The little Match Girl. 1845
My childhood was full of happy memories. Of course I did cry just like any other child. Yet I can remember times I was happy was more than times I cried. And for some tears, and laughs the responsible person was Hans Christian Andersen (1805-1875). Yes, this famous Danish Auther who lived a century ago even before I was born was the reason for my tears as a child. And who first really taught me, that the world is not what it seems like in a child's dream, and there are exceptions. There are things which are irriversible, and there are pains, which are never gonna go away. I still have a pain in my heart for "The little Match Girl" who died by the window.
Hans Christian Andersen has about 156 stories to his name, written in his nine volumes of fairy tales. I am sure, more than half of the children in the world are going to hear his stories, as these were translated to thousands and thousands of books, written in more than hundred languages, and cartoons and films. There is no house without a little book of "Ugly duckling", "Thumbelina" or "The princess and the Pea". His stories were so popular that they reached us kids in far corners of the world, in cartoons in early 90's even before youtube and internet became a sensation.
Story of little match girl, was about a small poor girl who was trying to sell maches on a Freezing new years eve. She was going everywhere, to sell some matches, pleading everyone to buy with her feable voice. Bearheaded and on barefoot, she sees the well warmed rooms of affluent children, and their cristmas eve through windows. Except for the first few mintues of the cartoon, I was literally crying till it ended. Even a preschool child would understand it is not going to end well for the little match girl. "Death" for a child is not even a concept, as they would even happily play under a coffin. But the process which lead to the Death of the little match girl was hard to bear. That was something preventable. I was angry with everyone who did not listen to her cries when she was alive.
After her failing attempts of selling matches, she ends up under a window, burning match after match, and with the little warmth it provides, she desperately tries to connect with her dead mother. And finally with the last match ends up in ash, she joins her, leaving the cruel world behind. As of writing this, I cannot do it with tears. Why did he do that? Did he enjoy making children cry? But from a corner of my heart, I am writing this with gratitude as Hans Christian Andersen did open up the door of empathy in my heart as a child. I would never be able to close that door until I forget the little match girl.
The Emperor's new cloths. 1837 by Hans Christian Andersen
My little ones have found, "The Emperor's new cloths". They asked me to read the story, and this brought back all the memories, as I knew it was written by my famous childhood auther. Now, the plot of the story is so hilarious that they were giggling throughout. I am sure you have heard the story before. Because it has a significant bearing on what I am going to talk about next on philosophy, I will just remind the story in case if you have forgot about it.
The Emperor, who loved wearing new cloths was fooled by two men. They had promised to weave the best gramourous costume, and told the emperor that, this cloth will only be seen by true intelligent people. Not the fools. And after just bogous acting that they were making a new cloth, they just fooled the Emperor to wear "Nothing". Nobody wanted to agree that emperor wears nothing, as nobody wanted to agree that they were not intelligent. Apperently the weavers had hacked the natural weakness of humans, which is called their Ego. King had even taken a parade, naked, in front of men and women of whole kingdom, yet nobody spoke. Guess what, it was only a child atlast who shouted the King is naked. And the weavers by that time was nowhere to find.
As a child I never understood the full potential of the story. Only half of it. What is the true moral of the story?
We can just say, that we should not be fooled by such stupidity. We should speak truth about what we see. It is not clear what is the moral of the story at a glance. But, I am sure one person who would tell the answer and that is non other than great Dr. Seuss with Thing 1 and Thing2, who is the Other great storyteller, compared to Hans Christian Andersen.
Philosophy of Emperor's New Cloths.
If you asked the question, why only the child who was able to see the naked King. Someone would say not. Everyone saw the naked king but only the child spoke about it. This is parital truth. Imagine yourself in the situation as an adult and as the child. If you see your king on a big parade naked, and everyone else is agreeing that he is wearing a glamorous costume, I am sure you also would keep silent. You see more than a "naked Man". For you he is the "King". He has the power to destroy your life, not only for you but all your family members and even ancestors. More than your ego, it is the fear that would make you not speak. So we can assume you saw more than what your child did.
Compare this to the child. He only saw, a "naked Man". Barely a king. Even if he recognised the man as a king, he would not know this "King" is gonna kill your family because of what you say. So, this is why children behave as children. They do not see additional information that an adult see.
But the problem here is both the child and the adult see the same thing. So, we can assume, what we see is altered by the information we have recieved previously. In this case, everyone was being "rational" but the child's vision was more closer to the truth than the adult, as it is not clouded by thoughts. I have discussed about this phenomena in the famous quote by Harper Lee. "People generally see what they look for and hear what they listen for"
There is a little more depth I would like to take you from here and take you to Socrates. Let's get our principle correct. We argued that Adult's vision is more distorted as he has more information to consider. However, child is more closer to the truth atleast in the above case of Emperors cloths. But, if a child is more closer to the truth, can you guess who is even more closer to the truth? That would be a toddler. What a toddler see is even more closer to the truth than a child, because he even not see a "Naked man". He would see a "Human (man or women)" or even a "moving thing". If we go back step further, a neonate would see a "thing".
What about a child who was born one day ago? That child would see Nothing. As there is no prior information stored to compare He would see nothing.
If our logic is true in this case which is "When we go back on the timeline of consiousness, we are more closer to truth". A day old baby is more closer to the truth. Yet, we understand that a day old child would see nothing in this world. What does this tell you about philosophy of truth? Only conclusion I can come is a child would see nothing on the day one on earth is because "Actually there is nothing". That is the true nature of the world. Every "thing" that we think is there is some creation of our own mind. And guess what who understood this truth. Great Socrates.
Most difficult journey of someones life is, breaking their own illusion to see, what the child saw on the day one of their life. That is the true meaning of being mindful.
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