University of Sargodha

Name: Akash Amreen

Roll Number: BENF18M016

Department: English

Class: BS-V (SS)

Subject: Fiction-III

Assignment Topic: Machiavellianism

‘He found himself understanding the wearisomeness of this life… though it was part of a brighter
childhood’ -- (Ch. 5 Pg. 76)

Human nature is dynamic; it changes throughout the time according to circumstances, situations,
needs and requirements of time. Literature depicts such historical and social incidents that were
inappropriate but they were only justified because situations approved them. A huge number of
philosophers have given different theories of goodness and evilness about human nature.
“Machiavellianism” according to the Oxford English Dictionary (2005) “is the employment of
cunning and duplicity in statecraft or in general conduct”. Nicholo Machiavelli was an Italic,
philosopher, diplomat and writer who is especially known for his book ‘The Prince’. He gave the
idea that being feared is better than being loved. Many writers of English literature followed his
thoughts such as Francis Bacon, Bolingbroke, Gibbon, and John Adam etc.

Immanuel Kant, a German philosopher writes in his book, Religion within the Limits of Reason Alone,
offers a secular theory about evil.

According to Kant, we have a morally good will only if we choose to perform morally right actions
because they are morally right (Kant 1785, 4: 393–4:397; Kant 1793, Bk I). On Kant’s view, anyone
who does not have a morally good will have an evil will. There are three grades of evil which can be
seen as increasingly more evil stages of corruption in the will. First there is frailty. A person with a
frail will attempts to perform morally right actions because these actions are morally right, but she
is too weak to follow through with her plans. Instead, she ends up doing wrong due to a weakness
of will (Kant 1793, Bk I, 24–25).

The next stage of corruption is impurity. A person with an impure will does not attempt to
perform morally right actions just because these actions are morally right. Instead, she performs
morally right actions partly because these actions are morally right and partly because of some
other incentive, e.g., self-interest. Someone with an impure will performs morally right actions, but
only partly for the right reason. Kant believes that this form of defect in the will is worse than frailty
even though the frail person does wrong while the impure person does right. Impurity is worse
than frailty because an impure person has allowed an incentive other than the moral law to guide
her actions while the frail person tries, but fails, to do the right thing for the right reason (Kant
1793, Bk I, 25–26).

The final stage of corruption is perversity, or wickedness. Someone with a perverse will
inverts the proper order of the incentives. Instead of prioritizing the moral law over all other
incentives, she prioritizes self-love over the moral law. Thus, her actions conform to the moral law
only if they are in her self-interest. Someone with a perverse will need not do anything wrong
because actions which best promote her self-interest may conform to the moral law.
 Lord of the Flies was written following two devastating world wars. The First World War
was supposed to be "the war to end all wars", and yet, just twenty years later, the world entered
into another war, even more destructive than the first. Many people came to regard human ways
differently after this. It seemed that we were innately partly warmongering and bloodthirsty. This
negative view of man might be what set the tone for the treatment of evil in Lord of the Flies, where
it is presented as the inner qualities that enable you to lose sight of what you originally considered
good and virtuous.
The setting in William Golding's Lord of the Flies is an idyllic tropical island. Yet, during the course
of
the novel, the fertile, green landscape is transformed into a blazing, destructive inferno by the
arrival
of a group of British schoolboys.

In the first few pages of the book, the boys run on the beach and swim in the ocean. Near the
end, they are less like civilized people and more like savages, with more than one death to their
conscience. What brings about the idea of evil on the tropical island is the mention and the
following fear of "the Beast". In the minds of the boys, this "Beast" is an actual, concrete entity that
threatens the group from the outside. But as Simon deuces, "the Beast" actually lives within them.
"The Beast" might then be another term for the evil within the human mind and soul.

Jack uses a pig's head as an offering to the Beast. Simon hallucinates that the head is talking
to him. Golding calls it the Lord of the Flies - this is a translation of the Biblical name Beelzebub -
another name for the Devil. "Fancy thinking the Beast was something you could hunt and kill!" said
the head... "You knew, didn't you? I'm part of you? Close, close, close!" The voice of the Lord of The
Flies makes Simon realizes that the evil the boys have been looking for actually lives inside them -
even in him.

The characters in Lord of the Flies can be interpreted as prototypes of human behavior, where
Ralph represents civilization and leadership, and Jack represents the savagery within the human
soul. In a broader sense, we may consider Ralph as representing "good" and Jack as representing
"evil". That is
not the same as saying that Ralph is good, and that Jack is evil. Although Ralph is a sympathetic
character, our protagonist and one of the few who seem to take a meditative view of their own
actions, he also has evil in his heart, as we see in the case of Simon's death. Although Ralph is in
denial about his participation in the event, we see that he is not completely consumed by savagery.
Jack is in many ways Ralph's opposite. Where Ralph assumes his leadership because he wants them
all to get off the island, Jack wants it to satisfy his own need for being in command. If Ralph
represents the democratic ruler, Jack is the tyrant.

