Amazing Book.  I am so glad that I read this book. 

The first sentence of the book: “Life is difficult.”   Well, that gets my attention right away since there are so many great things about life and so many difficult things.  Still on the first page:  “Life is a series of problems.  Do you want to moan about them or solve them? Do you want to teach your children to solve them?” 

Since my answer to both questions is to solve them, I continued reading the book.  If I were to quickly recap this book, I would say the book is about learning to love yourself through self-discovery and developing discipline (wanting to grow). 
​
At the back of my book, I listed out nine books that support the ideas in this book.  I enjoy finding interdisciplinary bridges to the books I am reading.
 

As I was reading from Hume's Essays Moral, Political, Literary, I ran across this opening sentence in Essay XII Of Civil Liberty:  "Those who employ their pens on political subjects, free from party-rage, and party-prejudices, cultivate a science, which, of all others, contributes most to public utility, and even to the private satisfaction of those who addict themselves to the study of it." 

Something for me to ponder.  In Politics, Aristotle claimed that political science was the highest science.
Hume’s Essay VIII of Parties in General states that “faction subvert the government, render laws impotent, and beget the fiercest animosities among men of the same nation, who ought to give mutual assistance and protection to each other”.

How is it that we can cultivate the science of government without being drawn into the factions?  How are we divided so quickly into different groups?

Hume points out that we can divide into groups based on our interests, our beliefs and our affections.  Affections, that is an interesting word.  I understand how we “naturally [wish] that right may take place, according to [our] own notions of it.”

According to the 1828 Webster’s Dictionary Online, Affections is defined as passion, a mend of mind, desire, along with several others. 

I think that Hume might be saying that we have attachments based on the groups we belong to.  That registers with me, I know that during election times candidates work to let us know what groups support them, hoping that we will vote based on our loyalty to different organizations. 

As I have been pondering these ideas, I see how easy it is for us to be pulled away from the goal and purposes of government toward the emotion of politics. 

John Adams said, “Government is instituted for the common good, protection, safety, prosperity and happiness of people…” (The Report of a Constitution or Form of Government for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, 28-31 October 1779).  I believe that.  The more challenging part is to define those words into actionable principles that can be agreed upon.  Because this is so challenging we divide into different groups based on what we believe those words to mean and how to apply those words.     
 
As I got older, I realized how little I understood the science of government.  In school I was taught some basic ideas of how our government ran but there is so much more that I didn’t understand or was not taught.  Some of the ideas I was not taught were:

1. Why do we form government. 
2. What is the purpose of government.
3. How do we know what good government is or is not.
4. How do we find the principles of government.
5. How do we decide if a proposal is based on the principles of good governance.

I have tried to correct this lack of knowledge over the years.  I have read different books and listened to different people and yet even with this find that I have so much still to learn about government.  There are several things that I have learned over the years that have influenced my thinking.  A couple of these are:

1. Government starts in the home.  The family is the foundation of government.
2. A good foundation is critical.
3. Government should be founded on the principles of Natural law.

 
As I have been trying to apply these ideas I have paid a bit more attention to issues in the community.  Why?  Because I have learned it is my responsibility to learn for myself if ideas are true or false.  I can’t depend on what others tell me is the right way to think.  That is hard to do.  There are so many voices.  How do I wade through all of the ideas, and voices?  I want to decide based on my beliefs and principles and be “free from party-rage and party-prejudice”.    I want to be on the side that “contributes most to public utility” or to do the things that bring us together towards a better environment for everyone.  Yet what is that path?  Where do I find it?  That brings me back to natural law and what natural law is.  As I have studied what some of the great thinkers* said about natural law I have concluded that there are two basic ideas in the world.  1. Those that believe in natural law, and 2. Those that do not believe in natural law.  These divisions can’t be unified, for they see the world so differently that they can’t agree.   I have chosen to believe in natural law. 

Using the help of many ideas I am defining natural law as a system of justice common to all people at all times which is recognized through correct reasoning that is tied to obedience to God. 

