We all are somehow fad up by our routines and our lives. We all want to live in our dreams. We all want to live a life of superheroes somehow. But we cannot do it in real life. We cannot live that life, but fantasy books give us a chance to live that life for a few moments or for a short time span. We forget our worries and we enjoy that fantasy life. We imagine ourselves as a part of that scenery that has been created by the writer.

Reading books makes us wiser. It enhances our talents. We should learn from others’ experiences and books make it possible for us to know the different lives people live and the different situations they face in their lives. When we just live our own life and don’t want to know about other people, we cannot improve our life. Books tell us some very harsh stories, and in some stories, there is a happy ending. It teaches us that life not always remains the same. A person with difficult life can expect a good future. Books give us a way to hope. We can find peace of mind in them. Ground realities are part of our life, but we can live for some time in our dreams. Fantasy books make us the hero or heroine of the story and we enjoy our time. Fiction reading develops empathy and helps us to build better relations with others. You imagine yourself as a part of the story and you live the character which you want to live. It also inspires us to write. You learn the art of using language and enjoy playing with words.

Sometimes in our life, we lost our right path. We start to become part of this practical and materialistic world and forget our real norms and values. We are human beings and we want continuous guidance. Good books can be a source of our guidance. Sometimes in life, we forget the lessons we were taught by our parents in our childhood. We know what is wrong and what is right, but we forget it and become busy in our lives. Life is actually a race where even we don’t find time for ourselves. This makes us bitter and we feel that we are actually going wrong. This is the actual point in our lives when we come back to our reality and our real teachings. Reading books help us a lot in this. Time changes but books remain the same. This is the beauty of books. This is the beauty of knowledge that always remains in its place. Whenever we need it, we acquire knowledge from it.

As George R.R. Martin said, “A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies”. We have just one life to live. We cannot live more than one life, but by knowing about the life of other people, we can feel the life they live. Writers share their imaginations and some real stories with us. A person who just lives his own life and never tries to learn from the experiences of other people is living a boring life without any creativity. It doesn’t matter how successful you are in your life. You should learn from every moment of your life. You should have leisure time for yourself and reading a book at that time will be the most interesting activity. The five-hour rule was coined by Michael Simmons. The concept is simple: no matter how busy successful people are, they always spend at least an hour a day or five hours a workweek learning or practicing.

In the end, we will all become stories. Reading develops your special emotional relationship with the book you read. When you turn the last page and feel a little as if you have lost a friend. You feel sad that why this book has finished. Our society needs positivity. Negative thinking is increasing day by day. We are so busy in our life that we don’t have even time to think about ourselves. We are progressing day by day, but there is a space or wholeness that has been created in our lives and our personalities. We are losing our real values. We are living robotic life. We have everything, but we are not happy and satisfied with our lives. This is because we are much busy. This is our fault. We make our lives like this. Reading a good book can give you happiness. A fictional story with a happy ending can give you hope that your ending will also be happy. Hope is the main thing that our society needs most. Writers should write about hope.

Now books are also available on the Internet, iPads, computers, etc. But the printed book is a traditional and old method. No technology can take the place of this hard form of books. This is the century of technology and people are lost in this flourishing world. But the value of books is still high. We cannot imagine a world without books. Instead of flipping through a book to find information, most people type it into Google. Technology is making us lazy. We have all information at one click. But we get information about only the thing that we want. On the other hand, when we open the book, we learn more. We can carry books with us anywhere we go. Computers and laptops can have technical issues, but books are easy to use. These devices can be hacked or crashed. Gadgets are difficult to read in sunlight. Moreover, the use of gadgets has many drawbacks. As we know, old is gold, so books are gold for us.

Based on the above, we can say with complete confidence that reading books is extremely important for absolutely every person. We should have time to read books because it will lead to good changes in our life. Reading books should be popularized because it is very useful. Through this, we will connect to the best path of knowledge. And I want to conclude my essay by quoting J.K. Rowling, who said, “I do believe something very magical can happen when you read a book”.

