Maximizing the learning experience for adult learners (Principles for Essay

Maximizing the learning experience for adult learners (Principles for adult learning) - Essay Example Adult learners have unique attributes that affect the ways in which they learn. On reaching adulthood, an individual achieves autonomy and can exhibit self –direction. This aspect influences how they learn because they need to express their autonomy in the learning process. Therefore, an effective adult educator must have strategies of ensuring an involvement of the learners. For learners to express their autonomy in the learning process, it will be crucial for the educator to present them with an opportunity to contribute in the development of study objectives. Moreover, other avenues of engagement in the learning process such as group work and individual presentations will foster autonomy in the learners (Sharma, 2006:45). It is critical for adult educators to have facilitation skills as they will prove effective in providing the individuals with proper guidelines contrary to teaching. Autonomous adults will only need guidelines because they can endeavor in personal studies and research in order to advance knowledge. Moreover, autonomy will require adult learners to establish personal that conform to the objectives of the learning process. The learning experience must provide an avenue for the learners to find self-fulfillment through a successful pursuit of personal goals. Both patients and nurses require having a set of personal goals that can meet an individual’s personal learning needs. Therefore, an educator must exhibit competency in demonstrating the procedure of personal goal setting (Sharma, 2006:45). It is critical for an educator to emphasize the need for the learners to understand the significance of personal goals. In doing this, the educator must highlight the harmony between the class learning objectives and personal goals. Adult learners approach the learning experience with a unique perspective. They anticipate for an opportunity to cooperate in their experiences into the learning

Raw materials transport costs Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Raw materials transport costs - Essay Example Carriage inwards are the costs that are incurred as a result of transporting raw materials into a firm, these costs should be added to the value of goods purchased, and this means that the cost of raw materials should include the value of the goods purchased plus the transportation costs incurred by the firm in transporting these raw materials. Carriage outward is the cost of transportation of final or finished goods to the customer; these costs are treated as expenses and therefore are recorded in the profit and loss account as an expense.Therefore from the above discussion on the cost of transportation which are carriage inward and outward it is evident that carriage inward which is the cost incurred in transporting raw materials into the firm should be included in the valuation of inventory and therefore require that they are added to the cost of raw materials, carriage outward which is the transportation of goods to the customer should be treated as an expense and therefore shoul d not be included in the valuation of inventory.Work in progress is a term used to goods that are not yet finished goods, their value is included in the valuation of inventory, overhead costs are those costs that cannot be directly traced to a particular products example rent and security costs, these costs are assigned to the product using an appropriate method whereby their cost is assigned to cost objects . Work in progress is calculated by adding up the direct materials costs, direct labor costs and the overhead costs, the overhead costs are assigned to the unit of production using an appropriate method, example the overhead costs at Lehman ltd are assigned to products using machine hours. Overhead costs should be included in the valuation of inventory, the costs of produced goods should include direct materials, direct labor costs and overhead costs, in this case the following overheads are included: Factory rent, rates and insurance 50,000 sales office expenses 240,000 factory security 30,000 factory heat, light and power 450,000 sales commissions and selling costs 120,000 depreciation of machinery 230,000 depreciation of sales force vehicles 70,000 total 1,190,000 The overhead costs are assigned to products on the basis of machine hours and in this case it is evident that there were 10000 machine hours, however 500 machine hours are included in work in progress, therefore for the finished goods have utilized 9500 machine hours. For the finished goods the following overhead cost should be assign to each product: 1,190,000/9500 = 125.26 Therefore each finished good should be assigned 125.26 per machine hour it consumes. For the work in progress they have consumed 500 machine hours, should be assigned the overhead cost depending on a percentage set, example the company may decide that for the work in progress the overhead costs will be assigned at 50%, if this is the case the work in progress overhead cost will be 62.63 per machine hour. Finished goods: The table below summarizes the cost incurred by these goods and some costs that the goods may incurred, the following table summarizes the gross profit that will be gained as a result of modification and sale of these products. Stock Line A () B() C() selling price 50000 20000 22000 Costs incurred to date 40000 10000 15000 modification costs 10000 4000 4000 marketing costs 5000 4000 5000 cost of production 55000 18000 24000 gross profit -5000 2000 -2000 We calculate the cost of production by adding up all the cost that the goods have incurred and those that are to be icnured, to get gross profit we subtract cost of production from the selling price which in this case stands for the revenue that is to be gained, the gross profit for product A and C is negative while product B has a positive gross profit. Therefore product B will gain a profit and therefore it is best to modify and sell the product, for the other product the firm may

What drives teenagers to commit suicide?

What drives teenagers to commit suicide? Suicide can be defined as an act or an instance of taking ones own life voluntarily and intentionally. Suicide is not a choice to survive or a choice to escape. Instead, successful suicide is inevitably mortal. Suicide is the third leading cause of death and injury among adolescents and young adults in the worldwide. Suicide is a serious public health problem. According to the World Health Organisation (2004) an estimate approximately one million people die from suicide worldwide annually, and 10 to 20 times more people attempts suicide. A study by Lee.M.B Lung.W (2008) showed that suicide and psychiatric disorders have a strong connection; 16.3% of the general population and 25% of general medical patients outside of psychiatric departments have had suicidal thoughts or suicide attempts. There are many causes for youths wanting to commit suicide. Thus, we must be aware of the symptoms for suicide in order to prevent suicide from happening. What drive teens towards suicide? Stress Caruso (2007) believes that stress is not intrinsically appalling. Every human living in this world has stress that may cause them to take action to events and to improve themselves to be better and rise to the challenge. However, he mentioned that if overly exposed to stress, stress can be catastrophic. Too much pressure can cause or exacerbate suicidal feelings. Level of stress is seems to be playing a vital role in affecting people especially the youths towards committing suicide. Many researchers have discovered that stressful life events increases the risk of youths choosing suicide as the only solution. Stressful events such as family and romance conflicts or the presence of disciplinary problems frequently predate suicidal behaviour. (Brent, 1993; Vijayakumar Rajkumar, 1999; Yen et al., 2005) From Engars research (2004), he found that suicide is the second-leading cause of death in college students. It is believed that high anxiety levels and tensions cause them to attempt suicide. Take South Korea as an example, approximately six in every 10 South Korean youths have thought of suicide at least once, showing to the seriousness of the teen suicide issue. (Yonhap, 2008; Yein Jee, 2008) This is further proven from the survey, carried out by the state-run Korea Youth Counseling Institute, of 4,700 secondary school students in South Korea, 50-60 percent of the respondents had thought of suicide whereas 10-20 percent of them attempted suicide. (Yonhap, 2008) Youths there felt suicide urges when experiencing conflicts with family members, utterly lacking of hope, had problems with friends, or if friends took their own lives, having to do much more at school than