I have spent quite a bit of time studying Ants on my walks in the woods, they seem to have quite a bit to teach us with regards to building complex societys. So I decided to write a story, if I had any e-prime knowlegde I would have used it, sorry:-P Anyways, hope you like it!
What the Ant Teaches.
The Ant are a wise kind, and their teachings many. One day in the land of the Semites a king decided to observe the Ant, for this king had been given the gift of wisdom and could see that it is all around. He walked among the trees until an anthill appeared, sat down on a friendly log and silently observed.
At first the anthill seemed to him a terrible mess, the hill itself disjointed and random in construction, the ants themselves running wild in all directions, even climbing on top of each other, for no apparent reason! He saw a vision of the pyramids of Egypt, enormous man-made mountains of stone in the middle of a desert, and it seemed to him folly. Indeed the kings ancestors had laid down their lives in misery building those false mountains, and this vision of the anthill filled him with rage.
But he had to admit that their energy was impressive, and when he started observing the Ant themselves more closely purpose became apparent. One Ant he saw dragging a pine-needle five times its own size up a long straw in order to reach the hill, another carrying a large dead Beetle to feed his kin, and he saw a group of Ant defending each other against a hungry Spider. The hill now seemed to him a great nation, a single fist united for common good against the dangers of Nature. This all seemed good, but he was still not impressed with the wisdom of the Ant. But then he saw an Ant hauling the heaviest burden of all on his back, the body of a dead brother.
His vision of fists and warriors disappeared, and he saw the Ant in a new light. He felt like a fool now for comparing the hill with the pyramids in the desert. The Ant were not a fist against Nature, they were part of it! Like the Beetle they to died, and like the Spider they to got hungry. They did not fight nor fear for their lives, they lived them. That’s why the hill wasn’t in a desert like the pyramids and that’s why the hill, although a great achievement of Spirit, looked like a twiggy mess. And he saw that the wild running about of the Ant was indeed united by one purpose.
Thus he understood that there was neither hate in the Ant warding off the Spider nor tragedy in the fate of the dead Beetle. But the most powerful teaching off all was in the Ant carrying his kin, for the purpose hidden by the strangeness of all now became apparent to him. The purpose was love. The anthill was built by love, not misery, and though a man of lesser wisdom might not find it impressive as outward appearances go, the king now knew that the anthill was a construction more impressive than all the works of Man. Humbled, he gave thanks to the Mystery of Life.
The king was so impressed with the teachings of the Ant that he wrote it down, but men of lesser wisdom than him could not see through the strangeness of the Ant, and upon reading the words of the king they failed to see the true meaning. And so they built nations united like a single fist by fear and greed, to fight the world, for their common good.