Money can only buy happiness for a short period of time. It does not last forever and is always short lived. The main Character Mathilde's situation is that she is not wealthy nor a part of the social class that she thinks she belongs. Mathilde. She lives in a world where her real life is not the life that she believes she belongs or deserves. "She was one of those pretty and charming girls' wo are sometimes, if by mistake born into a family of clerks." (The Necklace pg1.) She believes that her beauty and charm make her worthy of belonging in a higher class of citizens. The party that she attends in the story makes her feel for the first time that she belongs. She is prettier than the other women. She feels that she is finally where she belongs. Money cannot buy happiness.

The deceptiveness of appearances is shown by Forestier's "diamond" necklace. The neckless appears to be made of diamonds but is actually just a fake diamond necklace. "Oh my poor Mathilde! Why, my necklace was paste. It was worth at most five hundred francs." (The Necklace pg. 8)  Both women are ultimately fooled by appearance, Madame Forestier did not tell Mathilde that the diamonds were fake. Mathilde also does not tell Madame Forestier that she has replaced the necklace that she lost. The fact that the necklace goes from worthless to extremely valuable means that true value is ultimately determined by how you see it and that appearances can easily deceive. 

Mathilde's perception of herself leads her to take self serving actions. The Loisels live within the middle class. However, Mathilde feels she is stuck in a world that is beneath her. She is unable to appreciate any part of her life including her husband whom loves her very much. She is blinded by the idea that her beauty is being wasted. When Mathilde loses the necklace and wastes the next ten years of her life she feels even more strongly of her wasted talent. She feels her beauty is once again being wasted. Mathilde continues to believe she has gotten less than she deserves, never thinking about the fact that she is responsible for her own downfall. Mathilde sees herself as a martyr but is actually very far from it, Monsieur Loisel himself is actually martyr.  He constantly sacrifices his desires and his well being for Mathilde's desires. He gives up his desire for a hunting gun so that Mathilde can buy a dress to wear to the ball. He also pays for the necklace his wife lost without complaint. Forced to sacrifice years of his life to pay back the debt brought on by Mathilde's selfish desires. Monsieur Loisel is the one who really is a martyr. 

Mathilde believes that material things have the power to change her. When she finally gets two of the things she desires most, her happiness is not lasting. At the beginning of the story the author lists off the things that Mathilde does not have, but believes she should have them. This shows how she envies other women. She disregards the things she does have, such as her loving husband. When she finally gets the dress and necklace, she feels as if they changed her into a Cinderella like transformation. She is finally the woman she has wanted to be all her life. However, when she loses the necklace the dream is ruined almost instantly, and her life becomes even worse than it was before. "She came to know what heavy housework meant and the odious cares of the kitchen.  She washed the dishes, using her rosy nails on the greasy pots and pans. She washed the dirty linen, the shirts, and the dish cloths, which she dried upon a line; she carried the slops down to the street every morning and carried up the water up, stopping her breath at every landing." (The necklace pg. 5) This quote show how her life had drastically changed from a middle class citizen, to a woman of the people. Her sarrows could have been avoided if she had just found it within herself to find happiness rather than trying to find in other worldly things. 

In comparison to Mathilde, Madame Forestier views objects with little. Her wealth has made her able to buy what she wants, as well seeing that object don't have any real power. At the end of the story when Madame Forestier is informed that the necklace is actually now extreamly valuable, she seems more concerned with the fact that Mathilde has wasted away a large part of her life.  When she shows less concern for the object and more concern for her friend, that is where you see that even through the wealth she places more value on non material things such as human life. The fact that Madame Forestier has fake jewels in the first place shows that she knows that objects are only as powerful as people perceive them to be. For her fake jewels can be just as beautiful as real diamonds if one sees them as such. There is just one big loophole in the story.  If someone were about to spend 40000 dollars on a necklace they would tell the person, they got it from that they were going to do that. If one were about to waste ten years of your life trying to pay back a debt that was owed, one probably would ask the other party involved to make sure that the necklace was indeed a real diamond necklace.  

This story genuinely tells a moral.  The moral of this story is to appreciate what you have and not to be greedy or envious for what you do not have.  Mathilde could have avoided all of the problems that she encountered in the story if she just didn't take a necklace.  She could have gone to the party and had the same amount of enjoyment even if she did not have diamonds around her neck.  If she was pretty she is pretty, there is no amount of glamour that can change that.