When the Beatles rose to fame their music was way ahead of their time they changed the way pop culture was interpreted. They made an impact not only on pop culture but to trends and traditions. Fun fact The Beatles made men okay with having very long hair. It is the mid-1060s nothing was the same when they arrived to make history they defined music at that time.

In music history and history of rock, it is called the British invasion of the US they were one of few bands that impacted the community, not only that the teen idol band made an impact on the music industry. They influenced a lot of youth in those times after they arrived. They had a main influence on fashion. They also shifted from US worldwide dominance of rock and roll to UK acts as said in an article I read for research. Also from professional writers to written by oneself. Most of the time The Beatles would compose and write their music. For example, the legend Paul McCartney wrote the song “Let it Be” It talks about how he should let things be, the reason he wrote this song was that he had a dream about his mother and her mother was telling him to let it be in tough moments. There were many things people didn’t agree with The Beatles such as their lack of respect in serious situations such as religion.

One time in an interview John Lennon once said he was “bigger than Jesus” At that time Christianity was a big thing. After people heard what he said many Christians were angry so they got a big pile of their records and burned them all. Their music flopped for a while although that didn’t stop the fans from being led by them. Later on, The Beatles grew even more with their music hits and into the American Youth Culture. Because of their lack of care for their consequences, they had a big transformation as any other artists and bands. Talking about lack of concern The Beatles at some point became very hippy and became mostly influenced by another legend John Lennon another band member of the group they started doing LSD and other drugs. Their music became something else it was very psychedelic. Influenced so many teens and the rest of the fans in the US and back then LSD was legal but after it became famous they outlawed it. Lennon’s voice in their song was distorted. A great example is the song “Strawberry Fields Forever” It was dissonant meaning the chords were weird and unusual making some people uncomfortable but many fans loved it. I think people who did LSD felt great listening to their music.

I would have to disagree with you, Luke. Though maybe by definition, the word “transcend” means “to go beyond” the idea of transcendentalism wasn’t to go beyond, but to correct and live correctly. As the document that Mr.Ripper provided us with states, “Transcendentalism was a movement for religious renewal, literary innovation, and social transformation.” Some were moving forward innovations, but most of this movement was a kind of refresh, or as said in the text, transformation, and renewal.

According to the readings “Transcendentalism emerged from Unitarianism, or ‘liberal Christianity’—an anti-Calvinist, anti-Trinitarian, anti-Creedal offshoot of Puritanism that had taken hold among the middle and upper classes of eastern Massachusetts.” These groups took Unitarianism and focused on concern for self-culture, a sense of moral seriousness, a neo-Platonic concept of piety, a tendency toward individualism, a belief in the importance of literature, and an interest in moral reform. These transcendentalists believed laws should be disobeyed if moral intuition held them to be unjust. This was also argued by Thoreau who “advised individuals to disobey unjust laws to prevent their involvement in evil.” Again as our text states in a broader sense, “the transcendentalists held that inspiration was blunted by social conformity, which therefore must be resisted.”

In Dominique’s question, he asks how transcendentalism shaped the core morals and values of people in America. Well, to answer that we should question the era he is referring to. If compared to our times we can see the huge impact that this movement has had. The biggest in my opinion is the one you have already mentioned, slavery. In fact when most think about, “what got rid of slavery?”, most would refer to Martin Luther King Jr. as he was the biggest public figure in equal rights for people of color, however, transcendentalism was the actual beginning of it all. If there was nobody like transcendentalists, there would be no traction for the cause of abolishing slavery to go off of. The reasoning behind this resistance to slavery was because it was seen, as you have also quoted, “as inherently wrong because it crushed the spiritual development of slaves.”