I believe that there is a right and wrong way to behave and that my job is to determine the right and align myself with it, regardless of my own beliefs.  In other words, I could want to live differently than natural law lays out but if I want to live a principled life, I must align myself with the laws that are set out otherwise I suffer the consequences of breaking those laws.  I struggle with this every day.  I would rather enjoy my sweets and goodies instead of healthy and good for me food.  I would really love to eat whatever I wanted when I wanted but the principes of health tell me that there are consequences and that I need to align myself with those principles if I want to find happiness.  The same applies to every area of life to include government.  There are principles that must be discovered through correct reasoning that are based on Natural Law. 

Luckily for me I live in a time of abundance.  Abundance of energy and knowledge.  I have access to the great minds of many people who have been studying these ideas and trying to share them+ out.  Learning about government principles takes time and energy.  Taking the time to read through people’s ideas and dissecting them down to the principles is work. I turn to my core book to verify the ideas and in order to help me focus on what is truly important.  This allows me to spend less time involved in factions based on interests, beliefs, and affections and more time on what is best for everyone in society.   

I love the words, “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 (The Declaration of Independence). 

These words changed my life.  I was luckily exposed to these words in school.  They have sunk deep into my heart and have returned to me again and again.  The US Government set up a system founded on the idea that all men were equal before God and the law.  Our job as citizens is to help promote and follow that idea.  We of course have faults; we see them every day and through all of history.  We also see the progress we have made by trying to follow these ideas. 

I would like to leave a better place for my children.  That requires me to make some changes in my life.  The more I can align myself with true principles, the happier I will be. I chose to spend my free moments† trying to understand natural law and the principles that flow from them so that I can understand better and pass that better understanding on.  To continue the progress that great men and women have tried to make.

What a wonderful time we live in that we have so much abundance.  We have time when most people except a very few have had to do more than any other generation.  We have abundant energy.  We are so blessed.  Now with our time, how will we use it?  Will we use it in ways that will make the world a better place?  Will we work to discover the correct principles around us so that we can see better?  Or will be caught up in cunning craftiness of men who try to deceive us (see Ephesians 4: 14)?  Will we be caught in the factions that surround and divide us?  
 
 


*Cicero, William Blackstone, Thomas Ried, Lysander Spooner, CS Lewis, Mortimer Adler, and Audrey Rindlisbacher

+see Thomas Jefferson Education, Blackbelt in Freedom and Depth
​
†I could fill Volumes with Descriptions of Temples and Palaces, Paintings, Sculptures, Tapestry, Porcelaine, &c. &c. &c.—if I could have time. But I could not do this without neglecting my duty.—The Science of Government it is my Duty to study, more than all other Sciences: the Art of Legislation and Administration and Negotiation, ought to take Place, indeed to exclude in a manner all other Arts.—I must study Politicks and War that my sons may have liberty to study Mathematicks and Philosophy. My sons ought to study Mathematicks and Philosophy, Geography, natural History, Naval Architecture, navigation, Commerce and Agriculture, in order to give their Children a right to study Painting, Poetry, Musick, Architecture, Statuary, Tapestry and Porcelaine.  (John Adams to Abigail Adams, 12 May 1780, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Adams/04-03-02-0258

So why read Politics?  I have been wondering what have I gained by reading this book. There are ideas in the book that I agree with.  I held them before I read the book.  There are ideas that I disagree with.  What benefit does this book add to my understanding? 
I notice these ideas as I thumb through my book and look at my margin notes:
 
“the best form of government, i.e. that under which the state will be most happy (and happiness, as been already said, cannot exist without virtue), it clearly follows that in the state which is best governed and possesses men who are just absolutely, and not merely relatively to the principles of the constitution….” (Book 7, Chapter 9)
 
“But if the citizens of a state are to judge and to distribute offices according to merit, then they must know each other’s characters; where they do not possess this knowledge, both the election to offices and the decision of lawsuits will go wrong.” (Book 7, Chapter 7)

“And in democracies of the more extreme type there has arisen a false idea of freedom which is contradictory to the true interests of the state.  For two principles are characteristic of democracy, the government of the majority and freedom.  Men think that what is just is equal; and that equality is the supremacy of the popular will; and that freedom doing what a man likes.  In such democracies every one lives as he pleases, or in the words of Euripides, ‘according to his fancy.’ But this is all wrong; men should not think it is slavery to live according to the rule of the constitution; for it is their salvation.”  (Book 5, Chapter 9)

“For men are easily spoilt; not every one can bear prosperity.” (Book 5, Chapter 8)

