The Necklace

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  “SHE WAS one of those pretty, charming young ladies, born, as if through an error of destiny, into a family of clerks. She had no dowry, no hopes, no means of becoming known, appreciated, loved, and married by a man either rich or distinguished; and she allowed herself to marry a petty clerk in the office of the Board of Education. . . .  She had neither frocks nor jewels, nothing. And she loved only those things. She felt that she was made for them. She had such a desire to please, to be sought after, to be clever, and courted.” —THE NECKLACE Guy de Maupassant    France, 1884 (pic by Grok) Read this short story here:  https://americanliterature.com/author/guy-de-maupassant/short-story/the-necklace

Finished Reading

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  • Judges (Old Testament)
  • Book 1 in Aristotle’s “Nicomachean Ethics”

Sophocles’ last line of “Oedipus The King” is “we must call no one happy who is of mortal race until he has crossed life‘s border free from pain.” Where Sophocles (497-406 BC) ends, Aristotle  (384-322 BC) begins, searching the subject of happiness in “Ethica Nicomachea.” His exploration asks if happiness is the result of what we do, or of who we are? Is happiness the result of having a good time or from living a good life? Is happiness dependent on goods (circumstantial) or self-sufficient in what is good (contentment)? Is happiness an activity or a state of being? The philosopher reasoned that virtuous completion determines happiness and is only measured at the end of life. 

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