Another very important movement of today that shares its roots with this movement is the modern environmental movement. Transcendentalists believed in laying “great value on the spiritual value of nature; Thoreau, particularly, is regarded as a principal forerunner of the modern environmental movement.” Thoreau was a very strong transcendentalist who took part in the dismantling of existing institutions in an attempt to “discover an economy that would provide full human satisfaction.” He was quoted describing himself as ‘a mystic, a transcendentalist, and a natural philosopher.’ To Thoreau and most of those who were part of the transcendentalism movement saw nature as a representation of ‘absolute freedom and wildness,’ whereas society provided freedom and culture merely civil.’

I first knew Lenny Bruce thanks to the show The Marvelous Mrs Maisel. Lenny and Miriam Maisel have a fictional friendship since they are both stand-up comedians who talk about controversial topics, especially for the time. I know about his appearance on The Steve Allen Show because it was reenacted in the show in the last episode of season two called “All Alone” which is a song he sang in the taping.

I wanted to write about him since I do know about him and I am interested to know more.

I am a big fan of the 1950s and 1960s.

Lenny is known for his black humor, profanity humor, and controversial topics that weren’t as openly discussed as today like sex, politics, religion, and race. He uses Jewish terms and Jewish culture in his comedic bits since he was Jewish. Comedians at that time just like the motion production code, were very restrictive about what they could talk about. I don’t agree that he got jailed because of his humor.

The First Part. He got arrested four times for obscenity on topics like religion blasphemy, and profanity and joked about topics that were illegal at that time like mixed marriages.

Religion Blasphemy. He got arrested for his jokes, saying the “Pope is Jewish’. He uses satire to criticize the Catholic Church like his piece “Religious Inc”.

Lenny Bruce stated, “ The reason I got busted — arrested — is I picked on the wrong god . . . the Western god — the cute god, the In-god, the Kennedy-god — and that’s where I screwed up” ( qtd. in Kaufman 132).

At that time, The Catholic Church had a lot of power and he couldn’t easily joke about it. Today we have shows like Family Guy, where they can easily touch on religious topics. By joking about religion, especially Christianity, he challenged the status quo.

Profanity. Lenny Bruce performed a skit called “A Bunch of Cocksukers” and he was arrested for the use of the swear word “cocksuckers” they believed it was against California’s obscenity law.

The Police detective officer who saw his act, “ . . . . Mr. Bruce recommended a sexual act prohibited by law.”(Schaeffer, 571)

Premarital sex was not discussed in mass media as well as pop culture. Homosexuality was also illegal. Since the target audience for pop culture was a male audience and the male appeal was important, the police might be considering that it was promoting the act of sex between two males.

The consequences were, “ Although he was acquitted, law enforcement agencies put him under greater scrutiny, resulting in drug arrests in Philadelphia and Los Angeles” (Schultz) Since this was his first obscenity arrest, the police later on put him under the radar which lead to 3 more obscenity arrests.

The Cafe Au Go Go Trial. An undercover detective was in the audience when Lenny Bruce was performing. He arrested the club owners as well as Lenny for obscenity humor and cafe owners for allowing him to perform in the club.

Brian Moylan states that “Bruce was sentenced to four months in a workhouse for a set he did in a New York comedy club that included a bit about Eleanor Roosevelt’s “nice tits,” another about how men would like to “come in a chicken,” and other scatological and overly sexual humor.” (Moylan)

He was sentenced to four months in jail. After that, a lot of club owners were worried about hiring him since they did not want to be in trouble with the government like what happened to the cafe owners of The Cafe Au Go Go. In his later life, he was banned from performing in Britain and several U.S. cities.

Lenny Bruce shouldn’t have gotten arrested, since it was freedom of speech. Satire wasn’t a popular form of comedy in pop culture and mainstream media. Lenny Bruce talked about topics that couldn’t be in mass media and pop culture like politics, race, religion, and sex, and satirized iconic figures in pop culture. Light humor, screwball, farce, situational comedies, and slapstick were what was popular in mainstream media and pop culture.

Positive reaction: The younger generation, the beat generation, and hippies the forming subcultures and countercultures that started in the late 1950s.

