New clothes for the emperor?
I want to tell you about a legend I heard long ago. Now I may not remember it correctly. It is possible that I don’t have the details right, but I’ll tell it like this:
There was an Emperor. It was so long ago, it doesn’t matter where he was emperor. His ambassadors were very skillful in convincing many countries to align themselves with his empire. It was custom that he visit each country that aligned itself. It was also custom that he pass in parade in the capitol of such countries. Of course, he was expected to wear the proper parade clothes for such occasions. Now the Emperors of his line had worn the same regal clothes for more than thirty centuries. The trappings that once were superbly awesome were found by the house staff to be, well, rather moth-eaten.
Now, the emperor was invited to a very large country where the people spoke a very different language and they had many different customs. After that first occasion, the Emperor was scheduled to go to the many other countries that had aligned themselves with his empire.
The Court now had a problem. The Prime Minister ordered that they prepare new clothes for the Emperor. However, the Parliament members did not want the Emperor to abandon the old proper clothes of his imperial highness. Those clothes had lasted more than thirty centuries. They could last for many more. They argued also that it would take years to make new clothes by the proper processes. Perhaps they were afraid of the depletion of the treasury. Some even said that the Emperor should not go to the far country, that there was no need for new clothes.
When asked, the royal haberdashers seemed pre-occupied with some undisclosed problem. Anyway, they sent word that they were busy on “some issues”.
An old tailor from one of the small villages offered to make the new clothes. He offered an exquisite design, even a model with options. He offered it free of charge, promising to do the work himself.
However, the Court and the Parliament did not consider the old tailor’s offer as worthy. Or perhaps they suspected him of attempting to dupe them. Or perhaps they convinced themselves that the Emperor was still very elegant in the traditional garments, even though his purple underwear was showing in so many places.
In the end, the Emperor began his grand tour in his tattered clothes. All the henchmen around “Ohed” and “Awed” at his clothes in order to suggest to the local people that they should also be praising the Emperor. It did not matter to them that he would likely parade like that in nineteen hundred countries. Of course the local people were disappointed that they could see him in his royal underwear. Occasionally a small boy might even remark, “Daddy, I can see the Emperor’s underwear!”
