Moral Along the Journey
MORAL PHILOSOPHICAL APPROACH
I. INTRODUCTION
The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
“What is essential is invisible to the eye,” this was best known as the philosophy of Exupery’s The Little Prince. Antoine de Saint-Exupery is well-known as both a pioneer of aviation and French writer. He was born in Lyon, France, in 1900. He always dreamed of becoming an adventurer even in his early age and he wanted to become naval officer, but he failed in the qualifying exam so he decided to pursue to become aviator. Even though he knew flying was dangerous and risky during his time, he still pursue his dream and joined the military and trained to be a pilot and he successfully became one in 1927. He was placed in charge of an airfield in the Sahara where he was stranded. He encountered number of accidents as a pilot but he always overcome and recover from different injuries and continued his career. Later, he became the director of his own aviation company in South America, where he often flew dangerous routes over the Andes Mountains. But his company failed and this time he pursue his career as writer and he became successful. He published books including the book entitled The Little Prince written during World War II. This book was somehow a reflection to the author’s life because the character of his book and the author himself crashed his airplane in Sahara Desert wherein he had a number of hallucinations, including an encounter with a fennec, a type of desert sand fox that bears a striking resemblance to the fox depicted in The Little Prince. It aspires to be a universal and timeless allegory about the importance of innocence and love. This book has become one of the most widely translated books in the history of French Literature.
The Prince by Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli
How a prince /a ruler can acquires and sustains his political life with reference to his public and private morality? This is the question raised on the treatise entitled The Prince by Niccolò Machiavelli. Based on Thomsom (2001), Machiavelli was an Italian statesman and political philosopher. He was employed on diplomatic missions as defense secretary of the Florentine Republic, and was tortured when the Medici returned to power in 1512.
According to Borghini (2017) he is one of the most brilliant and versatile intellects of the Italian Renaissance. When he retired from public life he wrote his most famous work, The Prince which describes the means by which a leader may gain and maintain power. Revered by some for being an astute thinker, a pragmatic visionary, and a champion of republican liberty. He is reviled by others for writing a manual for unscrupulous leaders everywhere, teaching them to do whatever it takes to defeat their enemies and stay in power, no matter how cruel or ruthless their actions might be. This book was said to be the famous of all his writings because it was most vivid and suggestive picture of political conditions in the Italy of the Renaissance.
II. DISCUSSION
Moral/Philosophical critics believe that the larger purpose of literature is to teach morality, to probe philosophical issues and to present the moral and philosophical issues on any literary pieces. The readers must ask the essential question, “What the reader might learn about life from reading this work?” to clearly show the moral-philosophical relationship in the text and the reader. However, the text is a work of art, it is not without a message with moral implications, and again it is based on the reader, not on the text. Here is the literary piece. The Little Prince and the Prince.
The Little Prince
In reading the book written by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry entitled The Little Prince, readers may get a lot of moral that they can apply in their daily lives even the philosophy that they must possess that everything may invisible to their eyes but not in their heart. Their eyes might be blind in the truth but their heart will tell them beyond the truth. Reading this book will make them realize a lot of things and it will change how they valued life and the people around them. It will lead them wondering their childhood days and it also helps to prepare the younger readers into adulthood, how adult thinks and neglect to appreciate little things even their decisions and how they make things complicated. In the journey of little prince when he decided to left his own planet he met different people wherein he learn things from each of them about grown-ups.
Based on Ospina (2014) there are some ways the little prince prepare young ones for adulthood, it will help them to avoid the things that lead their life unhappy and wasted the first is “Remember to look beyond the surface”. The second is “Don’t hide your true feelings; it will cost you everything that is important”. The third is “Judge yourself before you judge others”. The fourth is “There is a very little substance in coveting the admiration of others”. The fifth is “Drinking to forget is a vicious and ultimately feeble endeavor”. And the very important is “Care for the things you have, for they cannot replaced”. Along the little prince’s journey he met different people and learn different moral from them that the reader might get out of reading the book.
In the beginning of the book, the narrator tried to show his drawing to the grown-ups which is the boa constrictor digesting an elephant but they don’t see it is as what the narrator wants them to see it, rather they see his drawing as a hat. It only shows grown-ups didn’t use their imagination as they only focus what is visible in their eyes. The second conveys that the little prince didn’t say anything about how much he cared for his rose which he watered and nurtured always. He left the rose but he always think of it and thinking that the world might harm it. The third is shown wherein the little prince met a King who teaches him that judging yourself is more difficult than judging others and it is more important in that way you can grow as individual. The fourth is, in the next planet, the little prince met a man who admires no one but himself and always wanted others to admire him. It gives as a message that too much admiration for oneself means you do not care for anyone or too much admiration for others means you don’t valued and appreciate your own. The fifth is in the next planet, wherein the little prince met a drunkard who is ashamed of drinking. Instead of doing things that is productive the man let himself being drunk and waste his time, the manner that the little prince didn’t understand. And the last is even the little prince saw a lot of beautiful roses, he is still longing for his rose the one he nurtured. He realized he cannot replace it with another rose. This quotation made the readers to think of the person they love that no matter how many friends you have they can’t replace the seat of your family in your heart.