expected, strivingfor a higher standards of education in this globalised era in order to get a better job etc. Depression Lickerman (2010) believes that depression is unquestionably the most common reason why people take their life. Depression is a severe dejection that is accompanied by feelings of hopelessness and meagerness typically felt over a periods of time. In another words, it is an illness where peoples thoughts, moods, behaviour and feelings are infected. Since depression can affect thinking, things will seems to get even harder when one is feeling down and he or she may not be able to look at the possibility of a good outcome. They will never be happy nor think that things could go right for them again. The person does not envisage when a problem can be overcome. (Eveleth, 2008; Lyness Nock, 2010) Suicide is the permanent solution for depressed people as they think there are no other solutions to the temporary problems they are experiencing. A depressed youth may feel that there is no another way out from issues, no other getaway from emotional pain, or no way outof a desperate sorrow. (Lyness Nock, 2010) According to American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, more than 19 million Americans which aged 18 and above are severely affected by depression every year. Another analysis of the result is that one out of ten men and one out of four women will experience depression in their life. Kyle Eveleth, a Prudenville junior and psychology major believes the loss of support from family and friends could lead to this illness, which is one of the risk factor towards suicide attempts. Substance Abuse Teens under the influence of alcohol and drug are also more at risk for suicidal behaviours and suicidal thoughts. They may become over-sentimental and impulsive and may result in attempts to end their own lives. (Lickerman, 2010) Alcohol is a depressant that slows the function of the central nervous system. This alters a persons five senses as the brain is blocked from getting the right information. (Dowsen Shatz, 2009) Under the right amount, alcohol can aid a person to feel relax and less worried. However, if one overused, alcohol may cause wobble, lose their coordination, blurred vision, and slur speech. They will be confused and disoriented. (Dowsen Shatz, 2009) Drugs on the other handare chemicals that change the way our bodies function. A drug may be helpful or harmful. Drugs dull our senses, alter our sense of consciousness, and reduce physical pain in the brain. (Dowsen Vranken, 2008) Misuse of these substances can mean serious misery and danger. Situations is worse for teens with propensity to illness due to their biologic, or family history, or other life stresses. Suicide attempts occur especially when both substances are consumed together. (Lyness Nock, 2010) According to National Statistical Office (NSO) in South Korea, there were about 12,000 suicides representing 5 percent of all deaths in 2007, a shocking increase of 14% compared to previous year. A poll taken by NSO shows that girls and teens who drink alcohol are more likely to feel the suicidal urge compared with non-drinkers and boys. (Yonhap, 2008) Several studies (Miller, Mahler Gold, 1991; Way et al, 2005) have found that teenagers with alcohol or drug abuse contributesup to 70% of alchohol-drug related suicides. Therefore, it is undoubted that substance abuse significantly influence teens towards suicide. Family risk factors Under family risk factors, inherited biological factors may also contribute towards suicide and suicidal behaviour. From the family, twin and adoption studies, this factor has been proven to lead to the increase of risk of attempted and completed suicide. (Nock, Borges, Bromet, Cha, Kessler Lee, 2008) There is evidence to suggest biologic factors may give rise to suicidal behaviour via gene-environmental interactions. This is said to be disruptions in the functioning of the inhibitory neurotransmitter serotonin. (Pandey, 1997) When it is disrupted, humans mood and emotion will be affected. Dr. Boeree (2009) says that inadequate serothin may be associated to increase in aggressive behaviour, depression, obsessive-compulsive disorder, anxiety disorders and suicide. As for twins, some studies had been conducted to prove the relationship between suicide. Researchers Roy, Segal and Sarchiapone (1995) ascertained suicide is more prevalent in monozygotic co-twins than dizygotic co-twins where this tendency is very rare. These results strongly shows that genetic factor do play a role in suicidal behaviour in twins. Furthermore, teens who has family history involving depression or substance abuse are most liking associated with suicide, as are those who have been abused sexually. (Fritz, 2010) Another factor that is included in family risk factor is the frequent change of residence. Most families that often move their place of residence may bring a considerable effect on their children. Children that experience this frequently may be distressed or psychologically disturbed and, therefore, affect his or hers physical, mental, social, and emotional well-being. They may feel instable and insecure in their living conditions. The frequent breakdown of connection with peers, discontinuation of group activities, distress, and worries due to the new environment can be distressing and confusing. Those childrens psychosocial well-being may be largely affected, and hence, rise suicidal thoughts and behaviours if they are not capable to handle. Parents may be unable to provide sufficient love and care which include neglecting their childrens psychosocial needs. To get more attention from their parents, a suicide attempt may be carried out to express them. (Ping, Mortensen, Pedersen, 2009) How does teens with suicidal tendencies behave or react ? Depression Depressive symptons is a significant indicator. Depressive symptoms includs crying a lot, lost of interest, weight changes, sleep disturbances, restlessness, and feeling a low energy. An epidemiological study shown that hopelessness and low self-esteem were the most predictive symptoms for suicidal behaviour. In this analysis, almost 56% of the patients attempted suicide. (Yaldizli.O, Kohl.H.C, Graf.M, Wiesbeck.AG, Wurst.M.F (2010) Anxiety The suicidor will feel fear, worry, and hopelessness. In this situation, symptons of anxiety will be shown physically and mentally. For instance, sweating, stomach aches, muscle weakness. Someone who has anxiety might experiences sense of panic. A study examined the rates of anxiety, mood and substances abuse disorder among teenagers. The result of the study shown that the level of anxiety will have higher risk of suicide.(Galera C, Bouvard MP, Encrenaz G, Messiah A, Fombonne.E 2008) In conclusion, suicide does not solve the problem but brings more sorrow and hardship to the victims family members and friends. We can help potential suicide victim by watching out for early suicidal symptoms or signs. These can be highly unsociable and introvert behaviour and frequent mentioning about ending ones life. We should bring the victim immediately to a psychiatrist or counsellor to set the victims life back on the right path again. The most effective way of preventing suicide is to find the main reason or reasons why the victim is contemplating suicide. This will help to reduce the number of suicide cases in the world.

The Process of Mitosis Essay -- essays research papers

The Process of Mitosis Mitosis is the term used to describe cell division for replication. The product at the end of mitosis is two daughter cells both genetically identical to the original (parent) cell. This process (mitosis) is used for growth and repair within an organism (and also for asexual reproduction). There are five main stages to mitosis, called Interphase, Prophase, Metaphase, Anaphase and Telophase. Although the process has been divided up into these stages the process of mitosis is actually continuous. Interphase --------------------------------------- In this, the first stage the cell will look just like any other 'normal' cell although this is far from the case because very much is actually happening. All cell organelles are being produced in quantity and the chromosomes - DNA molecules are being copied exactly. The two identical copies of DNA are called a "pair of chromatids" and they are linked together by an item called a "chromomere". During this stage a store of ATP is also built up. [Best put a labelled diagram of a cell during Interphase here.] Prophase --------------------------------------- In this second stage changes to the cell become visible. The chromosomes condense, coiling up to about 5% of their original length, now clearly visible when a stain is added. The centrioles move to the opposite poles of the cell and small microtubules around the centrioles become visible (called "Asters"). The nuclear membranes...

