Merchant of Venice Essay: Universal Elements -- Merchant Venice Essays

The Universal Elements of Merchant of Venice  Ã‚      Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice contains many themes and elements that are considered timeless or universal. Samuel Taylor Coleridge defines a timeless or universal element as a â€Å"representation of men in all ages and all times.†Ã‚   A universal element is relevant to the life of every human being – it is universal. The first major theme that plays an important role in the play is the Christians’ prejudice against the Jews. A second important theme is the attitude toward money.   Perhaps the most important theme of the play is the love between people. This love can occur between the same sex, or the opposite sex, platonic or romantic.   In Merchant of Venice, the three timeless elements are prejudice, money, and love.    The first theme is that religious intolerance and prejudice play destructive roles in the book. Even to this day, there is racism and prejudice in schools about race and religion. Antonio, as a true Christian, has often condemned moneylenders. He knows that since the early twelfth century, Christians are forbidden by the Church to lend money for profit. Shylock, as a Jew, does not consider his money-lending and overwhelming interest to be a sin in any manner. In fact, he considers his earnings through money lending as the gift of God. He appeals to and quotes the Scriptures in defense of his profession. Shylock and the other Jewish moneylenders are essential to the prosperity of the merchant community, but they are also outcasts as human beings and as Jews.   Shylock often shows his dislike to the Christians; â€Å"I hate him for he is a Christian†, (Act I, Sc. III, L. 38). The Christians ridicule and hate the Jewish moneylende... ...o, who she cares about for the sake of Bassanio. Jessica gives up her family ties to marry Lorenzo. Even Gratiano and Nerissa are devoted to one another. The play is truly about the happiness that true love brings.    In this play, three timeless elements that are very relevant today and throughout history are prejudice, money, and love. Shakespeare included many examples of all these themes in his play. Bassanio, Antonio, Gratiano, Lorenzo, Portia, and Shylock are the main representatives of these themes. You could take anyone in history and compare him or her to anyone in this play. An example of this would be the prejudice and mean spirit that both Shylock and Hitler share. Shakespeare did a very good job showing these elements in real life scenarios. Samuel Taylor Coleridge put it perfectly; this play is a â€Å"representation of men in all ages and all times.†

John Locke Essay

The topic that I chose for my philosophy paper is empiricism. Empiricism is the theory that all knowledge is derived from sense-experience. This idea was developed from a famous English philosopher, John Locke, states that knowledge can only come from our sensory experience, nowhere else. Empiricists believe that getting knowledge without the experience is unachievable. There are three subcategories of Empiricism; Classical, Moderate, and Radical. Classical Empiricism completely rejects the thought of â€Å"in-born† knowledge. It states that at birth, we are born as a blank slate. Throughout the years, the more experience the more we learn. Radical empiricism is a dividend of the theory that concludes that knowledge comes from our senses. When we experience certain things, the sense that comes along with it is what gives us the knowledge that we take from it. Moderate empiricism is a more improved on and fits today’s philosophical and psychological findings. Moderate empiricism writes that not all knowledge should come from what you live through; some of it is simply learned. A valid example that they used to further prove their theory is the understanding of school subjects such as math or history. A person doesn’t have to live through anything to understand that a triangle has three sides or that George Washington became president in 1789. I interpret this theory the way it was written. I understand where john Locke’s idea of empiricism evolved from and there are many pieces of evidence to support it. I think what this theory states is that our experiences define us as humans. What we live through is what gives us the knowledge on either how to improve on it, to learn from it, or to continue doing it. In many ways, I believe that this is true in sculpting our personality. I think this theory goes in search of why people are so different, despite that they are taught the same material in school, and they answer that with the fact that every individual goes through incomparable experiences and that’s what makes us different and therefore gives us our knowledge. There are numerous examples of empiricism. Any experience in which a lesson is taken from is proof of empiricism. That may include a job experience in which the employee disappointed their manager and now knows to do everything he can to avoid doing what it is that he did. This goes along with Classical and Radical empiricism. The individual has learned something based solely on experience, but also through the sense of embarrassment and disappointment. A student who puts in a large amount of effort in his work and then receives praise on it from his teacher will want to go through that experience again and feel accomplishment. I feel very diverse about this theory. In many ways I do agree with it because our experiences are what give us our beliefs and set us as different individuals. However, the theory in ways contradicts itself because it underestimates the power of learning in class and knowing  not to do certain things even. An example that I have lived through that goes along with my opinion on this is my health class in the seventh grade where we were taught all the vital effects of drugs. Therefore, I have learned, but not through experience, not to do drugs. I did not have to go through addiction or even experimentation of illegal substances in order to get the knowledge not to do them. The theory that more closely relates to my belief is rationalism. Rationalism states that knowledge is based off of reason. Examples of that is mathematical problems,  knowing an illusion isn’t real and that your mind is actually being deceived, and why things happen the way they do. We don’t touch a pot of boiling water because we’ve done it before and experienced pain, we don’t touch it because we see the steam coming out of it and with that, we imply our reasoning that it would burn if we do touch it. There is also a flaw in empiricism. We all perceive things differently, and therefore our knowledge may be inaccurate. A student presenting might think he did awful and never volunteer again because his experience gave him the false knowledge that he wasn’t able to do good. Meanwhile, his fellow classmates might have thought greatly of his presentation. Empiricism can give off false knowledge of our experience, making us self-conscious, and even changing our personality completely, all because of how we perceived it. That is why I apply rationalism to my life and personality. I don’t have to experience something in order to gain knowledge from it. I am able to make decisions based off of reasoning, knowing the effect of an action without having to experience it, and knowing what is right without having to do what is wrong first.

The Epic Of Gilgamesh And The Emperor s New Groove

The Babylonian work The Epic of Gilgamesh and Disney’s The Emperor’s New Groove both feature similar main characters and story lines. While both works do not follow the same plot line, the characters Gilgamesh and Kuzco possessed similar personalities, traveling partners, and changes in character. The initial portrayal of the rulers in both works is significant. In both The Epic of Gilgamesh and The Emperor’s New Groove both kings are portrayed as arrogant kings who tyrannize their subjects. Both works also contain traveling partners for the respective kings. In The Epic of Gilgamesh, Enkidu is created and joins Gilgamesh on his journey. In comparison, Pacha, a commoner in The Emperor’s New Groove, accompanies Kuzco back to the palace. The significant transformation in character in both kings is momentous in both works. Gilgamesh becomes a respectable ruler, who is worthy of praise, whereas Kuzco realizes the importance of compassion towards others. In bot h The Epic of Gilgamesh and The Emperor’s New Groove, the respective rulers are portrayed as chauvinistic and arrogant. Gilgamesh, two-thirds divine and one-third mortal, was aware of his superiority and used this as reason to oppress his subjects and women. As the author of The Epic of Gilgamesh says, â€Å"Day and night his behavior was overbearing. He was the shepherd. He was their shepherd yet, powerful, superb†¦.Gilgamesh would not leave [young girls alone], the daughters of warriors, and the brides of young men.†