This story teaches them lessons in life that they must put in their mind and will lead them in a right decision and taking right path in their lives. “A problem starts with a tiny sprout that wasn’t handled with immediately”. The next lesson is “Money is not everything”. The next “Your loved ones can never, ever be replaced”.
The little prince always make sure to destroys the appearance-wise benign baobab shoots so that they don’t grow and destroy his planet. It also teaches readers that they must face every problem they encountered even they think it is harmless because it might become a big trouble without their knowing. The second lesson means that money can’t give everything. It might be important to people lives for survival but they must not forget that they also need people around them, they should not just engage themselves making money. A lot of people accept a particular job because it paid well even it’s not truly their desire. And sometimes a person that has a lot of money forget to look back to the people helped them before. The little prince observed this to the businessman he met in one of those planet who really valued money and wealth. In the next lesson conveys that little prince realized that even his rose looks like a common rose when he saw a lot of roses he still thought of his rose which he always watered and nurtured in his planet. It also tells people to appreciate the person whom they cared for even the things they have in the present because it will not be replaced by others.
Konnikova (2012) stated that in Exuspery’s viewpoint in his book “adults seem the absurd one” means adults likely to go anywhere quickly and persisting stubbornly in mindless pursuits, even they don’t have any idea why they are doing that. The readers might get lesson from what the little prince’s friends like the fox and the rose. Their sense of wisdom wherein they state what is important and not of the questions that might worth asking. But it also states about creativity and thought is difficult to overstate for example, as their age increase, their world’s perspective changes. There are only few people who still wondering, the sense of enjoyment when individual is still in his younger years. As people grow older they gain experiences and being aware of self-control, they are able to express their ideas and suppress their emotions and desires if necessary. But somehow, people don’t appreciate the effortless ability to take in the world in full. Experiences that teaches people threatens to limit their imagination and the sense of possible.
The Prince
Lamus (2016) stated that the philosophy of Machiavelli is recognizable in his treatise wherein he said that “men are bad and they don’t change”. It shows how pessimistic view of human nature the author is. It means that all men are evil without any possibility of redemption. In morality aspects especially in judging the prince reality should take into account. He questioned how could prince be good if he, himself surrounded by evil and wherein he is responsible in governing his people? Why the prince should show goodness if he is dealing the bad one? He also states that “all men are evil and they were going to act according the wickedness of their spirits whenever they have free scope”. This shows how pessimistic the author is. This quotation conveys that man can’t improve, he can be redeemed. Man, instead of looking up for what he should be, at the world of ideas, at Plato's forms or at the virtues that can be attained from Christianity, should rather look down. This is the man that the prince must rule.
Machiavelli’s philosophy is “to become a good leader he must do anything even it is immoral and wrong”. It concerns with the prince’s duty wherein concerning military matter must always think of the war only, even in times of peace. They must know their surroundings exactly so they can defend and make effective strategies to counter the enemies attack. He said that to become a new prince is much difficult rather than a hereditary prince because in the beginning of his duty he must stabilize his new power and make it stronger that will endure, this given task to the prince requires him to do immoral things in order to achieve his goals.
According to Machiavelli (n.d) cited by Ali (2015) a strong state must possess a leader who is able to defend his power at all time and at all costs. He maintains that a ruler may deceive, trick, oppress and even kill his opponents as long as his misdeeds serve the state’s stability, cruel actions may have done and it conveys the fact that good can come from evil actions. This treatise shows and offers enough material to demonize its writer. However, Machiavelli does not champion unlimited ruthlessness and violence. Nor does he justify any objectives that seem to warrant violence. However the author does not try to align his work to Christian morals as he examines the practice of statecraft and leadership.
The emphasis of Machiavelli in his treatise The Prince is how the states should function and not how morals are to be followed. He said that the prince should be a beast if necessary. It means that as the prince he must show his braveness and cruelness if needed based on the situation, if it includes his people safety. In the intriguing chapter XV111, the author advocates that a prince must have virtue or must possess this quality to govern his people properly, it defined as the exercise of his freedoms by the man of energetic and conscious will. In this chapter the author also asserts that it is unnecessary for a prince to have all the good qualities he have enumerated mercy, faith, humanity, religiosity and uprightness, but it is very necessary to appear to have them, to have them and always to observe them, but with a mind so framed that should you require not to be so, you may be able and know how to change to the opposite.