A Missionary Who Transformed a Nation Essay

When Englishman William Carey (1761–1834) arrived in India in 1793, it marked a major milestone in the history of Christian missions and in the history of India. Carey established the Serampore Mission—the first modern Protestant mission in the non-English-speaking world—near Calcutta on January 10, 1800.1 From this base, he labored for nearly a quarter century to spread the gospel throughout the land. In the end his triumph was spectacular. Through his unfailing love for the people of India and his relentless campaign against â€Å"the spiritual forces of evil† (Eph. 6:12), India was literally transformed. Asian historian Hugh Tinker summarizes Carey’s impact on India this way: â€Å"And so in Serampore, on the banks of the river Hooghly, the principal elements of modern South Asia—the press, the university, social consciousness—all came to light.† 2 Who was William Carey? He was exactly the kind of man that the Lord seems to delight in using to accomplish great things; in other words, the kind of person that most of us would least expect. He was raised in a small, rural English town where he received almost no formal education. His chief source of income came through his work as a cobbler (a shoemaker). He had an awkward, homely appearance, having lost almost all his hair in childhood. Upon his arrival in India and throughout his years there, he was harassed by British colonists, deserted by his mission-sending agency, and opposed by younger missionary recruits who were sent to help him. Despite these setbacks, he became perhaps the most influential person in the largest outpost of the British Empire.3 Carey didn’t go to India merely to start new churches or set up medical clinics for the poor. He was driven by a more comprehensive vision—a vision for discipling the nation. â€Å"Carey saw India not as a foreign country to be exploited, but as his heavenly Father’s land to be loved and served, a society where truth, not ignorance, needed to rule.†4 He looked outward across the land and asked himself, â€Å"If Jesus were the Lord of India, what would it look like? What would be different?† This question set his agenda and led to his involvement in a remarkable variety of activities aimed at glorifying God and advancing His kingdom. Following are highlights of Carey’s work described in Vishal and Ruth Mangalwadi’s outstanding book The Legacy of William Carey: A Model for the Transformation of a Culture.5 Carey was horrified that India, one of the most fertile countries in the world, had been allowed to become an uncultivated jungle abandoned to wild beasts and serpents. Therefore he carried out a systematic survey of agriculture and campaigned for agriculture reform. He introduced the Linnaean system of plant organizations and published the first science texts in India. He did this because he believed that nature is declared â€Å"good† by its Creator; it is not Maya (illusion) to be shunned, as Hindus believe, but a subject worthy of human study. Carey introduced the idea of savings banks to India to fight the all-pervasive social evil of usury (the lending of money at excessive interest). He believed that God, being righteous, hated this practice which made investment, industry, commerce, and economic development impossible. He was the first to campaign for humane treatment of India’s leprosy victims because he believed that Jesus’ love extends to leprosy patie nts, so they should be cared for. Before then, lepers were often buried or burned alive because of the belief that a violent death purified the body on its way to reincarnation into a new healthy existence. He established the first newspaper ever printed in any Oriental language, because he believed that â€Å"above all forms of truth and faith, Christianity seeks free discussion.† His English-language journal, Friend of India, was the force that gave birth to the social-reform movement in India in the first half of the nineteenth century. He translated the Bible into over 40 different Indian languages. He transformed the Bengali language, previously considered â€Å"fit for only demons and women,† into the foremost literary language of India. He wrote gospel ballads in Bengali to bring the Hindu love of music to the service of his Lord. He began dozens of schools for Indian children of all castes and launched the first college in Asia. He desired to develop the Indian mind and liberate it from darkness and superstition. He was the first man to stand against the ruthless murders and widespread oppression of women. Women in India were being crushed through polygamy, female infanticide, child marriage, widow burning, euthanasia, and forced illiteracy—all sanctioned by religion. Carey opened schools for girls. When widows converted to Christianity, he arranged marriages for them. It was his persistent, 25-year battle against widow burning (known as sati) that finally led to the formal banning of this horrible religious practice. William Carey was a pioneer of the modern Christian missionary movement, a movement that has since reached every corner of the world. Although a man of simple origins, he used his God-given genius and every available means to serve his Creator and illumine the dark corners of India with the light of the truth. William Carey’s ministry in India can be described as wholistic. For something to be wholistic, it must have multiple parts that contribute to a greater whole. What is the â€Å"whole† to which all Christian ministry activities contribute? Through an examination of Christ’s earthly ministry, we see that the â€Å"whole† is glorifying God and advancing His kingdom through the discipling of the nations (Matt. 24:14; 28:18–20). This is God’s â€Å"big agenda†Ã¢â‚¬â€the principal task that he works through His church to accomplish. If this is the whole, then what are the parts? Matthew 4:23, highlights three parts: preaching, teaching, and healing. Because each part is essential to the whole, let’s look at each one more carefully. Preaching includes proclaiming the gospel—God’s gracious invitation for people everywhere to live in His Kingdom, have their sins forgiven, be spiritually reborn, and become children of God through faith in Christ. Proclaiming the gospel is essential to wholistic ministry, for unless lost and broken people are spiritually reborn into a living relationship with God—unless they become â€Å"a new creation† (2 Cor. 5:17)—all efforts to bring hope, healing, and transformation are doomed to fail. People everywhere need their relationship with God restored, yet preaching is only one part of wholistic ministry. Teaching entails instructing people in the foundational truths of Scripture. It is associated with discipleship—helping people to live in obedience to God and His Word in every area of life. In Matthew 28:20 Jesus tells His disciples to â€Å"teach [the nations] to obey everything I have commanded you.† Unless believers are taught to obey Christ’s commands, their growth may be hindered. Colossians 3:16 says, â€Å"Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom.† Healing involves the tangible demonstrations of the present reality of the Kingdom in the midst of our hurting and broken world. When Jesus came, He demonstrated the present reality of God’s Kingdom by healing people. â€Å"The blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cured, the deaf hear, the dead are rais ed, and the good news is preached to the poor,† was Jesus’ report to His cousin John the Baptist in Matthew 11:4–5. Jesus didn’t just preach the good news; He demonstrated it by healing all forms of brokenness. Unless ministry to people’s physical needs accompanies evangelism and discipleship, our message will be empty, weak, and irrelevant. This is particularly true where physical poverty is rampant. The apostle John admonishes, â€Å"If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth† (1 John 3:17–18). Here’s a picture of the basic elements of a biblically balanced, wholistic ministry: First, there are multiple parts—preaching, teaching and healing. These parts have distinct functions, yet they are inseparable. All are essential in contributing to the whole, which is glorifying God and advancing His Kingdom. Lastly, each part rests on the solid foundation of the biblical worldview. In other words, each is understood and implemented through the basic presuppositions of Scripture. In summary, preaching, teaching and healing are three indispensable parts of wholistic ministry, whose purpose is to advance God’s kingdom â€Å"on earth as it is in heaven† (Matt. 6:10). Without these parts working together seamlessly, our ministry is less than what