Negative: The people in power which is why he got arrested several times and mainstream media which is why he was brushed off from pop culture from the 1950s. I am a big fan of that era and I didn’t hear of him till I watched Marvelous Mrs Maisel. When I think of comedians of that time I think of the duo Jerry Lewis and Dean Martin and Lucille Ball. For example, The New York Times published an article on June 14, 1964, which was his final arrest, named “Lenny Bruce and 2 Cafe Owners Go on Trial in Obscenity Case”. Newspapers only talked about Lenny Bruce in a negative light like when he gets arrested and barely positive mentions about it in newspapers at that time.

I don’t agree with his arrests, Lenny Bruce was an iconic comedic figure who talked about fresh topics that no one dared to talk about at that time, like the oppressive and corruptive government, satirized racial relations like mixed marriages that were illegal at that time till 1969. He also talks about his Jewish culture which was mocked a lot in American pop culture at that time. He inspired so many iconic comedians today like Jon Stewart and Dick Gregory.

Do you think Lenny Bruce would still get jailed if he was a comedian today? or do you think our society is going backward and is so sensitive to jokes about anything?

“Some people create their storms and then get mad when it rains.” is a quote about someone ruining their own life by decisions that they make. In the parable The Pearl by John Steinbeck, the main character Kino finds a pearl and leads his family to tragic events through his actions and behaviors. Kino is most responsible for all the tragic events that happened in the book as his greed encourages him first to make poor choices, then causes him to commit violent and irrational actions, and then finally leads him to try and recover from the consequences of his greed.

When Kino first finds the pearl he is led to make poor choices which leads to tragic events. The first bad decision Kino makes is when he looks into the pearl for the first time and sees the material items he wants. On page 22 Kino says, “A rifle, I will have a rifle”. Kino envisions owning a rifle in the pearl which is an extremely selfish item and something that he does not need. Deciding that he needed a rifle is the first bad decision he makes which ends up killing his only son. Another harmful decision that Kino makes after finding the pearl is after he gets attacked in his hut and he refuses to throw the pearl into the ocean even after his wife told him to. On page 38 Juana tells Kino, “This pearl is like a sin.” This quote shows that Kino’s wife is begging him to throw the pearl away so they won’t continue to put the family in danger, and again Kino doesn’t listen, and makes a careless decision. The final poor choice that Kino makes is he refuses to accept the pearl buyers’ offer. On page 52, “I am cheated…”. This is a bad decision because Juana wants him to sell the pearl so they won’t have the problems they had before and he decides to decline the offer and go sell it himself. Tragic events happen after Kino finds a pearl which leads him to make poor choices or decisions.

In the middle of the parable, Kino’s violent and irrational actions guide him to terrible events. Kino used to look at his wife in a lovely way but now when she tries to get rid of the pearl he becomes vicious to the point where he hits and kicks his wife. On page 59 it says, “

This quote shows that Juana was going to do the right thing to throw out the pearl and Kino found Juneau and was threatening towards her.

Agriculture is the life of us all, without that how do we live? Just go open your cupboards and refrigerator. Without agriculture, what do you think would be in either? Ice cubes, maybe. Certainly no dairy, meat, fruits, vegetables, or bakery, all made from farm products. We can’t live without food or drink, and obviously, the better quality food we have, the better quality of life we can live.

Agriculture is the root of civilization. Towns and metropolises were born from agriculture. Without agriculture, there would be no civil society to survive. José Rizal once said that not all of us can be doctors and some people must cultivate the land, but it seems that we have forgotten the wisdom of our national heroes. Everyone wants to find a good job in the city. Can’t blame them. Everyone should live a better life. I just want to say that good agriculture is everyone’s responsibility. We must think and practice how to achieve sustainable development. A gift from God. We have a responsibility to make the most of farming not only for me but also for our family because other people will get a free livelihood and earn income from it like my other uncles. They use the fence and other equipment for them to raise pig farms to be their main livelihood or the family to earn money to support the family. For me, this is a calmer and more natural way of life. It is a completely reliable source of business. Farming for a living, some groups involving different organizations or occupations make gardening a secondary activity. Farming is not limited to planting and gardening. It also includes dairy products, poultry, fishing, agriculture, and beekeeping. These also depend on the results of gardening training for a certain, combining these elective techniques. More effective agriculture will promote development because it gives life and at the same time provides the necessary equipment to sustain this development. In this case, it sounds ambiguous, but agriculture has been able to affect humans, for example, different types of wood. It can be used in various types of modern furniture, whether it is a home office leisure center or more. Another vivid example is natural medicine, where fruit herbs and other green plants can be used to treat various diseases without taking into account the negative effects of the medicine. It is a breakthrough in the health sector.