Machiavelli argues that life presents instances in which an overriding danger and urgency dictate resolute, extreme, and even savage actions necessary for defense, survival, and the improvement of our lot. When such conditions arise, pangs of conscience or concessions to morality are self-defeating. He said that in the Prince religion is a mere instrument of political domination and unity
According to Zmora (2003) this view had shown in one of his speeches states the dignity of a general theory. The concrete example of this is the assertion that appears throughout Machiavelli’s writings to the effect that power and wealth can be achieved only by force or fraud, or both. This is presented in the speech as an axiom of political life: “God and nature” arranged it thus. One may, of course, decline to take part in the struggle for power and wealth. It is highly observed even in the government of other countries. Those people who are in the position committing immoral actions just to maintain their job as they are paid well but one cannot escape the consequences of such a choice. The good and the meek may be assured that the strong will prey upon them, and the world will remain the same as before: Power-driven, restless, and remorseless.
In chapters 15-18, the author discusses the virtues a prince must possess, and systematically refutes the main tenets held by authors of the specula principis. They had high regard for liberality, for example, as a necessary virtue for a ruler, the author, however, considered it a vice: The ruler, once he has spent all his money, will be forced to increase the burden of taxation on the people, which will in turn engender hatred and lead to his downfall. They claimed, furthermore, that the virtue of mercy was preferable to heavy-handed policy, severity, and cruelty; Machiavelli insists that “each prince should desire to be held merciful and not cruel; nonetheless he should take care not to use this mercy badly.” “Be it known, then, that there are two ways of contending, one in accordance with the laws, and the other by force, the first of which is proper to men, the second to beasts. But since the first method is often ineffectual, it becomes necessary to resort to the second. A Prince should, therefore, understand how to use well both the man and the beast.” He must be aware when to be a man and when to be a beast.
Machiavelli used as his example the Duke Cesare Borgia, who was known as user of cruelty, and his brutal deeds achieved results that are difficult to write off as immoral. To demonstrate this, he draws a comparison between Borgia’s policies and those of the Florentines: “Borgia was held to be cruel; nonetheless his cruelty restored the Romagna, united it, and reduced it to peace and to faith.” Anxious not to appear inhumane, the Florentines did nothing to check the violence between opposing factions in Pistoia, a city then under their rule. A quick body count, says Machiavelli, reveals that Borgia was in fact more “merciful” than the Florentines: Borgia’s cruelty preserved the social order, whereas the Florentines’ mercy brought about its collapse.
Machiavelli states not that cruelty is a good thing, but that it is impossible to recognize a priori whether it is good or evil. Of course, mindless cruelty is bad, but wickedness can be “honorable.” Machiavelli accepts the ordinary senses of moral terms and employs conventional value judgments. He does not sanitize violence and deceit, cruel acts are for him cruel acts whatever the circumstances or benefits. But this is precisely what enables him to question their meaning as they enter the political field of vision. He reveals the interdependence of good and evil. “Good” and “evil” exist, Machiavelli in effect says, but they are not absolute categories, and in fact they are frequently bound up together.
According to Webber (n.d) quoted by Tay (2012) he who lets himself in for politics, that is, for power and force as means, contracts with diabolical powers and for his action it is not true that good can follow only from good and evil only from evil, but that often the opposite is true. Anyone who fails to see this is, indeed, a political infant. (Politics as a vacation).
III. CONCLUSION
In the story The Little Prince, readers could get a lot of lessons in life that will lead them to some realizations about how they perceive life and give value to it. This story made people realize that there is nothing wrong to go back and reminisce childhood days because it allow them to discover the essential life that is invisible to the eye but not to the heart. It will remind them the priceless moment and the importance of living in the present. It teaches readers to give importance to the things and especially the people around them because they can’t find someone or something what they have in the present and they must appreciate and love them because they are unique.
After reading the treatise entitled The Prince, the readers will come into realizations and questions including why government should resort to immorality in order to survive especially if their subjects expect them to be moral. Like what the prince did, in order for him to reach his goals he must possess a quality like being cruel and do other immoral actions. Why the prince or other officials of the government can’t eliminate evil within the government? And if that’s the case, then no human society is truly secure, for there are always internal and external enemies that lie in wait. In a dangerous world filled with people keen to exploit the weakness of others, it is impossible to base morality on morality. In such a world, conscience invites abuse just as weakness invites aggression. Without the willingness to use what conventional morality would consider wrongful means, it is impossible to guarantee its survival. Evil doings are everywhere. Even the people who are supposed to protect the society and its people are also responsible in ruining the people and society.
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