Christ intends, and will lack power to transform lives and nations. To comprehend the nature and purpose of wholistic ministry, two concepts must be understood. First is the comprehensive impact of humanity’s spiritual rebellion. Second is that our loving, compassionate God is presently unfolding His plan to redeem and restore all things broken through the Fall. When Adam and Eve turned their backs on God in the Garden of Eden (Gen. 3:1–6), the consequences of their sin were devastating and far-reaching; they affected the very order of the universe. At least four relationships were broken through the Fall. First, Adam and Eve’s intimate relationship with God was broken (Gen. 3:8–9). This was the primary relationship for which they had been created, the most important aspect of their lives. When their relationship with God was broken, their other relationships were damaged too: their relationship with themselves as individuals (Gen. 3:7, 10), with each other as fellow human beings (Gen. 3:7, 12, 16), and with the rest of creation (Gen. 3:17–19). The universe is intricately designed and interwoven. It is wholistic, composed of multiple parts, each of which depends on the proper functioning of the others. All parts are governed by laws established by God. When the primary relationship between God and humanity was severed, every part of the original harmony of God’s creation was affected. The results of this comprehensive brokenness have plagued humanity ever since. War, hatred, violence, environmental degradation, injustice, corruption, idolatry, poverty and fa mine all spring from sin. Thus, when God set out to restore His creation from the all-encompassing effects of man’s rebellion, His redemptive plan could not be small or narrow, focusing on a single area of brokenness. His plan is not limited to saving human souls or teaching or even healing. Rather, it combines all three with the goal of restoring everything, including each of the four broken relationships described above. Colossians 1:19–20 provides a picture of God’s wholistic redemptive plan: For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in [Christ], and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross. (Emphasis added) God is redeeming all things. Through Christ’s blood our sins are forgiven and our fellowship with God is renewed. And not only that—we also can experience substantial healing within ourselves, with others, and with the environment. The gospel is not only good news for after we die; it is good news here and now! The task of the church is to join God in His big agenda of restoring all things. We are â€Å"Christ’s ambassadors,† called to t he â€Å"ministry of reconciliation† (see 2 Cor. 5:18–20). In the words of Christian apologist Francis Schaeffer, we should be working â€Å"on the basis of the finished work of Christ . . . [for] substantial healing now in every area where there are divisions because of the Fall.†6 To do this, we must first believe that such healing can be a reality here and now, in every area, on the basis of the finished work of Christ. This healing will not be perfect or complete on this side of Christ’s return, yet it can be real, evident, and substantial. Preaching, teaching, and substantial healing in every area where brokenness exists as a result of the Fall—in essence, wholistic ministry—is the vision that Christ had and modeled for us on earth. It was the vision that set the agenda for William Carey in India. It is the vision that should set the agenda for our ministry as well. When Jesus sent out His disciples on their first missionary journey, â€Å"He sent them out to preach the kingdom of God and to heal the sickâ⠂¬  (Luke 9:2). Yet today it’s common for Christian ministries to separate the twin ministry components. Some focus exclusively on preaching, evangelism, or church planting, while others focus on meeting the physical needs of the broken or impoverished. Typically these two groups have little interaction. This division is not what Christ intended. By focusing on one to the exclusion of the other, ministries are limited and ineffective in bringing about true, lasting transformation. The Bible provides a model of ministry where preaching, teaching, and healing are, in the words of Dr. Tetsunao Yamamori, â€Å"functionally separate, yet relationally inseparable.†7 Each part is distinct and deserves special attention and focus. Yet the parts must function together. Together they form a wholistic ministry that is both powerful and effective—a ministry able to transform lives and entire nations. The work of William Carey in India gives historical testimony to this fact. According to theologian David Wells, preaching, teaching, and healing must be â€Å"inextricably related to each other, the former being the foundation and the latter being the evidence of the working of the former.† There is a story told about the subject of the following sketch which may be repeated here by way of introduction. It is said that long after he had attained to fame and eminence in India, being Professor of oriental languages in the college of Fort William, honoured with letters and medals from royal hands, and able to write F.L.S., F.G S., F.A.S., and other symbols of distinction after his name, he was dining one day with a select company at the Governor-General’s, when one of the guests, with more than questionable taste, asked an aide-de-camp present, in a whisper loud enough to be heard by the professor, whether Dr. Carey had not once been a shoemaker. â€Å"No, sir,† immediately answered the doctor, â€Å"only a cobbler!† Whether he was proud of it, we cannot say; that he had no need to be ashamed of it, we are sure. He had out-lived the day when Edinburgh reviewers tried to heap contempt on â€Å"consecrated cobblers,† and he had established his right to be enrolled amongst the aristocracy of learning and philanthropy. Some fifty years before this incident took place, a visitor might have seen over a small shop in a Northamptonshire village a sign-board with the following inscription: Second-hand Shoes Bought and Sold.WILLIAM CAREY.| The owner of this humble shop was the son of a poor schoolmaster, who inherited a taste for learning; and though he was consigned to the drudgery of mending boots and shoes, and was even then a sickly, care-worn man, in poverty and distress, with a delicate and unsympathizing wife, he lost no opportunity of acquiring information both in languages and natural history and taught himself drawing and painting. He always worked with lexicons and classics open upon his bench; so that Scott, the commentator, to whom it is said that he owed his earliest religious impressions, used to call that shop â€Å"Mr. Carey’s college.† His tastes — we ought rather to say God’s providence — soon led him to open a village school; and as he belonged to the Baptist community, he combined with the office of schoolmaster that of a preacher in their little chapel at Moulton, with the scanty salary of  £16 a year. Strange to say, it was whilst giving his daily lessons in g eography that the flame of missionary zeal was kindled in his bosom. As he looked upon the vast regions depicted on the map of the world, he began to ponder on the spiritual darkness that brooded over so many of them, and this led him to collect and collate information on the subject, until his whole mind was occupied with the absorbing theme. It so happened that a gathering of Baptist ministers at Northampton invited a subject for discussion, and Carey, who was present, at once proposed â€Å"The duty of Christians to attempt the spread of the Gospel amongst heathen nations.† The proposal fell amongst them like a bombshell, and the young man was almost shouted down by those who thought such a scheme impracticable and wild. Even Andrew Fuller, who eventually became his great supporter, confessed that he found himself ready to exclaim, â€Å"If the Lord would make windows in heaven, might this thing be?† But Carey’s zeal was not to be quenched. He brought forward the topic again and again; he wrote a pamphlet on the subject; and on his removal to a more important post of duty at Leicester, he won over several influential persons to his views. It was at this time (1792) he preached his famous sermon from Isaiah 54:2,3, and summed up its teaching in these two important statements: (1) â€Å"Expect great things from God,† and (2) â€Å"Attempt great things for God.† This led to the formation of the Baptist Missionary Society; and Carey, at the age of thirty-three, proved his sincerity by volunteering to be its first messenger to the heathen. Andrew Fuller had said, â€Å"There is a gold mine in India; but it seems as deep as the centre of the earth; who will venture to explore it?