Studying agriculture opened my eyes to its importance in the lives of each of us. It expanded my knowledge and ability to discover new things related to the environment. Agribusiness assists me with making my own food, planting more plants and vegetables, and producing cash too. The only thing I can do to give value to farmers is to eat and express my gratitude. When I eat dinner, I pause for a moment and express my appreciation for the hands that delivered and really focused on my food, and I declare a petition for the farmer, his family, and the homestead. In my opinion, agriculture is very important, and improving agribusiness is an assurance of a brilliant future.

Nathaniel Hawthorne sets the character and story of“Young Goodman Brown”(YGB) in the colony of Massachusetts town of Salem, where the Puritans tried to create a religious society with strict morals and pious standards, but also where the infamous Salem Witch Trials occurred. These trials killed the lives of many innocent people and tarnished the names of countless others. The people carrying out these acts otherwise known as the Puritans believed that some people are predestined by God to go to heaven, and that those people are identifiable by their morality and piousness; people cannot earn their way to heaven by performing good works, but if they are part of the elect, they will instinctively and naturally do good. Hawthorne uses the setting to explore the dark side of the Puritan emphasis on the appearance of good.

At the beginning of the story, YGB believes wholeheartedly in these Puritan tenets, even though he is at that moment lying to his wife, Faith, saying that he is on an overnight business trip when in fact he is heading off into the forest out of curiosity to attend a witch’s meeting. He believes in the perfect goodness of his wife who seems to radiate pureness, with her pink bow and purity, that generally believes in the goodness of everyone else, too. He believes that after his dalliance in the woods with the devil, he will be able to return home and live as a good man with his perfect wife and go along with her to heaven. However, when he gets to the forest, in what may or may not be a dream, he discovers that essentially the entire town, including Faith, whom he had thought to be incapable of sin, are at this convocation, are “friends of the devil.” In horror, Goodman Brown concludes that “There is no good on earth, and sin is but a name.” He concludes that everyone is evil and that the word “sin” means nothing because everyone is sinful. When Goodman Brown returns to the town, he is no longer the happy young newlywed he was when he left. He is bitter, stern, and gloomy and mistrusts the “good” appearances of everyone around him, instead seeing sin everywhere, hiding below that surface.

Goodman Brown’s wife, Faith, is the embodiment of faith and purity, even in her actual name. YGB’s internal conflict is based on whether to “keep the faith” and come to terms with his recent revelation. At first, the struggle is literal: his wife begs him to remain at home and not head off into the woods; YGB’s decision to leave behind Faith becomes a metaphor for his epiphany about religion, which he similarly abandons at the end of the story. Faith remains a symbol of YGB’s religious faith throughout the story: when YGB first meets up with the devil, the devil accuses him of being late, which Goodman Brown explains by saying “Faith kept me back a while,” a play on words(Hawthorne 2) meant to refer literally to his wife Faith begging him not to leave, and figuratively to his religious faith, which could have stopped him from meeting up with the devil, but didn’t.

