rstood through the wisdom of mankind. In his obsession, he placed the lives of other human beings in danger, disregarding health and reason in his operation. His ignorance is essentially different from that of Victor, for Walton contained no knowledge of how to accomplish his task, and did not even exercise the determination to accomplish this task. This contrast between the two men is elucidated in Walton’s September Fifth Letter to his sister Margaret, where he agrees with his men to turn South and relinquish his quest while Victor is outraged and maintains the desire to continue his search. Walton has come to take heed of the obvious limits to his endeavors, while Victor has not. By the end of the novel, Walton had come to respect the authority of nature before it could to his unnecessary demise.Experimenting with the limitations of authority constitutes a major role in the novel Frankenstein. Both Victor and Walton resolve to accomplish a degree of godliness, with the former mastering the mystery of creation and the latter pursuing the secrets of the physical world. Both men violate the principles this world has been founded upon, where there are boundaries for which no man can cross, and knowledge which no man was intended retain. Both men, however, took separate routes in displaying their aspirations: Walton understood there were limits to human endeavor and stopped himself just short of ruin, while Victor pushed himself through the breaking point. In either case, both men found that authority needed to be respected, and transgression upon that authority only brought sorrow and misfortune, and death. ...