† â€Å"I will go down,† responded William Carey, in words never to be forgotten, â€Å"but remember that you must hold the rope.† The funds of the Society amounted at the time to  £13 2s 6d. But the chief difficulties did not arise out of questions of finance. The East India Company, sharing the jealousy against missionary effort, which, alas! at that time was to be found amongst the chief statesmen of the realm , and amongst prelates of the Established Church as well as amongst Nonconformist ministers, were opposed to all such efforts, and no one could set his foot upon the Company’s territory without a special license. The missionary party and their baggage were on board the Earl of Oxford and the ship was just ready to sail, when an information was laid against the captain for taking a person on board without an order from the Company, and forthwith the passengers and their goods were hastily put on shore, and the vessel weighed anchor for Calcutta, leaving them behind, disappointed and disheartened. They returned to London. Mr. Thomas, who was Carey’s companion and brother missionary, went to a coffee-house, when, to use his own language, â€Å"to the great joy of a bruised heart, the waiter put a card into my hand, whereon were written these life-giving words: ‘A Danish East Indiaman, No. 10, Cannon Street.’ No more tears that night. Our courage revived; we fled to No. 10, Cannon Street, and found it was the office of Smith and Co., agents, and that Mr. Smith was a brother of the captain’s; that this ship had sailed, as he supposed, from Copenhagen; was hourly expecte d in Dover roads; would make no stay there; and the terms were  £100 for each passenger,  £50 for a child, and  £25 for an attendant.† This of course brought up the financial difficulty in a new and aggravated form; but the generosity of the agent and owner of the ship soon overcame it, and within twenty-four hours of their return to London, Mr. Carey and his party embarked for Dover; and on the 13th June, 1793, they found themselves on board the Kron Princessa Maria, where they were treated with the utmost kindness by the captain, who admitted them to his own table, and provided them with special cabins. The delay, singularly enough, removed one of Carey’s chief difficulties and regrets. His wife who was physically feeble, and whose deficiency in respect to moral intrepidity was afterwards painfully accounted for by twelve years of insanity in India, had positively refused to accompany him, and he had consequently made up his mind to go out alone. She was not with him when he and his party were suddenly expelled from the English ship; but she was so wrought upon by all that had occurred, as well as by renewed entreaties, that with her sister and her five children she set sail with him for Calcutta. Difficulties of various kinds surrounded them upon their arrival in India. Poverty, fevers, bereavement, the sad illness of his wife, the jealousy of the Government, all combined to render it necessary that for a while Carey should betake himself to an employment in the Sunderbunds, where he had often to use his gun to supply the wants of his family; and eventually he went to an indigo factory at Mudnabully, where he hoped to earn a livelihood. But he kept the grand project of his life distinctly in view; he set himself to the acquisition of the language, he erected schools, he made missionary tours, he began to translate the New Testament, and above all he worked at his printing press, which was set up in one corner of the factory and was looked upon by the natives as his god. Carey’s feelings at this time with regard to his work will be best expressed in the following passage from a letter to his sisters: â€Å"I know not what to say about the mission. I feel as a farmer does about his crop; sometimes I think the seed is springing, and then I hope; a little time blasts all, and my hopes are gone like a cloud. †¦ I preach every day to the natives, and twice on the Lord’s Day constantly, besides other itinerant labours; and I try to speak of Jesus Christ and Him crucified and of Him alone; but my soul is often dejected to see no fruit.† And then he goes on to speak of that department of his labour in which his greatest achievements were ultimately to be won: â€Å"The work of translation is going on, and I hope the whole New Testament and the five books of Moses may be completed before this reaches you. It is a pleasant work and a rich reward, and I trust, whenever it is published, it will soon prevail, and put down all the Shastras of the Hindus. †¦The translation of the Scriptures I look upon to be one of the greatest desiderata in the world, and it has accordingly occupied a considerable part of my time and attention.† Five or six years of patient unrequited toil passed by, and then four additional labourers were sent out by the Society to Carey’s help. Two of them will never be forgotten, and the names of Carey, Marshman, and Ward will ever be inseparably linked in the history of Indian missions. Ward had been a printer; and it was a saying of Carey’s, addressed to him in England, that led him to adopt a missionary’s life: â€Å"We shall want you,† said he, â€Å"in a few years, to print the Bible; you must come after us.† Marshman had been an assistant in a London book-shop, but soon found that his business there was not to his taste, as he wished to know more about the contents of books than about their covers; so he set up a school at Bristol, mastered Greek and Latin, Hebrew and Syriac, and became prosperous in the world; but he gave up all to join Carey in his noble enterprise, and moreover, brought out with him, as a helper in the mission, a young man whom he himself had been the means of converting from infidelity. Marshman’s wife was a cultivated woman, and her boarding school in India brought in a good revenue to the mission treasury. His daughter married Henry Havelock, who made for himself as great a name in the military annals of his country as his illustrious father-in-law had won for himself in the missionary history of the world. The jealous and unchristian policy of the East India Company would not allow the newly arrived missionaries to join their brethren, and they were compelled to seek shelter under a foreign flag. Fortunately for the cause of missions, a settlement had been secured by the Danes at Serampore, some sixteen miles up the river from Calcutta, and it now proved â€Å"a city of refuge† to Englishmen who had been driven from territory which owned the British sway. The governor of the colony, Colonel Bie, was a grand specimen of his race; he had been in early days a pupil of Schwartz, and he rejoiced in knowing that the kings of Denmark had been the first Protestant princes that ever encouraged missions amongst the heathen. He gave the exiled missionaries a generous welcome and again and again gallantly resisted all attempts to deprive them of his protection, declaring that â€Å"if the British Government still refused to sanction their continuance in India, they should have the shield of Denmark thrown over them if they would remain at Serampore.† Carey determined, though it was accompanied with personal loss to himself, to join his brethren at Serampore, and the mission soon was organized in that place, which became, so to speak, â€Å"the cradle of Indian missions.† It possessed many advantages: it was only sixty miles from Nuddea, and was within a hundred of the Mahratta country; here the missionaries could preach the Gospel and work their printing press without fear, and from this place they could pass under Danish passports to any part of India. There was a special providence in their coming to Serampore at the time they did; for in 1801 it passed over to English rule without the firing of a shot. They were soon at work, both in their schools and on their preaching tours. Living on homely fare and working for their bread, they went forth betimes in pairs to preach the word of the living God, now in the streets or in the bazaars, now in the midst of heathen temples, attracting crowds to hear them by the sweet hymns which Carey had composed in the native tongue, and inviting inquirers to the mission-house for further instruction. The first convert was baptized in the same year on the day after Christmas. His name was Krishnu. He had been brought to the mission-house for medical relief, and was so influenced by what he saw and heard, that he resolved to become a Christian. On breaking caste by eating with the missionaries, he was seized by an enraged mob and dragged before the magistrate, but to their dismay he was released from their hands. Carey had the pleasure of performing the ceremony of baptism with his own hands, in presence of the governor and a crowd of natives and Europeans. It was his first recompense after seven years of toil, and it soon led the way to other conversions. Amongst the rest, a high-caste Brahmin divested himself of his sacred thread, joined the Christian ranks, and preached the faith which he once destroyed. Krishnu became an efficient helper and built at his own expense the first place of worship for native Christians in Bengal. Writing about him twelve years after his baptism, Car ey says, â€Å"He is now a steady, zealous, well-informed, and I may add eloquent minister of the Gospel, and preaches on an average twelve or fourteen times every week in Calcutta and its neighborhood.