“In the first place it is evident that if we know the causes which destroy constitutions, we also know the causes which preserve them; for opposites produce opposites, and destruction is the opposite of preservation.  In all well-attempered government there is nothing which should be more jealously maintained than the spirit of obedience to law, more especially in small matters; for transgression creeps in unperceived and at last ruins the state, just as the constant recurrence of small expenses in time eats up a fortune.”  Book 5, Chapter 8)
“The citizens begin by giving up some part of the constitution, and so with greater ease the government changes something else which is a little more important, until they have undermined the whole fabric of the state.” (Book 7, Chapter 7)
​
“Revolutions are effected in two ways, by force and by fraud” (Book 5, Chapter 4)
 
“..general willingness of all classes in the state to maintain the constitution.” (Book 4, Chapter 9)
 
“But we must remember that good laws, if they are not obeyed, do not constitute good government.  Hence there are two parts of good government; one is the actual obedience of the citizens to the laws, and the other part is the goodness of the laws which they obey;…” (Book 4, Chapter 8)
 
“…the law is supreme…” (Book 4, Chapter 4)
 
I marked many other things, but these are the ideas that stood out to me as I flipped through the pages.  Aristotle is trying to determine what type of political association is best suited for securing happiness (virtue) for its citizens.  He takes the time to analyze all the types of governments he knows looking at what happened to them, pointing out the good and the bad. 

His arguments are also incomplete.  There are more forms of government than he outlined.  Many of his foundational ideas about people I find flawed so why continue reading a book that has ideas in it that I don’t agree with?   

Taking each government type and looking at opposites, gives a clearer picture of the importance of following the argument to the end.  Ideas can sound good, but when they are carried out do they end good? In this particular case, governments established seemed to have some good intentions that the people united with.  What were the results of must of them?  Collapse.  Each had flaws and problems in them that could not be overcome with the foundation they had. 
​
As I reflect on the ideas that stood out to me (listed above) I had to ask why these points stood out to me more than the other points I marked and made notes about.  These quotes apply to the current situation I am in.  Aristotle has some reminders to us today about governments.  His works are hard to get through, and his history is old and sometimes even lost on us but his points still ring true even among his false assumptions.
These last weeks I have been watching a group or two of people that have decided to be their own lynch mob.  They don’t want to go to and through the law, they want to destroy the law and all that it stands for…the state.  It is painful to watch, it hurts may heart.  My reason begs for something different.  I feel like I am Sparks in The Ox-Bow Incident.  Awkward, not knowing what to do but knowing what is happening is wrong. 

Nihilism does not contend that there is nothing, but it states that everything is meaningless.  And George A. Sargent was right when he promulgated the concept of “learned meaninglessness.”  He himself remembered a therapist who said, “George, you must realize that the world is a joke.  There is no justice, everything is random.  Only when you realize this will you understand how silly it is to take yourself seriously.  There is no grand purpose in the universe.  It just is.  There’s no particular meaning in what decision you make today bout how to act.”  (p. 152).
 
Dr. Frankl’s approach, known as Logotherapy, focuses on discovering meaning.  “Man’s search for meaning is the primary motivation in his life and not a “secondary rationalization” of instinctual drives.” (p. 99). 
 
Rereading this book has been very rewarding.  It is amazing how timing plays into things, along with different experiences.  I have not read this book in a very long time.  It becomes more impactful in today’s situation, where there seems to be less and less focus on finding meaning in our lives and more and more focus on ‘live for the moment’.   As I re-read this, his ideas about the Existential Vacuum stood out more than ever.  Depression, aggression, and addiction are everywhere.   Dr. Frankl has a solution to this, which is for us to find meaning in our lives, through work, love, or showing courage during difficult times.  As he tells his experiences in the concentration camp, you can see him validating his teaching of logotherapy with real experience.    
Not only can we choose our thoughts, but we can also analyze our thoughts and determine if we are telling ourselves the truth, decide if we are in the drama triangle, and then change those thoughts that are wrong.  That alone will make things better for us.  It will not remove the challenges we face, but it will help us choose our response to the challenges we are facing.  We can look for ways to build our inner strength and courage. 
It is wonderful that this book is available for us to read and learn from as we search for meaning in our lives.  

