Morality in the Heart of Darkness"I hope that I will be forgiven for discovering that all moral philosophy hitherto has been boring and belonged to the soporific" (Nietzsche 561). Perhaps so, but the question of moral philosophy has been discussed for a long time and provides a significant element in Conrad's story Heart of Darkness. Overall, the timeless discussion dates back to the early philosophical writings of Plato and transcends from general religious motifs to the general applications and codes of behavior espoused by Kant and Mills. These individuals and lines of thought seek to establish a code of "good" behavior based on something: a benevolent god, extensible codes similar to the Golden Rule, or even a relativistic collective opinion. Later, during the nineteenth century and until the end of the century, popular thought changed direction and attacked such codes through works such as Blake's The Marriage of Heaven and Hell and various works by Nietzsche such as Beyond Good and Evil. bad. In more modern times a sort of balance between these two currents leads to what Richard Garner describes as amorality, or the total rejection of a moral system. Conrad, who wrote Heart of Darkness as his contemporaries denounced objective morals, incorporates much of these philosophies and uses the work as a demonstration system for a unique morality. The development of a moral system generally encounters many problems; mainly, and this concerns moral systems based on Judeo-Christian religious principles, that evil exists in the world. A morality based on a Judeo-Christian God comes into conflict between omnipotent love and existence itself, for how could an omnipotent, omniscient, omnibeneficial god allow evil to exist? his thoughts on a relativistic morality. Works Cited Conrad, Joseph. Heart of Darkness. New York: W. W. Norton and Company, 1988. Garner, Richard. The experience of philosophy. Ed. Daniel Kolak, Raymond Martin. Belmont California: Wadsworth Publishing Company, 1996.Guerard, Albert J. The Inner Journey. New York: W. W. Norton and Company, 1988. Kant, Immanuel. The experience of philosophy. Ed. Daniel Kolak, Raymond Martin. Belmont California: Wadsworth Publishing Company, 1996.Milton, John. Paradise lost. New York: W. W. Norton and Company, 1993. Nietzsche, Friedrich. Beyond good and evil. Trans. Marianne Cowan. Chicago: Gateway Editions, 1955. Plato. Plato's four Socratic dialogues. Trans. Benjamin Jowett. Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1934.