Puritans vs. Rationalists

Many things are different between the Rationalists and the Puritans. One of these things being that God chooses people to be saved and that God determines how things in the world happen. The Puritans think that God decides everything. The rationalists however seem to think that God left the world after he created and lets people decide how things happen.

Nowadays you might see that our political parties have Rationalist views as well as those of Puritan beliefs. A sort of Puritanism can be found through those who think a government or a deciding power must do everything for the people and make their decisions for them. A present time rationalist thought could simply be that the government should stay out of peoples’ affairs and that the people themselves should “experiment” with choices and see how the country turns out.

Benjamin Franklin is known to be a rationalist since he set out alone on his journey. His ideals and the virtues he follows show this rationalist point of view. He even set up virtues he would improve on as to better improve his life. He started with the virtue of temperance. He made it so that he and not God determined the way he lived. Even his definition of temperance, “Eat not to dullness. Drink not to elevation.” shows that he made his life what it is by guidelines and a plan.



To lead my life like Franklin would definitely be a difficult task. I couldn’t think of how he could have had that amount of discipline and not have crossed any obstacles along the way. Virtues, being hard to come up with, seem to be the same for everyone as to lead a good life without much conflict. I would have to say I would choose the same virtues as Franklin did, but I do know that I would have much more difficulty following them than he did.

Franklin, being a rationalist as Thomas Jefferson also was, probably had a good say in certain things when the Declaration of Independence was written. What I believe to be the most known line in the Declaration “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” shows plenty of rationalist thought.

First of all, the simple fact that all men were created equal definitely was not believed by Puritans. According to Puritan belief, only some men are chosen to go to Heaven. Rationalists believed quite the opposite. Also, when “…that they [men] are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights…” is seen in the Declaration, it goes to show that Puritan thought is absent in this document.

Puritans believed that God only gave certain people rights and that others either had little or no rights compared to them. Rationalists saw obviously by the text that all men have the same rights and freedoms as each other. Even the whole Declaration can be seen as purely Rationalist thought. It is said throughout the document that the people of the United States are CHOOSING freedom instead of it being given to them by some higher power. Puritans believed only some people are CHOSEN to have freedom and that some are chosen to be thrown into hell.

All in all, the United Stated is greatly supported by Rationalist thought even to this day. The people of America believe to this day in choosing freedom and in the freedom and the choice of going to Heaven even. Yes, there most likely are still Puritan beliefs in today’s world, but Rationalist belief can greatly out show it.

The Puritans

Many Puritans immigrated to the New World as to secure their religious freedom. Even so, their beliefs seem to weigh down upon them and put them into a state of fear. Their beliefs include the concept of original sin, in which every man is born sinful, only some will be saved and those that are to be saved are “chosen” by God, limited atonement which means that Jesus only died for the chosen and that God’s grace cannot be earned nor denied.

One last belief is that of saints and those who are deemed as saints have the will to interpret the word of God and to live straightforwardly. One of these famous saint/preacher citizens was Jonathan Edwards. He was known to scare people in his sermons, the most famous being “Sinners in the Hands of An Angry God”. This sermon greatly reflects the beliefs of Puritans such as when Edwards says “There is nothing that keeps wicked men at any one moment out of hell, but the mere pleasure of God” which goes to say that God isn’t merciful and that he is mad at mankind. Only His “chosen” group of people will not lose God’s mercy.

I can see that by listening to these sermons that Puritans sort of lived in fear. This would be because they never knew when the last day would come for them or when God would come to save the Chosen and cast all others into hell. Even though I think most Puritan beliefs are stupid, only the perseverance of the saints seems like a reasonable belief to be had.

One thing that caught my attention was that Jonathan Edwards’ favorite line from the bible was “Their foot shall slide in due time” –Deuteronomy 32: 35. He seemed to emphasize that God was holding people up as if on strings like a puppet so that they didn’t slide down into hell. This fear could keep people living a virtuous life easily yet scare them to what seems like the point of paranoia.

“The devil stands ready to fall upon them, and seize them as his own, at what moment God shall permit him” is also a quote from Edwards. It seems he really believes that mankind is generally evil, and so much that he would say this as to make people believe that the devil is just waiting beneath them like a shark after its prey, mouth wide open to receive them.

It is reasonable to have religious freedom as the Puritans believed, but to be scared into good morals and virtue seems a little overboard. If I had a preacher say to me that “The old serpent is gaping for them; hell opens its mouth wide to receive them; and if God should permit it, they would be hastily swallowed up and lost”, which can show that only some are chosen to be saved, then I would have second thoughts about living their. Also, if I had to hear “They [people] are already under a sentence of condemnation to hell” and I knew that I was born into sin I would freak out and go crazy about it. I wouldn’t even be able to think straight if I had to be paranoid about pissing off God or not, just so I might have a chance to be a chosen one.

Writing One

The Hidden Truth Behind Zaxby’s

When you walk into Zaxby’s, the first thing you notice is that the cashiers warmly welcome you to the restaurant. You then order your food from the colorful menu that shows what looks like the most delicious meals to be had from a fast food restaurant. You sit down after paying and they call your ticket number. You walk up in anticipation of your freshly cooked meal.

As you sit down and take a bite to find your anticipation did not fall short of true. However, did you ever think to realize maybe what you are eating isn’t actually fresh? Did you ever stop to think of how the food is prepared before it is cooked? Did you ever think that your food was actually more than a day old?

When you eat your food while in a hurry on lunch break, you probably don’t stop to think about the aforementioned questions. If you were ever to step in the shoes of an employee, especially a cook, you would see that the food isn’t quite as fresh as the advertisements say so. The chicken tenders you eat are sliced cuts of chicken taken out of a bag inside a box, which possibly has been sitting in the fridge for many days. It is then put inside of a bucket that contains a marinade powder and water mix. This mix is what makes the chicken that the customers eat taste so good. While being made though, it is like smelling something decaying and rotten.

After preparing the chicken in the buckets a top is put on each one, which there are usually four of, and put into the refrigerator to the left of the oldest buckets as to continue to rotate the food supply properly. Depending on how slow the week may go, that buckets of chicken could sit there longer than two days.

When it is needed, a bucket of the marinated chicken is pulled form the fridge and put into a cool metal holding pan besides the mushrooms, onion peels, and flouring bin. The flouring bin in itself is enough to make you stop eating at Zaxby’s when the truth is told. The flour at the beginning of the day is the only time you have fresh flour. All the other times it is about half fresh.

You might think “don’t the cooks throw away old flour and get new flour put into the bin?” but this holds only to be partially true. Once the flour is too sticky and used from little pieces of chicken and the marinade/chicken liquids, it is poured into a sifter and sifted back into the flour bin. A new scoop of flour is then put on top of the old sifted flour.

Even after cooking, there is a warming section in the middle of the kitchen so that cooked food doesn’t go cold. Unlike a business where the food is thrown out after sitting for too long, Zaxby’s keeps the food in the warmer for an indefinite amount of time or until it is sold. The only exception to this is the Brioche buns because they become hard and unusable after some time, forcing the cooks to throw them out.

Despite flavor, quality, presentation, and popular demand of the food at Zaxby’s, people should realize how truly disgusting the stuff is. If people are going to eat this food, maybe they should know the truth. Maybe they should think if eating the food is worth risking getting sick from old food. Maybe people should even try and get fast food restaurants to clean up a lot and to prepare and cook the food in such a way as to not risk the health of their customers any worse than fried or fast food already does.