"At any moment of decision, the best thing you can do is the right thing, the next best thing is the wrong thing, and the worst thing There’s nothing you can do.” -Theodore Roosevelt. For everything you do in your life, you will have to make a decision. Sometimes it is difficult to do what is right, and people often find themselves caught in the web of morality. As Theodore Roosevelt said, it is best to do the right thing, but what happens when what is good and what is bad becomes blurred? This is when people get confused and the wrong thing becomes right in their minds. This is an idea that appears quite often in The Outsiders and Tom Sawyer throughout the main characters' progression through adolescence. Although a key concept in Tom Sawyer is how individuals often do the wrong thing for the right reason, this idea is best illustrated in The Outsiders when Ponyboy and Johnny are on the run from the law, Darry hits Ponyboy as punishment, and Cherry spies the Socs. for the Greasers. An example of people doing the wrong thing for the right reasons in The Outsiders is when Cherry Valance spies on the Socs for the Greasers. After Johnny kills Bob, Cherry feels it was all her fault after spending the night talking with Ponyboy, so she offers to spy on the Socs for the greasers as compensation. Cherry does this for the right reasons and out of the goodness of her heart, but spying is never the moral thing to do. "She said she felt it was all her fault, which is true, and that she would follow what was happening with the Socs in the rumble and she would testify that the Socs were drunk and looking to fight and that you fought back in self-defense" - Dally (p. 76) Cherry felt so bad for what she had done that she had betrayed the people...... middle of paper .... .. what Tom and Huck did was wrong because Muff Potter had to suffer for their decisions, Ponyboy and Johnny's situation was different because they acted in self defense and Ponyboy ran away for his friend. Ultimately, all of the outsiders' decisions were made with good intentions in mind. Ponyboy ran away from the police to protect his best friend Johnny, Darry hit Ponyboy because he was trying to teach him a lesson, and Cherry felt bad for what she did so she helped the greasers by spying the Socs. The situations in Tom Sawyer were self-made choices that were bad, but they were also made for bad reasons. As Roosevelt said: The best thing you can do is the right thing, but when you don't do the right thing, the best thing you can do is the wrong thing. And sometimes a bad thing isn't so bad if you do it for the right reasons...