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| If the Power was never
meant to be used,
why did the Creator,
in his infinite
wisdom, give us the
ability to use it?
Surely you don't
mean to say that the
Creator made a
mistake?
Sacrilege... We put
ourselves over no
one. We call
ourselves servants,
and we mean it. We
exist only to serve.
This credo may not
have originated with
us but it describes
us well.
Saidar (and Saidin for that matter) is not a "power." It is a tool, nothing more. A tool can be neither good nor evil: You cannot blame a hammer when you hit your hand with it. Turned to an evil purpose, a tool will work just as effectively as when it is turned to a good purpose. Consider swords. Swords are not inherently evil (even the Myrdraal blades must be instilled with evil before they can work the way they do), and yet they can accomplish both good and evil tasks. It is not the sword that is evil, but the human using it. Used rightly, Saidar is good; used wrongly, it is evil, just like the sword. You speak the truth when you say that what a Gray needs most is intellect, and not Saidar. Unfortunately, however, you overlook a simple fact of human nature: Any science sufficiently advanced will awe anyone who does not understand how that science works, provided it is advanced enough. Learning how to use Saidar is a discipline, a science, that most people cannot comprehend, though sometimes they may, given training. Because people do not understand this science it is held in awe, and Aes Sedai are respected for it. This respect we use as a tool to further our true goal: the unity of all there is; in other words, the answer to the philosophical question. Aes Sedai in the Age of Legends did bore a hole in the Dark One's prison. Certainly, knowledge can be misused, just like any other tool. Knowledge is a tool that leads to wisdom if used well, and destruction if used poorly, just as an Illuminator's firework. They had the knowledge, and they used it wrongly. They misused Saidar and Saidin (tools) to carry out this wrongful use. The reason their knowledge-tool was misused as well was because they did not percieve the entire tool when they used it: Their knowledge was incomplete, and, being idealists (the most dangerous people of all), they went ahead and used it anyway. We do bear their guilt on our shoulders. Each time a man is brought in to be gentled, we bear it, with all the grace, and all the humility possible. Gentling a man is a punishment to those who perform the ritual as well as the victim of that ritual. The human race pays for its error, through pain. Our pain, and that of others. We have dedicated ourselves to the atonement of our sins, becoming the servants of all. A great man once said, "Take the log from your own eye before you go seeing specks in others' eyes," or something remarkably similar to that. We prefer to fix the log embedded in humanity's eye, blinding it to truth, before we go on to the specks elsewhere, the Trollocs. This advice also might apply to you, young man. I shall not stoop to personal insults. Serafelle,
Servant to All |