† But we must turn from the other laborers and the general work of the mission to dwell upon the special work for which Carey’s tastes and qualifications so admirably fitted him. We have seen that his heart was set on the translation and printing of the Scriptures and to this from the outset he sedulously devoted himself. On the 17th March, 1800 the first sheet of the Bengali New Testament was ready for the press, and in the next year Carey was able to say, â€Å"I have lived to see the Bible translated into Bengali, and the whole New Testament printed.† But this was far from being the end of Carey’s enterprise. In 1806, the Serampore missionaries contemplated and issued proposals for rendering the Holy Scriptures into fifteen oriental languages, viz., Sanskrit, Bengali, Hindustani, Persian, Mahratta, Guzarathi, Oriya, Kurnata, Telinga, Burman, Assam, Boutan, Thibetan, Malay, and Chinese. Professor Wilson, the Boden Professor of Sanscrit at Oxford, has told us how this proposal was more than accomplished: â€Å"They published,† he says, â€Å"in the course of about five-and-twenty years, translations of portions of the Old and New Testament, more or less considerable, in forty different dialects.† It is not pretended that they were conversant with all these forms of speech, but they employed competent natives, and as they themselves were masters of Sanscrit and several vernacular dialects, they were able to guide and superintend them. In all this work Dr. Carey (for the degree of Doctor of Divinity had been bestowed on him by a learned university) took a leading part. Possessed of at least six different dialects, a thorough master of the Sanscrit, which is the parent of the whole family, and gifted besides with a rare genius for philological investigation, â€Å"he carried the project,† says the professor, â€Å"to as successful an issue as could have been expected from the bounded faculties of man.† And when it is remembered that he began his work at a time when there were no helps or appliances for his studies; when grammars and dictionaries of these dialects were unknown, and had to be constructed by himself; when even manuscripts of them were scarce, and prin ting was utterly unknown to the natives of Bengal, the work which he not only set before him, but accomplished, must be admitted to have been Herculean. Frequently did he weary out three pundits in the day, and to the last hour of his life he never intermitted his labours. The following apology for not engaging more extensively in correspondence will be read with interest, and allowed to be a sufficient one:— â€Å"I translate from Bengali and from Sanscrit into English. Every proof-sheet of the Bengali and Mahratta Scriptures must go three times at least through my hands. A dictionary of the Sanscrit goes once at least through my hands. I have written and printed a second edition of the Bengali grammar and collected materials for a Mahratta dictionary. Besides this, I preach twice a week, frequently thrice, and attend upon my collegiate duties. I do not mention this because I think my work a burden — it is a real pleasure — but to show that my not writing many letters is not because I neglect my brethren, or wish them to cease writing to me.† Carey was by no means a man of brilliant genius, still less was he a man of warm enthusiasm; he had nothing of the sentimental, or speculative, or imaginative in his disposition; but h e was a man of untiring energy and indomitable perseverance. Difficulties seemed only to develop the one and to increase the other. These difficulties arose from various quarters, sometimes from the opposition of the heathen, sometimes from the antagonism of the British Government, sometimes, and more painfully, from the misapprehensions or injudiciousness of the Society at home; but he never was dismayed. On the contrary, he gathered arguments for progress from the opposition that was made to it. â€Å"There is,† he writes â€Å"a very considerable difference in the appearance of the mission, which to me is encouraging. The Brahmins are now most inveterate in their opposition; they oppose the Gospel with the utmost virulence, and the very name of Jesus Christ seems abominable in their ears.† And all this is the more remarkable, when we remember that he was by nature indolent. He says of himself, ‘No man ever living felt inertia to so great a degree as I do.† He was in all respects a man of principle and not of impulse. Kind and gentle, he was yet firm and unwavering. Disliking compliments and commendations for himself, it was not his habit to bestow them upon others. Indeed, he tells us that the only attempt which he ever made to pay a compliment met with such discouragement, that he never had any inclination to renew the attempt. A nephew of the celebrated President Edwards called upon him with a letter of introduction, and Carey congratulated him on his relationship to so great a personage; but the young man dryly replied, â€Å"True, sir, but every tub must stand on its own bottom.† From his childhood he had been in earnest in respect to anything he undertook. He once tried to climb a tree and reach a nest, but failed, and soon came to the ground; yet, though he had to limp home bruised and wounded, the first thing he did when able again to leave the house was to climb that same tree and take that identical nest. This habit of perseverance followed him through life. One evening, just before the missionaries retired to rest, the printing office was discovered to be on fire, and in a short time it was totally destroyed. Buildings, types, paper, proofs, and, worse than all, the Sanscrit and other translations perished in the flames. Ten thousand pounds’ worth of property was destroyed that night, no portion of which was covered by insurance; but under the master mind of Carey the disaster was soon retrieved. A portion of the metal was recovered from the wreck, and as the punches and matrices had been saved, the types were speedily recast. Within two months the printers were again at their work; within two more the sum required to repair the premises had been collected; and within seven the Scriptures had been re-translated into the Sanscrit language. Carey preached on the next Lord’s-day after the conflagration, from the text, â€Å"Be still, and know that I am God,† and set before his hearers two thoughts: (1) God has a sovereign right to dispose of us as He pleases; (2) we ought to acquiesce in all that God does with us and to us. Writing to a friend at this time, he calmly rem arks that â€Å"traveling a road the second time, however painful it may be, is usually done with greater ease and certainty than when we travel it for the first time.