A man named Niccolò Machiavelli once said: “Men generally judge more by appearances than by reality. All men have eyes, but few have the gift of penetration. By this he meant having eyes but not all of them mean having the gift of seeing things and situations for what they really are. Having sight does not mean being able to see with both eyes but being able to separate thoughts and make accurate judgments. What catches the eye is not always the true meaning of the topic in question. In Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man, the main character is constantly brought into situations that have a deeper meaning than meets the eye. In The Invisible Man the protagonist witnesses important things and facts about things and people but is unable to construct a deeper meaning. The main character lived in the 1930s and was born in the South, then continued much of his life living in Harlem, New York. The 1930s were difficult times for African Americans and as he leaned on his grandfather's final words on his deathbed, in which he said, "Son, after I'm gone I want you to keep fighting well. I never said, but our life is a war and I have been a traitor since I was born, a spy in the enemy country since I handed over my gun during Reconstruction. Live with your head in the lion's mouth. I want you defeat them with yeses, weaken them with smiles, accept them to death and destruction, let them swell you until they vomit or gape.”(16). The narrator led his life in the South and after leaving the South he went to Harlem with his grandfather dyeing words in his heart. He couldn't understand his grandfather due to lack of knowledge and experience in the real world. The main character is devoid of…half of paper…hired him to say only what he wants people to hear. When Brother Jack's eyes pop out, the facade he is trying to promote to people is revealed. . The whole time the narrator didn't know about his eye: “I looked from his face to the glass, thinking he had disemboweled himself just to confuse me... And the others knew it all along. They weren't even surprised. I stared into the eyes...” (474). The narrator always thought that the Brotherhood's intentions were good and instead it was just political advantage. The narrator now sees that he cannot believe or trust anything he sees because they are only an illusion, just like Brother Jack's eye. The glass eye symbolizes truth, thus revealing that the way objects present a deeper meaning than it actually implies. Similar to Clifton using the Sambo doll, he is playing a role defined by the Brotherhood