I have really enjoyed and used The Fourth Turning: An American Prophesy by William Strauss and Howe.  I have many notes in the book and even loose papers that I have added over time.  I was looking forward to reading the update in The Fourth Turing is Here.  I am sadly disappointed.  Much of the book is rehashing the old material with more of the author's opinion compared to the first book.  I can’t say more than his opinion because he does not source everything in a way to verify his words. For example, on p. 239, he states, “Overall, America’s blue zone is wealthier, healthier, more educated, more professional, more mobile, more economically unequal, and more ethnically diverse.  America’s red zone is more churchingoing, more neighborly, more charitable, more family oriented, more rooted, more violent, less bureaucratic, and less taxed”.
He sourced:  America’s blue zones are wealthier and healthier, more economically unequal, [Red zones are] more neighborly, more charitable, more entertaining, more affordable.   I am curious about his sources for the other claims.
The book also goes on and on trying to prove his cycles theory, but it focuses on the events that prove his point, and history is way more complicated.  His repetitious rabbit trails are exhausting, so it is easy to skim without thinking.   For this reason, I prefer The Fourth Turning: An American Prophesy.  It has fewer history lessons, so I can go out on my own and learn the history instead of depending on the author’s point of view. 
There are several parts of this book that are updated or newer.  1. There is a section on what the rising generation, named the Homelanders, may look like.  This section was interesting.  Reading this section, I think, will help you decide if you need to adjust what you are doing as a family and may change how you mentor youth who were born 2006 and after.  2.  The crisis predictions have adjusted based on the current situations we are in. These seem very plausible, which has led me to read a couple of other books:  Red-Handed:  How American Elites Get Rich Helping China Win by Peter Schweizer and When China Attacks: A Warning to America by Grant Newsham.   Unfortunately, I was not surprised by the information in Red-Handed.  I am still working on When China Attacks.  So I guess it was worth the cost of the book if it motivated me to learn more about the world events. 

At the end of Book 3, I had this note: Everyone is miserable. Look at the Elites - they are miserable too because they know someone else will conspire to take all that they gained away from them. Every level suffers.

Over and over again I see only miserable people when it comes to socialistic governments. On the sides of many pages I have written the name of many dystopias. It is like the are all trying to show us that any form of government besides a enlightened, extended, commercial, limited, representative, federal, democratic republic (The U.S. Constitution and the 196 Indispensable Principles of Freedom by O. DeMille p. 100) will not work the way people hope it will. It took a lot of experience and trial and error to get to creating what the US Founders did.

In Book 9 (around lines 585) we are asked what are we filling our selves and our society with? Are we focusing on only of the parts of man (desire, action, reason)? and society?

I feel that as a society we are only focusing on the 'desire' of things or some would say equity for all but overall we have missed the boat because that is only one part of our being. To be balanced and whole we need all 3 parts combined. Trying to separate things out into castes and pretending to call it balanced is not right any more than only focusing on 1 or 2 of the traits that make us a human or a community. Until we unify the 3 traits as best as possible as an individual and a society we will be miserable in the end because we are incomplete. There will not be justice in the state if there are caste systems. Justice will occur when all the people are able to live their mission. When everyone is equal before the law and do not and can not infringe on the rights of others. Any other state is a shadow or an illusion. 

The author talks about the changes since the smartphone was released.   Think about the changes for a second of life before the smartphone and after.   I remember the day when I was working in the military and had a dial-up internet system that we used.   I remember advancement from floppy drives to hard drive discs to thumb drives.  I have lived through the time when you did all your work and then signed on to the internet, then sent your data, and then got off the internet.   Today, I am connected all the time; I don’t even have to do anything to connect to the internet.  All I do is click a button, and the system does the work.  Easy.   In fact, I will complain if the connection is not immediate.  There are so many things that I use the internet for.   However, I didn’t grow up with this.  I barely use social media now, and as a teenager, the "social media" was the gossip at school.  Not a large group, yet that was bad enough.  Now you can surround yourself with social media groups.  I don’t even know how many social media groups there are.
 
The research shows that most people spend around 16 hours per day that they are not fully present.  WOW.  Think about that, every time we look at our phone, we are not fully present in the moment. 
 
Mr. Haidt states there are several effects we are not thinking about and each of them is harmful to us.

