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[Halister Marner]

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Essays of Virtue - Part Two of Eight - By Halister Marner

There once was a knight, a good man, who stood tall and served his lord and people with all his heart. The man fought many battles and killed many foes, the citizens adored him, and his lord was pleased. Even with all these glories, the knight still did not feel satisfied; he would sit alone in his quarters, looking over trophies of victorious excursions and of riches plundered from the darkest of opponents.

One day the knight awoke, the feeling of emptiness strong within him. Without a word to his lord or people, he vanished, seeking a cure for his malady.

The knight wandered many years, his pain growing every day. The knight’s actions became more desperate, he stopped fighting, and the will to exist soon left him. The knight was resigned to a dark fate, one of pain and misery; one he believed would never change.

On a moonlit eve, the knight stood upon a tilled field near Britain, his sword pressed to his chest in a ritualistic fashion. On his face, he wore a ghastly pallor of pain and remorse, his features twisting as he prepared for one final thrust.

Just as the knight was prepared to end his life, a loud cry from the farmhouses to the east pierced the night air. The knight stopped, lowering his blade and rising to his feet. The sounds of orcs and screaming civilians echoed through his ears. Without hesitation, he rushed to their rescue, slaughtering scores of plundering orcs. When all of his opponents had fallen, the knight looked towards the farmhouses… bodies of civilians, women and men, littered the ground in front of him. No one was left alive.

A sudden feeling of remorse fell over the knight, his mind wandering towards his lord and people whom he abandoned. Just as the knights thoughts wandered, a sudden sound of a child’s cry returned his focus. The knight approached the cries, entering a small plundered house. Sitting in a small makeshift bed, was a young child of no more then a season. The knight approached the child, seeing its slain parents strewn about on the floor below. The child’s eyes locked on the knight as he approached, its voice dimmed, and a smile formed on its face.

As the knight looked into the child’s eyes, a tear streamed down his face, and like a wave he felt his own soul, his own spirituality manifest. His actions of courage, his feelings of love, and his realization of truth birthed a new feeling inside of him, one that did not come from killing monsters, nor of fame or riches or duty, but by the humbleness of self realization.

He had discovered spirituality.

Spirituality is never discovered through a single virtue, it is never discovered through the material. It is only within ones self and through a unity of principle that one can embrace such an immense realization.
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"There are those who dream to escape reality, and there are those who dream to change it."