From a modern perspective, Goodman Brown’s revelation that everyone is sinful in some way seems obvious: of course, no one is perfectly good, as Brown imagined Faith and many others to be. That’s just human nature. But it is here that Hawthorne levels his most profound criticism of Puritanism. Goodman Brown believes that his experience or dream has forced him to see through the lies of perfect goodness told by his religion. And so he abandons it. Yet the story presents his actions not as a triumph but a tragedy, and Brown lives a life of suspicion, sadness, anxiety, and gloom. The story, then, suggests that the true issue is Puritanism and its internal logic, the way that it demands all goodness or none, perfect purity or eternally damned sin. Such a world, the story suggests, is one at odds with the realities of being human, one in which no one who takes it seriously can’t live a good life because it is impossible to live a perfect one.

Different people’s views on human nature lead to contrasting ideas of the purpose of government, whether that be caring if people are virtuous or not. Augustine calls for more government intervention, arguing that it will keep sinful people in line. Whereas, Aquinas believes the government should be in the interest of the common good, such as protecting life, preserving the state, and promoting peace, I will argue that the most important government’s purpose, apart from enforcing the law, is to make decisions that affect the common good of society. Therefore, the government ought to care about the ethical and moral implications of their decisions. Because the government has been given public trust, public officials must make decisions that promote virtue and human flourishing in order to protect society from leaders with evil intentions.

Virtue is the act of doing the right thing simply because it is the right thing to do. Because no one is naturally virtuous, it arises from habituation. Plato explains that justice is wisdom and virtue. He agrees that justice is a virtue of the soul, and the virtue of the soul means the health of the soul. Therefore, he concludes justice is desirable because it means the health of the soul. By being governed in accordance with virtue, the citizens can live a flourishing life and use their human capacities to their fullest. Furthermore, Aristotle agrees with this notion and says that living happily requires living a life of virtue. The government’s role exists for the sake of developing virtue in citizens. However, it is a shared pursuit of virtue that makes a society, not tyranny. The citizens of the government must also pursue a common good, and for Aristotle, that is to achieve this individual excellence and happiness.

Injustice, specifically laziness and absorption, harms society. Cicero agrees that a good ruler is someone who does not seek his own advantage but the advantage of the people ruling over him. Specifically, Cicero is not opposed to democracy as long as people refrain from being greedy. Similarly, in Plato’s ‘Republic’, he explains that justice is the advantage of the superior. The people in charge do what they want for the benefit of themselves. This problem is evident in many businesses and organizations today. Beyond their own mission and bottom line, corporations work hard to succeed with deliberate blindness to the common good and society at large. If burdens such as taxes, regulation, and market restrictions can be turned to their benefit, businesses urge those changes and do not concern themselves with costs beyond their own. Because justice often finds itself at the hands of whatever the people in charge choose to do, the government’s purpose is to care about fostering a virtuous society.

In order to protect the people from selfish actions and injustice, there needs to be a balance of order of the soul and order of the state. The government’s ethical and moral role is instrumental in ensuring justice and order. In relation to businesses, the government should address the health of the whole society, not just the organization, and foster harmony among the people. Everything surrounding businesses, such as health, environment, culture, education, and more, takes a backseat when leaders consume resources for themselves. I am not arguing that the government should be anti-business. I believe they provide the means to live, innovate, recreate, and make our lives better. However, I think businesses do not have the world’s best interest at heart, and the government has the ability to rewrite that narrative. The law has to be moral on principle and prudence. Moreover, it must balance between excess and efficiency. This can be achieved if officials pass the laws with the care of people’s virtues in mind, and, as Aquinas believes, in the interest of all people. Ultimately, this will call for justice and hold people who break the law liable for punishment.

A society in which the government cares whether people are virtuous and flourishing embodies perfectionism. The government’s purpose is to regulate, look out for, and promote our physical and moral well-being. Overall, the government should help people become more virtuous. Augustine states, “Without justice what are kingdoms but great bands of robbers?“. In order for people to be in accord with the common good and not act selfishly, the government must administer ethical and moral laws that are in the best interest of the people and ensure adherence to them. By comparing the government to a band of robbers, he supports the argument for perfectionism. Although, ultimately, I believe that the peak of human flourishing goes beyond law, the government should aid in leading a virtuous and flourishing society.