1.  Social deprivation.  We are not playing or interacting with people face to face, including our children.
2. Sleep deprivation.  Heavy screen time is connected with shorter times in sleeping, and longer times in waking up.  Those who use the internet in bed have even more sleep problems.
3. Attention Fragmentation.  We just can’t focus.  We want a “constant stream of stimulation”.  It messes with our ability to think.
4. Addiction.  There are reinforced patterns that we are seeking for (like eating potato chips);  we keep looking for that dopamine hit.   Social media and gaming experts study this cycle, and it is working.  Think about the last time you kept scrolling on Facebook looking for something good, funny, or interesting instead of just turning it off and doing something good, funny, or interesting?  I am guilty of this one! 

For girls, the problem is usually social media, and for boys, it is gaming.  Girls show increased signs of depression as their hours on social media increase.  “There is a clear, consistent, and sizable link between heavy social media use and mental illness for girls, but that relationship gets buried or minimized in studies and literature reviews that look at all digital activities for all teens.”  One of the biggest side effects of more time on social media is the feeling of isolation that people have.  The book shares a lot of data and studies connected to these ideas.  For boys there is a “failure to launch” or they just don’t adult or join the adult world. Pornography and the virtual world consume boys.
Those working to raise teens during this time have a lot of challenges before them.  This is something that we need to keep talking about and sharing with others so we are more aware of the damage that is happening.  Being a parent has always been hard work; now it seems even harder because you are going to battle both sides, those that want your child to use their programs and your child (along with all their friends).  Tough crowd.
As I look at this, it really shows me how important it is to put the phones down and spend less time on social media and more time doing something productive with my life.  

"These people, who had experience on their own hides twenty-four years of Communist happiness, knew by 1941 what as yet on one else in the world knew: that nowhere on the planet, nowhere in history, was there a regime more vicious, more bloodthirsty, and at the same time more cunning and ingenious than the Bolshevik, the self-styled Soviet regime. That no other regime on earth could compare with it either in the number of those it had done to death, in hardiness, in the range of its ambitions, in its thoroughgoing and unmitigated totalitarianism-no, not even the regime of its pupil Hitler, which at that time blinded Western eyes to all else.....Even in 1943 tens of thousands of refugees from the Soviet provinces trailed along behind the retreating German army-anything was better than remaining under Communism" (p. 342)

I have read other books that support this idea: Mao, Wild Swans, and Red Scarf Girl.  I don't think this is a way to provide equality for all unless you mean that some of the elites will decide how much everyone else will suffer, so that we can all have the same amount of stuff (nothing) and not voice our complaints.   For communism and the gulags to continue, they just need other people's money. 

I really hope that it does not get to this point:
"All you freedom-loving "left-wing" thinkers in the West!  You left laborites! You progressive Americans, German, and French students! As far as you are concerned, none of this amounts to much.  As far as you are concerned, this whole book of mine is a waste of effort.  You may suddenly understand it all someday - but only when you yourselves hear "hands behind your backs there!" and step ashore on our Archipelago. (p. 468)"

Are we that stubborn that we will refuse to listen to the voices of those who have suffered from oppressive governments?  

Are we so willing to give away the freedoms we have so that government can decide what we can and can't do?

Are we afraid of liberty, freedom & choice just as George Bernard Shaw says: "Liberty means responsibility.  That is why most men dread it."

In the Essay A Dissertation on the Origin and Foundation of the Inequality of Mankind, Jean Rousseau was looking at all the wrongs of the feudal system.   He shares what he believes are the four inequalities between mankind. 

1.  Merit – individual differences
2. Power gained by those that use the individual differences
3. Rank gained because of the use of power
4. Wealth gained because of the use of rank and power.

 
We do have individual differences – that is so great!  Is not man amazing!  We see that we can progress and grow.  We have developed such a complex language to share our thoughts and communicate with each other.  We have developed so much good in the world, each in our own way.  I love my washing machine and refrigerator.  There are so many, many things that I am enjoying because many have individual differences and can progress!  With these same advancements, we see that bad things have occurred with them.  People have used their differences to gain power over others in good ways and in bad ways.  The good ways included having wonderful mentors, teachers, and leaders.  The bad ways are there also unfortunately, because we believe in choice.  We just have to look around us and see how people have used their individual differences incorrectly.  There is crime all around us, both at low levels and high levels of society.  So what do we do about it?  Rousseau suggests that if we take away property, we will not have as many problems.  If we return to the state of nature or what he calls the “savage” man.  Things will be better.  But will we? 

