“Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.” ~ Leonardo da Vinci (Adopted by Steve Jobs)
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A Wolf left his lair during the day.
As he walked along hunting, he saw his shadow, which was very large. So, he thought to himself, “My, my, I am a great wolf, and look how large I am; I am as large as a lion and could, if I like, challenge him as king.”
Just then, as the Wolf was admiring himself, a Lion saw him and gave him a swat with his Lion’s claw and made a fine meal of him at his leisure.
Moral of the Story: Our desire for greatness deludes us in our capabilities.
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Introduction – The Essential Aesop – Epilogue
Related Articles: The Distinguished Napoleon – The Business of Aesop™ No. 2 – The Frog and the Ox; Self-Validation and Envy – No. 2. The Frog and the Ox – The Essential Aesop™ – Back to Basics Abridgment Series; Know Thyself First, Then Context – No. 56. The Ass and the Lapdog – The Essential Aesop™ – Back to Basics Abridgment Series; Hiring on Hope – The Business of Aesop™ No. 90 – The Cat-Maiden; Our Core Nature Persists – No. 90. The Cat Maiden – The Essential Aesop™ – Back to Basics Abridgment Series; I Wish I Were You; Maybe Not, I’ll Just Be Me – No. 91. The Horse and the Ass – The Essential Aesop™ – Back to Basics Abridgment Series; Know Your Limits – No. 104. The Eagle and the Jackdaw – The Essential Aesop™ – Back to Basics Abridgment Series; The Great Masquerade – Stand for America®
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Why We Loved It: Once again, Aesop teaches about delusion of self. We saw forms of it early in the series with the Frog [1] who blew himself up (literally) and the Jackdaw [2] who got his wings clipped. [3, 4] But, here, Aesop brings a profound variation on the theme.
Aesop is careful in choosing characters as an exceptional teacher. We recognize that Aesop could have used any of his characters to demonstrate the consequences of self-delusion, including his go-to generally foolish Ass, requiring one character to make the point, but Aesop rather used two characters, the Wolf and the Wolf’s Shadow.
Sometimes, Aesop casts against type, sometimes he casts in type. Here, Aesop uses his Wolf. The Wolf is Aesop’s archetypical vicious, mean, angry, self-interested, and always hungry character. Aesop’s predator Wolf who desires, wants, and needs to be fed, all the time. Sometimes food is just food. Sometimes the food is a metaphor within a metaphor, and the food represents greed, lust or any desire that craves to be satisfied, whether or not a physical bodily need. And, here, the Wolf represents any quintessential insatiable base desire.
But, even beyond the choice of the vicious Wolf as his character, Aesop introduces something even more interesting to this story, being his pseudo-character: the Shadow.
The Shadow is something created or caused by the existence of the Wolf, but it is not the Wolf. The Shadow is the quintessential fabrication.
Moreover, the Shadow is even beyond the fiction of a mirror, being something dead that only imperfectly reflects something else living, all the while reversing and distorting it. The Shadow is only an external inanimate dark outline, not even as competent as a dead reflection. Thusly, the Shadow is a metaphor within a metaphor, representing external things we create that we think are ourselves, but are not ourselves; to wit: our reputation, other peoples’ opinions of us, the car we drive, social media Likes, and similar externals. [5]
The Wolf sees his Shadow, which is only a corrupted distorted two-dimensional outline of himself, and he mistakes it for a representation of Truth. And, while preoccupied with his deluded gaze and vain admiration of himself, Aesop’s Majestic Lion swats the Wolf with a dose of Reality. Foolish Wolf—foolish vicious, mean, angry, self-interested, and always hungry insatiable Wolf, now made the meal as a final settlement of Truth.
All of Aesop’s fables teach us. But, this fable of the Wolf and his Shadow might even cause us—indeed should even cause us—some trepidation. We are not a shadow or a mirror. We are not external dead things, and we are not Likes (or no Likes), we are not things money buys (or what money does not buy), which neither reflect nor define us. [*5]
Self-delusion is the first antithesis to the foundation of all of Wisdom; to wit: “Know Thyself.“
“You are not someone else’s opinion of you.“ ~Taylor Swift
“This above all: To thine own self be true.“ ~William Shakespeare, Hamlet
“Fantasies abound, but reality always has a way to let you know it’s around.“ ~grz
“Know thyself.“ ~Socrates
[5] Epictetus. On the Tranquil Flow of Life. – Abridgment Series [#GRZ_17]
“Delusio propria est prima antithetis sapientiae.” (“Self-delusion is the first antithesis of Wisdom.”); “Abundant phantasiae, sed res semper habet viam ut scias ibi”. (“Fantasies abound, but reality always has a way to let you know it’s around.”) ~grz
© 2013 Arnold Zegarelli and Gregg Zegarelli, Esq. Gregg can be contacted through LinkedIn. Arnold Zegarelli can be contacted through Facebook.
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