Confucius, The Superior Man

I really liked analects xiv 24 and xv 20.  The reason for me liking analect xiv 24 is because it talks about how "the progress of the superior man is upwards; the progress of the mean man is downwards".  Which i interrupted as the superior man is one who always strives for the best in himself and only travels up words and doing good for himself regardless of what other people think or tell him.  The superior man only does good and never puts any other person down.  The mean man is downwards which is kind of saying that if you're rude and mean, that your progress will most likely go downwards.  If you are so concentrated on bringing other people down, then your progress is heading downwards because you are so negative that it just affects you and everyone else, so noting positive can come out of being negative.  Analect xc 20 was also really neat to me because it states "what the superior man seeks, is in himself.  What the mean man seeks, is in other".  This one is kind of pertaining to the last analect because it talks about how the superior man looks to within himself to gain greatness for himself, unlike the mean man who seeks what's in others, which ultimately means that he is jealous and wants what others have.  You should be happy with what you were born with and be happy with what you have.  People have everything within themselves, so why would you need to look to another to gain what you need, you were made that way for a reason.

Herodotus excerpt from the Persian War

While reading the excerpt on the Persian war, it was very interesting and a unique reading to learn about how all of these major wars had such an impact on the societies that we view today.  I mean lets face it, if the Greeks were to actually lose to the persians then our view on modern day societies and government would be completely different because the Persians had a very different view on government, society, and ultimately a whole view on life.  Now days if we really take a look at our civilizations and societies, they are relatively the same as the way that the Greeks set up things, like the city-states and such.  Well as far as the war went it was neat to see and very tenacious and fearless group of Greek soldiers stand up to the so called mighty Persians that were just going around the world concurring everyone.  It was also cool to see the leader of the Greeks King Leonidas stand in the front line with his soldiers and help protect his people and what overall Greece stood for.  That was an example of a great leader, of than the leader of the Persians Xerxes, who only sent his men in at no cost.  Xerxes did not care about his people, only about himself and making his glory and gaining respect for himself.   This was also a great example of two different types of leaders.

WW chapter 4

This was a very interesting chapter for me in a scene that it is very relevant to the societies that we have today.  It was very neat to learn about how different places started their government and societies.  For example the Persians tried to start their society by concurring all of the other societies surrounding them, which was ultimately working out for them, until they finally met the one society that would stand up to them and put a halt to their society expansion.  Different from the Persians, the greeks were more to themselves and developing their own society and civilization because they were more concentrated on building up their people to be strong and good in combat.  The Greeks had to learn to protect themselves, but they did not only mainly focus on that because they also had a well organized form of government.  They were able to organize the place into city-states which are kind of like our states that we have today, so as you can see they were pretty advanced as far as organization and structure goes.  This chapter also talked about how the Romans and Chinese were also great societies that expressed the same incredible intellectual views.  That is why when you read about past societies that they usually talk about all of these main societies as main structures for the future people to grow upon.