Rousseau states:  It is in fact impossible to conceive why, in a state of nature, one man should stand more in need of the assistance of anther, than a monkey or a wolf of the assistance of another of its kind:  or, granting that he did, what motives could induce that other to assist him; or, even then, by what means they could agree about the conditions.”
 
He continues, “... it is easy to conceive how much less the difference between man and man must be in a state of nature than in a state of society, and how greatly the natural inequality of mankind must be increased by the inequalities of social institutions.”
And
“Without my expatiating those uselessly on these details, everyone must see that as the bonds of servitude are formed merely by the mutual dependence of men on one another and the reciprocal needs that unit them, it is impossible to make any man a slave, unless he be first reduced in a situation in which he cannot do without the help of others: and, since such a situation does not exist in a state of nature, every one is there his own master, and the law of the strongest is of no effect.
“Having proved that the inequality of man is hardly felt, and that its influence is next to nothing in a state of nature, …”
 
As much as he points out the abuses of power that are true, I do not want to return to a state of nature.  I don’t want to return to the law of the jungle, where only the fittest survive, and where we don’t have a society or community of other people around us.   Maybe it is because I am not the strongest and the fittest out there.  But I think it is more.  As I reflect on the influence my family and friends have had on me, I see how much progress I have made as a person.  I see the amazingness of family and friends.  The power of a great education.  I think I have the capacity to have more sympathy towards others and more kindness to all mankind because I love my family.  If I didn’t have other people around me who cared for me and helped me to develop, I would be more animalistic.  I would have fewer skills for helping others, and I would have less empathy and compassion when I see those who suffer.  I don’t want to go back to the jungle; I want to march forward and keep progressing.  Revolution is not the answer, love is.  Rousseau will tell you we are worse off because of society, but I think we are better off.  We have so many, many amazing things in this world because of our metallurgy and agricultural advances.  True, we have used some of those advancements incorrectly and wrongly.  We have used power incorrectly and wrongly.  But we have also used it well and correctly.  We have raised the standard of living for so many people, and if we unite and work to lift others with us, imagine the world we can build. 

Paul Johnson in “A History of the American People” asks the readers this question, “[C]an a nation rise above the injustices of its origins, and, by its moral purpose and performance, atone for them?  All nations are born in war, conquest, and crime, usually concealed by the obscurity of a distant past.”

Yes!  I think we can.  Of course, it will be a lot of work – hard work.  But I think we can.  I think we can show the way that everyone can live a better way with freedom instead of with oppression.  The American Founders had so many things right when they set out to create a government where all men were equal before the law.  Yes, they had some things wrong and so do we.  Through a superb education, we can as families and communities, bring back all the great things of the Founding Fathers and work on fixing the wrongs.  It is up to us to gain the tools we need to fix our communities and nations so that we can all live better lives.  One of those inequalities is that man will use their wealth and power to legally plunder from others. Frederic Bastiat in his essay, The Law, shows us another alternative to Rousseau’s solution in how to deal with the inequalities in society.  Rousseau was correct in stating that institutions of religion and government support plundering people.  However, instead of revolution and the breakdown of societies back to a primitive state, I think we should consider Bastiat’s solutions of establishing or reestablishing a government where the laws are set up to guard against legalized plunder.   And to establish a family culture of education that the Founding Fathers had so that we can establish freedom and opportunity for more people to share their greatness with the world and help all mankind.  Imagine if we had an education like was described by Edmund Burke.

               "Burke told Parliament that nearly all Americans read the great classics on these topics, and then he said:                          This study renders men acute, inquisitive, dexterous, prompt in attack, ready in defense, full of resources. In
                other countries, the people, more simple, and of a less [brilliant] caste, judge of an ill principle in government
                only by an actual grievance; here they anticipate the evil, and judge of the pressure of the grievance by the
                badness of the principle. They [foresee] misgovernment at a distance; and snuff the approach of tyranny in
             every tainted breeze."  (Quoted in The US Constitution and the 196 Indispensable Principles of Freedom by Oliver DeMille, page 108)