Augustine replies back to him which kind of evil is Ev talking about: the evil that men do and the evil that men suffer. Ev responds to him saying, “I want to know about both kinds of evil.” Aug begins to define while conversing with Ev by explaining that God gives justly to the righteous and the wicked what they deserve. The explanation is clear. God gives the righteous their rewards and the wicked he punishes justly, but the way we experience His justice is through suffering. He further explains that the evil deeds that we perform are of our own accord, and that we are punished by God’s justice because they are done out of our own free will.
Lastly, Edgar’s crucial act of mercy led to his father Gloucester reaching an epiphany, that he was wrong by trusting Edmund. All three topics are relevant within Act IV and show how mercy is a critical aspect to life. I believe that mercy highly outweighs justice; mercy is the single most important quality to humankind which brings out peace. Whereas justice leads to an ongoing cycle of violence where nothing can get solved First, the mercy that King Lear willingly shows to Cordelia restores relationships. He openly states mercy towards Cordelia and says: “You do me wrong to take me out o’th’ grave: Thou art a soul in bliss; but I am bound Upon a wheel of fire, that mine own tears Do scald like molten lead” (IV vii 45-47) This statement portrays how Lear admits that he was wrong in the past.
Man’s behavior is learned and evolves as people mature. My view that people are inherently good makes me trust other people. Once someone proves to me that they are not a good person, I will no longer trust them. Machiavelli believes that man is inherently evil. He believes that people will do evil things every chance they get.
Jekyll implies this when he says that, ‘man will be ultimately known for a mere polity of multifarious, incongruous, and independent denizens,’ this is saying that good, bad and many other qualities make up the whole of a man. Also the Victorians had this idea that if you were deformed physically then your deformity represented degradation. The idea was that God had given you this deformity to punish you for something bad you had done. Jekyll’s experiments can only prove that human beings consist of two ingredients, one part good, and one part evil. Jekyll’s experiment was an attempt to separate the two ingredients.
When he talks about the original sin, he says that he used it as an excuse to sin, and that he would take great delight in it. This shows that he was not mentally strong enough at this point in his life to be able to take responsibility for his actions; instead he just blames God for them. He explains this by saying that the original sin of Eve makes people into the sinners that they are and how they naturally come by it. Later in his life, Augustine resorts to some
Job 4: 7-21 is taken from Eliphaz’s speech to Job. After undergoing immense suffering for no apparent reason, Job curses his life and birth and seeks comfort from his friends. Although Job is a good and holy man, Eliphaz states that suffering is the result of sin. He is implying that Job’s suffering is a result of a sinful life, although we already know the true reason for his pains. In verse 7, “Think now, who that was innocent ever perished, or were the upright cut off?”, Eliphaz basically says that the good do not suffer.
God eventually talks to Job making it clear that his actions need no explanation. The book of Job brings up the ever-present question of why bad things happen to good people and answers that question by saying God is above justice. When Job’s friends — Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar — hear of his calamity, they come to visit him and begin to argue their “theology” to him. Their theology is that a man’s suffering is always the result of his personal sin. Further, the more one has sinned, the greater one will suffer.
Augustine is quick to clarify that God did not make sin. If God is good and all things he created are good then sin can not be created by God, for sin is evil. Augustine believes that sin is humanity's responsibility. Augustine’s view of the original sin is very complex and does not discuss it completely in Confessions, for his point of writing the book is more of a personal reflection on his view of evil in his own life. Simply stated, original sin is the condition that inclines human beings to selfishness and disobedience, even when they may want to act otherwise.
Plato’s Euthyphro dilemma shows that the Divine Command Theory has several problems. If something is good simply because God commands it, then God arbitrary – He could have given different commands just as easily. According to Leibniz, this would be destroying all of God’s love and glory – “for why praise him for what he has done if he would be equally praiseworthy in doing exactly the contrary?” On the other hand, if God commands something because it is good, then that would mean good is independent of God. Therefore, we should not follow a God who is arbitrary, but rather, think about it separately. James Rachels states that we should be autonomous, and think about what is right and wrong for ourselves.
And so, Hester, I drew thee into my heart, into its innermost chamber, and sought to warm thee by the warmth in which thy presence made there!” (69). Chillingworth’s compassion and desire for love and good, over the cruel and evil atmosphere he later develops, reveals that he was not always wandering down the road of revenge, but was a man of virtue. His spiraling fall into malice and morally self destructive actions only occur after he sets himself down the road to find the other person who wronged him, the man who shares his wife’s sin, and take vengeance upon him. Roger continues his personal decline by betraying his human nature and turning to a more demonic nature. “The physician advanced directly in front of his patient, laid his hand upon his bosom, and thrust aside the vestment that, hitherto, had always covered it even from the professional eye.