Billy Budd

How are the names of the ships Rights-of-Man and Indomitable symbolically significant to the novel?

How are the names symbolic or what do they symbolize

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The Rights of Man (also the title of a famous work by Thomas Paine) and the natural and humane world which it represents is contrasted with the unnatural and inflexibly ordered world of the Indomitable. The King's ship, the Indomitable represents strength through force. The Rights of Man represents individual humane rights of free men. The Indomitable "requests" men from the other ship to be drafted into the King's service. The King's ship, as its name suggests, wins out. Billy Bud goes over to the Indomitable.

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