Because the characters are all children, an extra dimension is added to our understanding of
the
term "evil". Children are usually represented as innocent creatures in literature. In Lord of the Flies
the seemingly innocent boys end up committing murder and wreaking havoc on the entire island.
We
also commonly envision children as acting according to their natures to a larger extent than adults,
who are usually more doctrine by society's rules. If this interpretation is brought into Lord of the
Flies, does that mean that the boys' actions are "true" to their innate behavior? Is that also why
Ralph, Piggy and Simon, who seem the most mature, are the ones who resist this behavior?

Golding seems to imply that what we might call the boys' "evil actions" occur when they
abandon their civilized ways and start acting according to their primal instincts. To what extent are
the
characters responsible for their actions if they all have evil within them from birth? We would find
it
absurd to point to a pack of wolves, and call their behavior "evil". Perhaps we expect humans to
enter a position in which they critically consider their own actions and choices, rather than being
dominated by their own impulses. Ralph makes up new rules, like the rule about having to hold the
conch in order to speak in assemblies, and probably expects others to be kept from the society they
left, like the rule that you should not kill or steal. Ralph and most of the boys see the importance of
these rules, because they are enforced so naturally where they came from.

In society you must act according to certain rules and laws, and if you break the rules, you
are punished. But on the island, there are no consequences if you break the rules. In the case of the
boys on the island, they lose their sense of what is right and what is wrong when their own
remodeling of society crumbles. It seems that Golding considers evil to be part of what is to be
human, and that an evil streak can be found in us all. Perhaps he also implies that society functions
as a constraint to keep our innate savagery at bay, and that our true nature is similar to that of
wolves. Then it might be even more
important that the characters are all children, because they have yet to understand the workings of
society to see why certain rules and norms are necessary.

Although the book can be said to end on a high note, we find an approach to evil in this that
is
different from many other children's books; all the boys that are left on the island are saved in the
end, regardless of how they have behaved and what they have done. Two of the best of them are
even dead. Golding tells us that contrary to what many children's stories and fairytales let us
believe, good and evil are not objectively defined terms; that good will not always prevail and that
those who act on evil will not always suffer for it in the end. When Ralph weeps on the beach, he
weeps because he has learnt a hard lesson on what man is capable of doing.

Lord of the Flies is a literary expression of the manifestation of man within the context of
order, disorderliness and social exigencies.

The text was written by William Golding against the backdrop of the Second World War.
Being a professional naval officer, having experienced the sorrow, the horror and the pain of war,
translated his experience into readable form for serious didactic importance. In the text, some boys
were marooned on an uninhabited island when their plane crash landed. The boys realized that no
adult seemed to have survived the crash to provide leadership. No father, no mother, no guardian.
Luckily, Ralph and Piggy, two of the marooned boys, moved around the lagoon front while Piggy
emphasized the need to look for the other boys.
 The chant rose a tone in agony
“Kill the beast! Cut his throat! Spill his blood!”
Now out of the terror rose another desire, thick, urgent, blind
“Kill the beast! Cut his throat! Spill his blood!”
Again the blue-white scar jagged above them and the sulphurous explosion beat down. The littluns
screamed and blundered about, fleeing from the edge of the forest, and one of them broke the ring
of begins in his terror, “Him! Him!”(Ch. 9 Pg. 208)

These lines were uttered by Piggy and Ralph and they show their innate thoughts about evil,
torture and savageness. Even they don’t know what the beast is and either it is harmful or not.

In the course of this exploration, Ralph came across an object which Piggy described as a
conch. Piggy taught Ralph how to blow the conch. Ralph blew it and the noise from this serve as a
herald which attracted the other marooned boys. With a view to establishing a semblance of then
human society, there was an election where Ralph emerged the overall leader of the boys.
Meanwhile, Jack emerged as an antagonist.

“Ralph’s right of course. There isn’t a snake-thing. But if there was a snake we’d hunt it and
kill it. We’re going to hunt pigs to get meat for everybody. And we’ll look for the snake too–” “But
there isn’t a snake!”(Ch. 2 Pg. 50)

In these lines Jack represents his innate tendency to kill the snake, and he is representing
his internal evilness for the outer world.

Throughout the novel, Jack hunted for an unidentified beast which he believed was a
murderous being. The ruler ship of the island eventually degenerated into a crazy pursuit of power
and display of animalistic disposition. In view of this, Simon died; Piggy was killed as well. His
spectacle and head were broken, marking the beginning of anarchy on the island. In sheer
desperation for power, Jack tried to kill Ralph. Jack and his boys set fire to force out Ralph out of his
hiding place but the smoke attracted a British Naval Ship to the island and the naval officer put an
end to the bestial decline of morality.

