Pandora. (820 hits)
Category: Quotes & StoriesRating: 1.79 on 23 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by Starshine (View user info) at 2005-09-02 11:23:28 EDT
Whatever my name was, it does not matter. History remembers me as Pandora, as Eve, as that foolish woman who let sin and greed and evil into the world. They point to me as an example of how curiosity killed the proverbial cat, and how a thirst for knowledge can lead to one's doom.
But I tell you now that I knew what was in that box. I knew about evil and lies, and I opened that box of my own free will. I was tempted willingly, knowing fully what effect my descending would have on mankind.
Why? Am I insane? I stand before you in complete control of my wits, as I was that day. I deliberately chose to free evil, because it needed to be done.
Evil always existed. Just because it was locked up, hidden away in the depths of the psyche of the universe, did not stop it from continuing. We cannot destroy pain by masking it! We could never destroy evil without confronting it face to face, eye to eye.
Before, there was nothing. We lived, we farmed.: Life was at a standstill, days blurred into each other. The weather was the only thing that we would ever discuss, though it was exactly the same from day to day.
But it was already trying to escape. Mankind was beginning to learn new words, words like loss, and despair, and sin. But we did not understand them. We heard these words, but all the images they conjured up were but hollow ghosts of the true thing.
This is the first thing I remember vividly.
Someone in my village died. People were panicked, if what they were capable of could be described as such. You must understand, this was the first person that had ever died. Ever. We did not know death, the same as we did not know evil.
By that time, I knew that the cause of all this must be the small box that was buried under the largest tree in our village. The man who died lived right next to the tree, in the center of the town. I had guessed what the box truly was, and what it contained. If it could be called guessing. It was more knowledge without proof, a fact without understanding or evidence. But truths have a langage all their own, they speak beyond time, beyond anguish, beyond innocence.
They must have buried the box in some ages past, but we had all forgotten. It had been so long, and there was nothing to remember. I do not know how long we lived in that sort of stasis; it could have been thousands or millions of years. But that time does not matter.
What matters is that box.
Yes, I went out late at night, while the world slept. I did not want anyone to know what I was doing, for though there was no disapproval, I knew that was about to change.
This was the first deception.
I dug up the earth around the tree, and I found the box, deep in the earth, as I expected. I don't know how I knew where it was. I must have been there when it was buried, and the memory had faded into subconscious over the millennia. It didn't occur to me to be afraid. There was no fear. Not yet.
I lifted the box out of the ground. It was a simple affair. A plain black wooden box, I could hold it easily in one hand. But the box felt strong. It was something that a box should not be. I could feel the effort that people put into the making of it, I could feel the ages and the toil and the triumph of these people, who had worked so hard to make this simple object. I could feel it.
This was the first revelation.
But it still did not occur to me to be afraid, so I opened the box. It was not locked, at least not anymore. I opened the box, and at first, I didn't notice anything. But then I noticed something odd. The tree, which had never been known to bear fruit of any kind, now bore a single golden berry. I reached up, and picked it off the branch from which it grew. I ate it.
And then the world exploded.
That night, my village went mad. They didn't yet know what their newfound emotions were, but when they saw me, by the tree, with the box, they knew. They were furious; they started placing blame on each other, suspicious of everyone and everything. A brawl became a battle, a battle became a massacre. And the world knew pain.
One man from my village tried to protect me from the mob. He took their blows, because in that instant that everyone began to feel hate, he began to feel love. He died protecting me, taking the villagers cruel taunts and crueler fists. And the world knew sacrifice.
When the villagers saw that one of their own had died for the sake of another, they felt something else: guilt. They resolved to go back to their old ways, but it was not so easy. Things changed, and the villagers became human, in every great and terrible sense of the word. They were capable of evil, and hate, and death. But, they were able to love and enjoy and remember the lives of the past and to dream of the future.
Why did I open the box? I knew that without problems to face, we would never be able to triumph over them. Perhaps my folly has created the world's problems, but in my mind, I created the first solution. The problem with our endless life, without sin and sorrow, was that we were not living it.
User Reviews
Submitted by ahusa13 (user info) at 2005-09-08 22:42:25 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
not bad,but because of u i am like this a sinner.tanks
Submitted by IntangibleHands (user info) at 2005-09-08 22:28:59 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Amazingly well written.
The first post I have read all the way through in a long time.
Submitted by c1ndy (user info) at 2005-09-02 19:28:33 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
cool
Submitted by knucklesnelson (user info) at 2005-09-02 19:14:30 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
+2 your posts are quite enjoyable!
Submitted by Shlongy (user info) at 2005-09-02 15:29:56 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
If you have a vagina, you get a +2 from Shlongy.
If this is some kind of a trick, -2's for life.
Submitted by MANICMOTHER (user info) at 2005-09-02 13:30:05 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
interesting
Submitted by Hirilnara (user info) at 2005-09-02 13:13:50 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
This was damn decent! Plus, Greek mythology rocks!
Submitted by Brdn_Nkd (user info) at 2005-09-02 12:55:56 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
!muey bueno!
Submitted by userpete86 (user info) at 2005-09-02 12:54:08 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Quite a story. Interesting mix too.
Submitted by spamtrap50 (user info) at 2005-09-02 12:52:46 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Brand new Angry Kansan!
Submitted by Mike00295 (user info) at 2005-09-02 12:13:23 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by LadyPlural (user info) at 2005-09-02 11:34:44 (#)
Ranking: 2
Very good.
Submitted by starshine (user info) at 2005-09-02 12:05:24 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Yeah...I do agree with you. I guess I was just saying that to really be able to appreciate the good we have to have bad along with it :/ Trying to justify all the badness.
Submitted by Berty (user info) at 2005-09-02 11:59:25 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
The problem with our endless life, without sin and sorrow, was that we were not living it.
------
The post is good and it's well written.
That said though, I hate the above sentiment. It is nothing more than a fabricated excuse so people don't look at their pain as a purely negative experience. It's an understandable reaction, but it's bullshit.
It's defeatist and it's wrong. I mean what does it actually mean? That pain and suffering is somehow laudable? That if I find some person somewhere that has never known pain I should give them a good kicking? What? Does it mean that I should be proud of the bad moments in my life? That I should seek bad shit out?
Learned helplesness. That's all it is. If we'd stuck with that philosophy our kids would all be dying of Polio.
I believe that we can overcome pain and misery. When I think on my life, when I think about me and I think about how I feel I can quite confidently say I'd be better off without the pain that I have suffered, we all would.
Submitted by ruthless (user info) at 2005-09-02 11:52:18 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Nice.
Submitted by Unabonger (user info) at 2005-09-02 11:52:06 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
mer?
Submitted by Barnymeinhoff (user info) at 2005-09-02 11:42:18 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
nice
Submitted by AwesomeJohnson (user info) at 2005-09-02 11:35:26 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
WHY DID YOU OPEN THE BOX??!?
(Hellraiser quote)
Submitted by LadyPlural (user info) at 2005-09-02 11:34:44 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Very good.
Submitted by starshine (user info) at 2005-09-02 11:32:46 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Uh oh I've been caught! Well, your mom was worth it :)
Submitted by proofofpurchase (user info) at 2005-09-02 11:31:56 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
good stuff
Submitted by nitty34 (user info) at 2005-09-02 11:30:43 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I did a project on Pandora's Box in the 6th grade.
I think this was it. Have you been going through my mom's filing cabinet?
Submitted by starshine (user info) at 2005-09-02 11:26:23 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Good one lol.
Submitted by glasscock (user info) at 2005-09-02 11:25:56 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
show us your box