Holden Caulfield

Holden Caulfield seems to have all these different kinds of people stuck together in one body. He can be very generous, as he is to the nuns, very mean. He even lies to people. But one thing Holden has is a moral code that he goes by. In the Catcher in the Rye Holden shows at least three elements of his moral code.

One of his elements of his moral code is that it's all right to lie to make people feel better. One quote to prove that is, "Old Mrs. Morrow didn't say anything but boy you should have seen her. I had her glued to her seat. You take somebody's mother; all they want to hear about is what a hot-shot their son is." There you can see that Mrs. Morrow was really happy to hear that her son was doing well at Pencey, which made her feel better about her son. The point is that even though he lies, he sometimes lies to make others feel better, which is part of his moral code.

Holden not only lies to make others feel better, he also respects girls when many guys don't. Holden says regarding how men treat girls is, "It stinks if you analyze it. I think if you don't really like a girl, you shouldn't horse around with her at all, and if you do like her, then you're supposed to like her face, and if you like her face, you ought to be careful about doing crumby stuff to it, like squirting water all over it." Holden doesn't like it when guys play around with girls they don't like. The point is that, in his moral code, boys shouldn't treat girls badly. He has respect for them.

But most importantly, is his love of purity. Like when he was about to throw a snowball at a car and hydrant but didn't. "The snowball was very good for packing. I didn't throw it at anything, though. I started to throw it at a car that was parked across the street. But I changed my mind. The car looked so nice and white. Then I started to throw it at a hydrant, but that looked too nice and white, too. Finally I didn't throw it at anything." There you can see his love of purity take over him. He didn't throw the snowball at a car or a hydrant which to most peoples it would probably be very tempting to do. The point is that Holden's love of purity made him not throw that snowball.

Having a moral code is very important. Even though everybody's moral code can be very different like Holden's moral code. But they are here to guide Holden and us