Essay on Man

Essay on Man

1. Philosophical optimism

   • the belief that everything was created at for a good purpose
   • Nature is created perfect
     • Clearly seen in Pope's essay

2. Leibiz's Theodicty

   • Justification of Imperfections in our world
     • How did evil come into this world?
       • God's creations are not wise/powerful
   • Religion cannot contradict philosophy
     • Faith cannot contradict reason
       • God cannot contradict himself

3. "Whatever is, is right"

   • Demonstrates that pope believes that whatever exist has some form of truth in it

4. Target of Pope's Satire

   • Scientists
     • Also against those that who attempted to use rationality to disprove god
   • Aristocrats

5. Diesm

   • the belief that in observation and reason of the natural world exists sufficient proof that God is Real
     • http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deism
   • accompanied with the rejection of revelation and authority as a source of religious knowledge

6. Argument from design

   • This suggests that God designed the world in such a way that it included the possibility of evil, but that if rightly perceived, we would understand that all of it works together for a greater good.
     • http://www3.dbu.edu/mitchell/popetheo.htm

7. The Problem of Evil

   • How can we reconcile the existence of evil with God?
     • God created imperfect beings who can make mistakes

8. Great Chain of Being

   • Derived from Plato and Aristote
   • Religious hierarchical system
   • God
     • Angels and Demons
       • Stars and Moon
         • Kings, Princes, Nobles, and Men
           • Wild Animals and Domesticated Animals
             • Trees and Plants
               • Stones, Metals, and Minerals

9. What methods does Pope use in his satire?

   • He does not actively attack the pompousness of British aristocracy in his time, he just makes it easy to see how ridiculous the aristocrats were
     • http://www.studentpulse.com/articles/545/satire-in-18th-century-british-society-alexander-popes-the-rape-of-the-lock-and-jonathan-swifts-a-modest-proposal

10. What kind of satire is this?

    • It is Horatian it is due in large part to human failures. It is a formal form of satire because of the audience for which it was written
      • http://www.gutenberg.org/files/2428/2428-h/2428-h.htm

11. Symmetry and artifice

    • Balance in the world
      • God had created enough good in the world to balance out the evil.
        • Humans deception if something is real or not. And does it please us.

12. Didactic

    • Didatic is "intended to teach, particularly in having moral instruction as an ulterior motive."
    • Pope
      • intends to teach us that humans need to think for ourselves
      • believes that people will believe that God has created the perfect world