Wow, I am amazed by this essay that contains --such intellect. I am ashamed to say that as a grade 11 student I can't write an essay half as good as this one that I have writte. I'm more a novelist than an essay writer. But I decided to read thsi essay due to the fact that it was based on "Justice" and the fiction I am writing in fictionpress.com is based on Justice and Revenge .. . so yes, a great essay once again! I love the use of your flowing vocabularies!

J. Welkin

I'd like to commend this fine,young literary mind. His writing reminds me of a young Conrad or Bellow perhaps. If people do not understand this piece, or simply just deride it, they obviously do not comprehend the complexity of the story nor the context in which it is written. Truly, an extraordinary bunch of ignorami! All those who would like to contest on this boy's brilliance is welcome to, although by the very nature of your arguement you have already marked yourself as a neophyte to the world of literature. Cheers.

At first you are slipping very quickly into the brand of philosophy that free will is an illusion and everything about is programed in one way or another. Then you take a delightful turn to examine justice itself and its effects rather than its source (about which I am slightly skeptical however winning an argument you have made). This part of your essay I agree with, but you need to develop your reasons about the utopian thing more fully so that you're not just laying down: "this is this way" without saying why.

The entire peice is well written and well thought out, but you might want to put more of your thinking process into that one paragraph so we can see how you got to that conclusion. That makes it easier to agree.

Right , Gillian. By mentioning flames in my previous review, I actually meant, um, rather cynical suggestions. And concerning Robert's review, don't take that seriously. He's a personal friend :-)!

Alright. I reviewed your story earlier as a piece of literature. Having found out you're a kid in 8th grade I wanted to let you know, having known your age I would have given a less harsh review. I did not flame you, and I cited what I said with examples to try and help you. Having said that, I wanted to let you know I understand a lot of works are spur of the moment bursts of creativity. I do not have a problem with such. However, I reviewed more as a response to reviews calling your work extraordinary. It is good work for an 8th grader, but calling it an outstanding work of literature is infinitely embellished. If you wish for people to review your work taking under consideration that you are only in 8th grade, you might as well call it "An 8th Grader's Non-religious Reflections on a Greater Sense." If not, please refrain from calling the time I take to accurately review your essay merely a flame.

This piece is truly extraodinary. Anyone who thinks either wise should read it again in order to fully understand the thought behind this piece of work. It is not perfect, but It is well written. Reading the other reviews helped me reached a verdict you could say. I can't seem to find any flaws with the piece. If someone else can find a flaw, please share them.

Hey guys, it's the author. Before I get any more flames, I just want to point out that I wrote this in a moment of passion, so to speak. It was after an argument with some of my classmates. By the way, I'm in eighth grade. Anyway, thanks for taking the time to read (and possibly review)!

Hello, Ms. Justice. I just felt compelled to react to your essay, or lack thereof, on Justice. I was truly confused throughout the whole piece. I felt as though it was a complete mess, and didn't provide any insight as to the significance, or insignificance of the meaning to the word justice. I think you covered up your lack of knowledge with large, and insignificant words. Using a thesaurus to look up words with similar meanings, does not always work well, especially when the author doesn't know what the word means. Also, your style of writing is terrible, because the reader can't tell whether you are a sixth grader, building her vocabulary and writing skills, or a college graduate majoring in English. You go from one extreme to the other in your use of vocabulary, as you use larger words in the beginning and end of your paper, but then smaller words in the middle. There are many more points I can make about how this paper is completely irrelevent and grammatically flawed, but I'm not sure if its worth my time to do. But keep Gillian's comments in mind, as well, as mine. The criticisms of your writing will help you mature and grow into a true writer.

This is a tremendously well written piece, and it's clear that you've thought through the argument beforehand in some detail. I'm not particularly convinced by the uniqueness of humanity, however; I think that there probably are other animals that have a notion of something very close to justice. I'm not enough of a zoologist to be any more specific, but something about the notion just nags at me.

I would like to begin by encouraging you to keep writing. I am not one for negative harsh reviews. However, having read the first review, I felt I must respond to the complete and utter incompetent madness I felt your essay “NonReligious Reflections on a Greater Sense” to be. It is not an outstanding literary work. It was ambitious to take on a word such as justice and when I read your essay, I was disappointed. Your 'point of view' is simply that justice is another word for conscience animals otherwise do not have. By equating these two words, you undermine the importance of each concept. Your essay includes phrases like ‘individually endowed’ and ‘glorified falsehood’ in an attempt to dress up a simple statement and give an air of scientific impartiality. Credible arguments hold up without the use of a thesaurus. The attempt to sound intellectual is thwarted by the sentence “I mean, hey? who cares, right?” Your essay does not say anything. You write “Alas, no one has this perfect conscience, but one can only endeavor to remotely achieve justice” without explaining ‘perfect conscience’ and ‘justice’ I’m afraid I cannot mourn my lack of such or endeavor to achieve it. I am not sure what your essay is trying to tell me. As I read, I got a vague sense that you believed conscience and justice are interchangeable, that man’s mind is fallible, that without justice we would commit mass suicide. However, sentences like “One disagreement between the flawless, passive people of the perfect future could effect global chaos” I still can’t even make sense of. I believe you may have meant, “affect” but even then, the sentence does not make sense. As I reached your conclusion and you expressed how crucial your concept of justice is you said, “Justice, that insufficient word” I truly felt how insufficient your essay dealt with the topic. You ask rhetorically, “It is more like a sense…a sense of…what?” but without explaining the word you felt complied to write an essay about, I’m afraid I just can’t answer you.

I am speechless. The content and dialouge should speak for itself. This is an outstanding literaly work.