Government, in the broadest sense, is a mechanism through which ordered rule is maintained, its central features being the ability to make collective decisions and the capacity to enforce them. It refers to formal and institutional processes by which rule is exercised at community, national, and international levels. It exists whenever and wherever ordered rules occur. People in every part of the world recognized the concept of government. Most people accept without any question that government is necessary, assuming that without it orderly and civilized existence would be impossible. Thus, there is a presence of government to have a harmonious, systematic, and egalitarian society.

In ‘Leviathan’, Thomas Hobbes advanced the view that rational human beings should respect and obey their government because without it society would descend into a civil war ‘of every man against every man’. Social contract theorists develop their argument concerning a hypothetical society without government, a so-called ‘state of nature’. Hobbes described life in the state of nature as being solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, short, and having constant war. Only a strong government with a single ruler can prevent constant war. According to Hobbes, human beings were essentially power-seeking and selfish creatures who would seek to advance their own interests at the expense of fellow humans, if unrestrained by law. Without government to restrain selfish impulses, order, and stability would be impossible. In the absence of government, even the strongest would never be strong enough to live in peace, harmony, security, and buoyancy. The weak would unite against them. Thomas Hobbes suggested that knowing that rational individuals try to escape from chaos and disorder by agreeing with one another, a ‘social contract’, through such process leads to the establishment of government. Government is necessary to have systematic functioning of states. Three main branches of government, i.e. legislative, executive, and judiciary, help to create a welfare state by having functional specialization, and economic and social equality through proper jurisdiction.

Social contract theorists see government as a necessary defense against deviance, as they view, based on human nature. Not only that but also government is seen as a means of promoting good and not just avoiding harm. Government is seen as the instrument that enables its people to cooperate for mutual benefit. To have the perfect community or state, the proper function of government is imperative with the proper effect of law. If human beings are left to their own, competition and open conflict will be the inexorable result. While they are left to their own, it represses freedom and rights, breeding resentment and promoting inequality. People protect their natural rights – life, liberty, and property – by using their own physical strength and aptitude. Weaker and backward aptitude people will be ruined by the stronger and will have no rights and freedom. The strongest would enjoy high prestige and better facilities, and rank higher in social stratification, whereas the weaker would have no rights and would be ranked low in social stratification as they have no means of production like the stronger. Such things create social inequality based on their economic background. Thus, government is necessary in our society to maintain social equality, develop an egalitarian society, protect the natural rights of individuals, and defend against deviants. Notwithstanding this, government brings planned development in its states which also minimizes social and economic inequality through positive or backward discrimination.

With modernization, government seems to be increasingly necessary. Modern societies are large, complex, and highly differentiated. Such societies consist of sprawling urban communities with high populations and vast use of scientific methods and technologies. Urbanization, modernization, and industrialization in the modern era have made economic life more complex and generated an increasingly fragmented social structure. As a result of the decline of religion, ritual, and tradition in the modern era, modern society lacks a unifying set of common values and cultural beliefs. There will be no development of social harmony as individuals focus more on the selfish interests that divide them, not on the common interests that bind them together. Thus, imposing rules from above by government brings unity and makes our community or states more conducive and tranquil for their citizens. Governments originated with the need to protect people from conflicts and to provide law and order. People recognized that protection was easier if they stayed together in groups and if they all agreed that one (or some) in the group should have more power than another. This recognition is the basis of sovereignty. Not only government need to protect its citizens from one another but it also needs to organize to prevent outside attacks. Therefore, governments provide parameters for every behavior of citizens, protect them from outside interference, and often provide for their well-being and happiness.

To know the value of anything, it is best to imagine its absence. So, if there is no government in states, there would be no justice, social and economic inequality, no natural rights and freedom of citizens, security, and order. And also there would be no stability of states, both internal and external sovereignty. States without government would be full of disorder. Therefore, government is necessary as it helps all states to maintain their sovereignty, promote egalitarianism, defend deviance and justice, protect citizens’ rights and freedom, and be orderly and systematic.