† To such a man success was already assured, and by such a man success was well deserved. And it came. When the Government looked round for a suitable man to fill the chair of oriental languages in their college at Fort William, their choice fell, almost as a necessity, upon the greatest scholar in India, and so the persecuted missionary became the honoured Professor of Sanscrit, Bengali, and Mahratta, at one thousand rupees a month. He stipulated, however, that he would accept the office only on the condition that his position as a missionary should be recognized; and he took a noble revenge upon those who had so long opposed his work, by devoting the whole of his newly-acquired salary to its further extension. His new position served to call attention to missionary work; and by degrees a better feeling sprang up towards it both at home and abroad. Carey and his companions were at length able to preach in the bazaars of Calcutta. Fresh labourers had come to India. Corrie, Browne, Mart yn, and Buchanan were stirring the depths of Christian sympathy by their work and by their appeals. Grant, Wilberforce, and Macaulay were rousing the British nation to some faint sense of duty; so that when the charter of the East India Company came to be renewed in 1813, the restrictive regulations were defeated in the House of Commons by a majority of more than two to one. In the very next year the foundations of the Indian Episcopate were laid; and in the following year Dr. Middleton, the first Metropolitan of India (having Ceylon for one archdeaconry, and Australia for another) was visiting the Serampore missionaries, in company with the Governor-General, and expressing his admiration and astonishment at their work. Distinctions crowded fast upon the Northamptonshire cobbler. Learned societies thought themselves honoured by admitting him to membership. He had proved himself a useful citizen as well as a devoted missionary. He had established a botanic garden, and edited â€Å"The Flora Indica;† he had founded an agricultural society, and was elected its president; he suggested a plantation committee for India and was its most active member; he collected a splendid museum of natural history which he bequeathed to his college; he was an early associate of the Asiatic Society, and contributed largely to its researches; he had translated the â€Å"Ramayana,† the most ancient poem in the Sanscrit language, into three volumes; he was a constant writer in the Friend of India; he founded a college of his own, and obtained for it a royal charter from the King of Denmark; and in these and other ways he helped forward the moral and political reforms which have done so much for Hindustan. He was one of the first to memorialize the Government against the horrid infanticides at Sangor, and he lived to see them put down. He was early in the field to denounce the murderous abominations of the Suttee [sat i], and to oppose to them the authority even of the Hindu Vedas, and he had the satisfaction of seeing them abolished by Lord William Bentinck. He protested all along against the pilgrim tax, and the support afforded by the Bengal Government to the worship of juggernaut, and he did not die until he saw the subject taken up by others who carried it to a triumphant issue. What would have been his devout gratitude, had he lived to see the last links of connection between the Government and the idol temples severed in 1840, and Hindu and Mohammedan laws, which inflicted forfeiture of all civil rights on those who became Christians, abrogated by the Lex Loci Act of 1850! What would have been the joy of Carey, of Martyn, or of Corrie, could they have heard the testimony borne to the character and success of missions in India by Sir Richard Temple, the late Governor of Madras, at a public meeting held last year in Birmingham! He said, â€Å"I have governed a hundred and five millions of the inhabitants of India, and I have been concerned with eighty-five millions more in my official capacity. †¦I have thus had acquaintance wi th, or been authentically informed regarding, nearly all the missionaries of all the societies labouring in India within the last forty years. And what is my testimony concerning these men? They are most efficient as pastors of their native flocks, and as evangelists in preaching in cities and villages from one end of India to the other. In the work of converting the heathen to the knowledge and practice of the Christian religion, they show great learning in all that relates to the native religion and to the caste system. †¦They are, too, the active and energetic friends of the natives in all times of danger and emergency.† So far as to the character of the missionaries. Speaking of their success, he said, â€Å"It has sometimes been stated in the public prints, which speak with authority, that their progress has been arrested. Now, is this really the case? Remember that missionary work in India began in the year 1813, or sixty-seven years ago. There are in the present year not less than 350,000 native Christians, besides 150,000 scholars, who, though not all Christians, are receiving Christian instruction; that is, 500,000 people, or half a million, brought under the influence of Christianity. And the annual rate of increase in the number of native Christians has progressed with advancing years. At first it was reckoned by hundreds yearly, then by thousands, and further on by tens of thousands. †¦But it will be asked, what is the character of these Christian converts in India? what practically is their conduct as Christians? Now, I am not about to claim for them any extreme degree of Christian perfection. But speaking of them as a class, I venture to affirm that the Christian religion has exercised a dominant influence over their lives and has made a decided mark on their conduct. They adhere to their faith under social difficulties. Large sacrifices have to be made by them. †¦The number of apostates may almost be counted on the fingers. †¦There is no such thing as decay in religion, nor any retrogression towards heathenism. On the contrary, they exhibit a laudable desire for the self-support and government of their Church. †¦I believe that if hereafter, during any revolution, any attempts were to be made by secular violence to drive the native Christians back from their religion, many of them would attest their faith by martyrdom.† Carey was not the man to wish or to expect that Government should step out of its sphere in order to enforce Christianity upon the natives. â€Å"Do you not think, Dr. Carey,† asked a Governor-General, â€Å"that it would be wrong to force the Hindus to be Christians?† â€Å"My Lord,† was the reply, â€Å"the thing is impossible; we may, indeed, force men to be hypocrites, but no power on earth can force men to become Christians.† Carey, however, was too clear-headed not to see , and too honest not to say, that it was one thing to profess neutrality, and another to sanction idolatry; that it was one thing to abstain from using earthly power to propagate truth, and quite another to thwart rational and scriptural methods of diffusing it. And he was too much of a statesman, as well as too much of a missionary, not to see that in respect to some tenets of the Hindu system it would be impossible for the Government eventually to remain neutral, inasmuch as they subverted the very foundations upon which all government is based. Such was the man who in the sequel won deserved honour even from hostile critics, and earned high encomiums from even prejudiced judges. Well might Lord Wellesley, who was, perhaps, the greatest of Indian statesmen, say concerning him, after listening to the first Sanscrit speech ever delivered in India by an European, and hearing that in it Carey had recognized his noble efforts for the good of India, â€Å"I esteem such a testimony from such a man a greater honour than the applause of courts and parliaments.† Still, amidst all his labours and all his honours, he kept the missionary enterprise distinctly in view, and during the forty years of his residence in India he gave it the foremost p lace. Several opportunities and no small inducements for returning to his native land were presented to him, but he declined them all. â€Å"I account this my own country,† he said, â€Å"and have not the least inclination to leave it;† and he never did. To the last his translations of the Scriptures and his printing press were his chief care and his chief delight. He counted it so sacred a work that he believed that a portion of the Lord’s-day could not be better employed than in correcting his proof-sheets. In his seventy-third year, when weak from illness and old age, and drawing near to death, he writes, â€Å"I am now only able to sit and to lie upon my couch, and now and then to read a proof-sheet of the Scriptures; but I am too weak to walk more than across the house, nor can I stand even a few minutes without support.† His last work was to revise his Bengali Bible, and on completing it he says, â€Å"There is scarcely anything for which I desired to live a little longer so much as for that.† He went back to Serampore to die; and â€Å"he died in the presence of all his brethren.† It must have been a touching sight to see Dr. Wilson, the Metropolitan of India, standing by the death-bed of the dying Baptist, and asking for his blessing. It bore witness to the large-heartedness both of the prelate and of the missionary, and was a scene that did honour alike to the living and to the dying. Carey in his will directed that his funeral should be as plain as possible; that he should be laid in the same grave with his second wife, the accomplished Charlotte Rumohr, who had been a real helper to him in his work; and that on the simple stone which marked his grave there should be placed this inscription, and no more.

