Frankenstein Quote Analysis

Victor imagines the consequences of creating a female creature. He worries that the two beings might reproduce and endanger all of humanity.

The rhetorical question forces the reader to condemn Victor's project before he himself answers it, shaping our judgment in advance. Yet the phrasing 'for my own benefit' quietly admits his real motive—he would create her to save himself from the creature's threats, not out of compassion. This momentary honesty undercuts his pose as a selfless guardian of humanity.

Use this to argue that Victor frames his decisions in moral language ('everlasting generations') to disguise self-interested motives—he admits the female would benefit him, revealing that his ethical stance is performance, not principle.