“In times of strong emotion mankind disdain all base considerations; but such times are evanescent (soon passing and short-lived). The permanent constitutional condition of the manufactured man, thought Ahab, is sordidness (base, vile, meanly selfish, self-seeking, or mercenary).” Moby Dick
This thought shapes the journey of this book. Through literature review we ask the question: is ‘man’ condemned to the life of the manufactured ‘man’? It was Captain Ahab—the captain of the whaling ship the Pequod—who lived these very words. In fact, we all do. Like Ahab we are a manufactured ‘man’—not by choice—but as a result of living in a ‘manufactured world’. No soul seemingly can escape this wound.
The book is an essay exploring what it means to be a manufactured ‘man’, and seeks to know whether this wound is a fatal one?
The author asks you to consider the fate of the butterfly, because truly our own fate also is its fate.
Let’s imagine a scene together. In your hand their sits a butterfly, a beautiful butterfly gently resting upon your skin, who just moments before landed upon the palm of your hand. As you look down upon such a scene, your hand being a safe perch for the beauty that is the butterfly; one begins to wonder about this scene. Who I ask you would clasp ones hand at this moment to steal away the life of this butterfly at
once? It seems almost frightful to consider this point. Who but the vilest of hearts would commit this act? Consider this moment for yourself.
It seems in all of us there resides a self that would crush that butterfly, to extinguish its life at once. How the heart is made of many souls, how we must know all of our inner souls and selves. Ahab made this decision, and so must we. Do we follow the ways of the manufactured ‘man’, or do we revert back to our better selves that cherish those times of high emotion?