Secret River Conflict Impacts Greatest on the Most Vulnerable

When confronted with conflict it is the vulnerable who suffer the greatest as the powerful are indifferent to them. Vulnerability, encountering conflict and how people respond to conflict are unavoidable experiences worldwide. But ultimately vulnerability depends on the situation that a person is in. When it comes down to powerful verses the defenceless, it is the weak who are influenced the most by conflict as the powerful do not understand to what extent their actions effect others. Although the powerful trump others on their way to the top perhaps it is the assailable people who allow themselves to be manipulated. It is more prominent today that the vulnerable are greatly impacted at the hands of the powerful because of their differences, but what defines vulnerability in any given person relies on the position or state they are in. What can define a person as vulnerable are finical struggles, emotional struggles, physical struggles and racial struggles while also being defenceless, exposed and weak in nature. Considering this definition, vulnerability alters and differs for different people, whether they are blind, poor, depressed, discriminated against everyone is ‘vulnerable' in some form. It is almost always that a person becomes powerless due to their confrontation with conflict. Some of the most influential and powerful people can become weak and belittled at the hands of others or their own actions. It is the story of the rags to riches that we so often hear about but it can also be the case of riches to rags. Everyone has been deprived of their privileges or has been weak at some point in their life due to encountering a conflict. It is unavoidable; it is what defines us a person along with our resilience to keep fighting after being weak or defenceless. Most people do not have the courage to question the issue and their response to conflict is altered due to the lack of questioning. These weak people have the opportunity to be strong and stand up for what is morally right when an issue arises but instead succumbs to mob mentality and peer pressure forcing them to do things that are not of the norm, ultimately making them vulnerable. When in a new situation and new environment, people can become a weaker version of themselves. In the past it has been colonisation in Australia was what encouraged vulnerability. Some Australians thought that they had to â€Å"stick together† and by doing so attempting to control the Indigenous Australians and force them to assimilate into a dominant white culture. With this thought process of sticking together it forced some people to make decisions they wouldn’t normally make and became vulnerable and succumbed to what the majority was saying as they didn’t want to be viewed as siding with the Indigenous Australians. The situation a person is in impacts on their ability to stay strong and not become weak, once vulnerable conflict impacts greater. The problem with the powerful today is that they don't understand how their actions affect others. Majority of the powerful people worldwide started at the bottom of the food chain. Some worked hard for fortune and power; others had it handed to them. The problem with power is that it is easily abused and used for all the wrong reasons; to stay on top can sometimes become the top priority for the privileged. Staying at the top of the pyramid of society can significantly influence and impact the vulnerable as social status can be shifted immensely. On the way to the top the advantaged push others down so they can reach what they believe to be success and supremacy. The fragile are almost always targeted as it is easy to overcome and trump them giving the powerful an effortless route to total control of power. Due to the differences between the privileged ad underprivileged the powerful don’t understand what their actions can truly do. They don’t comprehend how little these people already have, because they may have never experienced a life unlike their own. During colonisation the British governor allowed British settlers to hurt and even kill the Aboriginals all because they were different. â€Å"On occasion of any native coming armed, or in a hostile manner without arms to any farm belonging to British subjects, such natives are first to be desired in a civil manner to depart from the said farm. † The indifferences between the two conflicting cultures made the powerful discriminate against what they believed to be a subhuman and inferior race and not really understand what is meant to the Aboriginals. The Aboriginals had the land first it was apart of their culture, their way of life and when it was taken away they had no other way to respond other then trying to claim back what was rightfully theirs. The government truly did not realise how they were affecting the Indigenous communities at the time. They take away what little the vulnerable have without even realising the consequences that has for the less advantaged. With a society obsessive over money and wealth there is no questioning when it comes to money versus human beings and raw emotions; money conquers all. The real question is why don’t people care about one another? The only way to fix and help the vulnerable from being constantly dragged down is to help the hedonistic society we live in. Power, wealth and what people believe to be success have become the top priority of those who are too selfish and too inconsiderate. These money infatuated people need to start taking into consideration others and stop pushing them down for their own desires. They need to realise that everyone is equal, everyone deserves the same and that they have to live with these people for the rest of their life. Sure, they can avoid the weak they have hurt but a life of harmony would be much greater then one of avoidance. The powerful that are ravenous and greedy need to stop and consider what how their actions are effecting the weak so that the targeted victims have a chance to grow and to prosper. Although the vulnerable are constantly victimised by those craving power perhaps they allow themselves to be manipulated. Sure, we all feel sorry for the less privileged but how can we when they allow themselves to be stepped all over? Yes, some of the disadvantaged are genuinely stuck in a lower social class with no hope of thriving but there are so many that take any opportunity they can in the hopes of moving up in the world. These choices are thoughtless choices. When an authoritative and influential figure approaches the weak and asks them for help there is no doubting that they would say yes. They powerful have the vulnerable in the palm of their hands and the underprivileged let them. Why, why would you let someone walk all over you when you know that they are just using you for something greater? I personally believe it is so that the vulnerable can be viewed as incapable and desperate drawing the powerful to them in the hopes of leeching something off them. What they don’t understand is that the rich and the privileged have a lot more resources for victory and it is a pointless attempt to try and receive anything from them. They want to stay at the bottom so that others feel sorry for them, so that they don’t have to work, so they can get by on the scrapings that we give them. They idolise the advantaged and in doing so they are blinded by their own obsession allowing them to be susceptible to manipulating and scheming. It is also the case of mob mentality when someone gives into peer pressure making them extremely pathetic and will do anything they are told because they don’t have the courage to question what is right, subjecting them to manipulation. In terms of past events in history, again British colonisation forced many people to succumb to peer pressure, with the added pressure and the desire for power it forced many settlers to do things they wouldn’t normally do. â€Å"It was not the voice of any one man but the voice of the group, faceless and powerful. † The underprivileged remain underprivileged due to the fact that they permit the privileged manoeuvre them in hopes of leeching something off them or in hopes that they may to become powerful. Ultimately the vulnerable endure greater suffering as they allow themselves to be manipulated and crushed in the hopes of something new, something better. What it means to be vulnerable can differ from situation to situation and only when confronted with a issue can they really know whether they are ‘vulnerable’ or not. To make this world a better place, a place of equality the powerful need to stop treating the disadvantaged purely based on indifferences. Nobody likes racism so there is no reason to discriminate against the poor or fragile just for being who they are.