There is hardly ever a man clever enough to recognize the full extent of the evil he does. In the novel, Lord of the Flies, written by William Golding, one could argue that man, in the state of nature, is born evil. The boys in the novel, represent a metaphorical idea in which they are born unto the island, and manifest mankind’s true nature. As the story progresses, the boys construct a society and ruin it. They revert to the primitive association in which fear and tyranny lead to ultimate rule. All of the boys that try to do the proper and befitting deeds are killed off. This violently throws them unto impending doom, thus proving that men are born evil.
No evil dooms man hopelessly except the evil he loves, and desires to continue in,
and make no effort to escape from. Jack in an excellent example of this indeed. It is quite
obvious that the boys do not need to hunt to survive, however, Jack finds much pleasure
in slaughtering vulnerable animals. When he kills a pig, “he [begins] to dance and his
laughter [becomes] a bloodthirsty snarling.” (58).
Without the influences of civilization to
restrict him from becoming a savage, Jack undergoes a series of degenerations in which
he is transformed into a power-hungry killer. Nothing in the nature around them is evil,
but one of the human ways of talking oneself into inhuman acts is to cite the supposed
cruelty of nature. Yet, nothing in nature ever harms Jack, so this does not justify his
actions of killing and destruction. Jack is evil– he is born evil. An additional example is yet another death of a defenseless pig. This time it is Roger who marks the pigs life for destruction. He stabs at the pig and shoves the stick, “Right up her ass!” (123) This is a bloodletting most vulgar and foul indeed. The type of murder only the most heinous and lowly killer could commit–Roger. There is no doubt that Roger is the worst of the group. He exists only to annihilate, obliterate, eradicate and destroy all life on the island. If this is not pure evil, what is?
Though most of the boys on the island are of an ill nature, there are a few
praiseworthy characters–maybe just one. Simon is perhaps the only boy that does not
give into the temptations of evil and thrill. Yet, none of that matters for he is killed off by his supposed comrades. Simon shows compassion to even the lowly “littleuns”. When the “littleuns” are hungry, “Simon finds the fruit they could not reach…[and] passed them
back down to the endless, outstretched hands.” (51) The surest defense against evil is
extreme individualism, originality of thinking, whimsicality, even-if you will-eccentricity. That is, something that cannot be feigned, faked, or imitated. Simon is an individual. He is far different from the other boys–he is virtuous. Yet, one could still argue that he is only pure of heart because he is not quite all there; Simon is an epileptic. It would not be fair to judge him alongside the other boys, for if he were normal, he may have been just as evil as them–another Roger perhaps. Ralph is also one of the better boys on the island–better, being only a relative term. That is, though Ralph is not quasi Roger, he still has his ill characteristics. Ralph himself takes place in the murder of Simon. He was only doing it out of fear, but none the less, he still took a life. Ralph, “treats the day’s decisions
as though he were playing chess. The only trouble was that he would never be a very
good chess player.” (106).
The fact that Ralph makes bad decisions does mark him as
somewhat of an evil character. If we are speaking in terms of Simon being good and
Roger being evil, Ralph lies inbetween them. He takes part in hunting and killing, yet
what separates Ralph from other boys is the fact that he takes responsibility for his
actions–the others do not. This does not, however, imply that Ralph is free of evil. Ralph is born with evil qualities just as any other boy on the island. Only the extent of his
iniquitousness may be argued.
It is not only the individuals that evince their sinister ways; The boys as a group
act with just as much a will for subversive disorder as they do when they act as single
entities. The boys form mobs throughout the novel. Most of them arise when they are
about to kill something. They invoke the chant, “Kill the beast! Cut his throat! Spill his blood!” (138) or a variation of this. It seems that the boys become more uncontrollable
when they are together than when they are apart. That incantation leads to several deaths, including a few pigs and most of all, Simon. The death of Simon is the outcome of a boys together as a fearful mob of children. They slaughter Simon without even identifying
him–in cold blood. After that most of them act as if they did nothing wrong. Toward the
end of the story, all of hell breaks loose. The island is aflame and Jack’s hunters set out
to slaughter the dissonant Ralph with extreme prejudice. Roger had “sharpened a stick at
both ends.” (190) They were going to slay Ralph and decapitate him, leaving his head on
a stick. Yet, no one spoke against Jacks words, no matter how dastardly and cruel they
were. They all would have killed him, thus proving that every single one of them is not
free of evil and cowardice. They are all born evil.
There is no explanation for evil. It must be looked upon as a necessary part of the
order of the universe. Thomas Hobbs said it best when he stated that when man has “ No
arts; no letters; no society; and which is worst of all, continual fear, and danger of violent
death; the life of man [is], poor, nasty, brutish, and short.” This very much relates to
boys and how they lived on the island. They had no art, no letters, and no real society.
They all lived in continual fear. When living in fear and faced with the choices of good
and evil, they choose the side of darkness, proving that man is born evil.