“His sandy hair, considerably longer than it had been when they dropped in, was lighter
now; and his bare back was a mass of dark freckles and peeling sunburn. A sharpened stick about
five feet long trailed from his right hand, and except for a pair of tattered shorts held up by his
knife-belt he was naked”( Ch. 3 Pg. 66).

Golding uses different appearances of Jack to depict savage and evil nature of human beings.

Same savage and evil thought prevails throughout the novel through different characters’
dialogues. Following is another example from the text that shows Kantian theory of evilness:

“Roger stooped, picked up a stone, aimed, and threw it at Henry— threw it to miss. The
stone that token of preposterous time bounced five yards to Henry’s right and fell in the water.
Roger gathered a handful of stones and began to throw them. Yet there was a space round Henry,
perhaps six yards in diameter, into which he dare not throw. Here, invisible yet strong, was the
taboo of the old life” (Ch. 4 Pg. 86).

Jack’s character developed in becoming that violent and blood-longing person and which
tells us that evil was in him. Jack loved the idea of hunting and killing. Jack and his fellow hunters
even made a bizarre song for chanting and murdering the swine that they’ve successfully
hunted. “Kill the pig cut her throat spill her blood!” (Ch. 4 Pg. 96) Jack valued and loved hunting the
pigs and he always longs to hunt.

Another important aspect of evil shown in the novel is that it does not exist outside; only
Simon can feel the truth of evil when he says that the beast might be within us. The other boys are
afraid of the beast. It is displayed to Simon alone that evil in the form of beast is just an illusion.
Golding feels that evil does not emerge out of some political or other systems; therefore, removal of
a particular system does not ensure removal of evil. He argues against those who think that it is the
political or other systems that create evil. Evil comes from the depths of man himself.

According to Wittgenstein; Hamlets are present everywhere, everyone in the world is facing
the circumstances like hamlet; if we apply the term Jacks to each individual it would be essentially
right; because every individual is facing same situational goodness and evilness.

“Fancy thinking the Beast was something you could hunt and kill!”(Ch. 8 Pg. 206)

In this quote, Simon realizes that the Beast the boys fear is, in fact, the boys themselves.
They are their own monsters. In this scene, Simon is hallucinating, so he believes that this
statement is made by the Lord of the Flies. However, it is actually Simon himself who has this
revelation.

The climax of an individual’s thinking is to approach his own nature and self, following lines
said by Simon are best representatives of their self-realization.

“I’m frightened of us” (Ch. 10 Pg. 225).

“What are we? Humans? Or animals? Or savages? What’s grownup going to think?” (Ch. 5 Pg. 129)

Piggy speaks these words to Ralph when he sees that Ralph is not calling the assembly and assert
his authority as the leader. It shows that Piggy is the sane voice among the children on the island.
He knows that the others are becoming wild and savages. Therefore, he reminds Ralph of his
responsibility and obligation to children. The question of grownups is posed to remind him of the
rules and laws of society.

The mythical Beast takes on a variety of forms. First we see it as a dream then a snake or sea
monster, then the dead pilot's body. The real Beast is the evil that lives inside the boys - but only
Simon fully realizes this and, ironically, he is killed when the other boys mistakenly think he is the
creature itself.

"We've seen the beast with our own eyes....... "It was furry. There was something moving behind its
head--wings. The beast moved too--" … "There were eyes--" "Teeth--" "Claws--" "We ran as fast as
we could--" "Bashed into things--" "The beast followed us--" "I saw it slinking behind the trees--"
"Nearly touched me--" (Ch. 06 Pg. 142)

Sam and Eric have run to tell the others that they have seen the Beast. Almost trying to outdo each
other, they begin to exaggerate ("eyes", "teeth", "claws") until they seem to convince themselves of
their own story ("The beast followed us" / "Nearly touched me").

The novel thus is about discovering the darkness in man’s heart. One is obliged to look
within oneself and see the lurking darkness (evil) there. Evil is in man’s heart, only it needs to be
recognized to weaken its grip. The devil is not present in any traditional or religious sense.
Golding’s Beelzebub is the modern equivalent of the anarchical, amoral driving force that Freudians
call the ‘Id.’ The novel suggests that institutions and order imposed from without are only
temporary, but that man’s irrationality and his urge to be primitive and to destroy is enduring.
Civilization is only a mask. The boys make their tragic journey from ignorance and irresponsibility
to viciousness. (Paramvir Singh 485)

To sum up the whole discussion, we can observe human’s evil nature and social and
jurisprudential rules and regulations that make our nature and habits good and virtuous. Moral
behavior is something that must be propagated and forced by the society as those moral constraints
are not a fundamental part of human’s nature. Hence, a demand for a system of true morality as the
basis of the episteme of any epoch is emphasized in order to implant strong and unshakable
civilized beliefs in man so that alluring wrong situations and actions cannot beat superficial
trainings as one witnesses in the characters of the novel as soon as absolute freedom is given to
them.
References:

1. Golding, William. Lord of the Flies. (Koma script and Latex)