Morality In Jonathan Bennett's The Conscience Of Huckleberry Finn

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In “The Conscience of Huckleberry Finn,” Jonathan Bennett presents the difficulty between sympathy and morality. Although the fictional story "Huckleberry Finn" is in the title, Bennett uses also uses Heinrich Himmler, Jonathan Edwards, Wilfred Owen. Bennett described their morality as "bad" assuming the readers would agree with him. Most of the time the person does not realize their morality is bad because of social norms. While morality and sympathy can be in a constant battle, ultimately the one that wins is what the person is more obligated to. Bennett presents Heinrich Himmler, Jonathan Edwards and Wilfred Owen in the article to show how sympathy does not always win over morality. Heinrich Himmler is the Nazi who came up with the “Final Solution” to murder mass amounts of people. …show more content…

Because people rarely self reflect, they would not change or improve a bad morality. Heinrich Himmler was sympathetic to his victims, yet he was a moral man and followed what he was told would do good for the world. Jonathan Edwards failed to realize his morals were bad and continued to believe them until his death. While Wilfred Owen completely got rid of his morals and proceeded to write poems about the horrors of war. Because people can recognize live by horrible morals, it does not necessarily mean change will happen. What makes Huckleberry Finn, although a fictional character, different from these people is his internal battle between a bad morality and sympathy. Huckleberry faces the option of helping his slave friend Jim escape or telling the slave catchers to capture him. He is faced with the option of sending Jim back to slavery and lying so his friend can have a chance at freedom. Huckleberry recognizes lying is be immoral, yet does so Jim can escape. Huckleberry tries to convince himself Miss Watson does not deserve the loss of her

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