«Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the government’s purposes are beneficent … The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well meaning but without understanding.»
Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis
The following fairy tale is based on a shower thought with a lot of classic fairy tale influences. Akin to a meme, a child might think, «Oh, come on, no one is that dumb,» but adulthood has taught me, «Oh, yes, sweet summer child, they are.»
Once there was a spinster who had no children. For many years she had preferred her freedom and comfort to the care of children. But when she came into her middle years, well-off and living at ease, she felt something lacking. Something that would depend on her. Something she could tend.
One day she heard of a young wolf that had fallen into a ravine at the border of the village. She went to look for it, and when she saw it below, thin and muddied and unable to climb out, she felt such pity that she asked some villagers to free it.
At first they were reluctant.
«Show some pity,» she said. «It is only decent that we help him.»
They prided themselves on being hospitable folk, always willing to open their doors to those in need. Some also wished to please her, and so they helped.
The wolf was glad to be free, and when the spinster turned homeward, it followed her.
«Look how gentle he is,» said the spinster, «and how thankful for what we did.»
So she welcomed him into her house. She fed him, washed him, and let him sleep in her bed. She was happy to have someone at last to care for. Some villagers found it strange. But the spinster said:
«If we have no pity for those who are different from us, what are we?»
Then some admired her for it.
A few days later, the spinster found three wolves waiting in her garden, looking at her expectantly. The young wolf knew them at once, and so the spinster let them into her house as well. She opened her food stores to them and let them stay.
Some villagers found it strange. But she said:
«These are his brothers and sisters. And should we not care for family?»
Then some admired her for her generosity.
A few days later, the spinster found five full-grown wolves in her garden. She was surprised, and still more when they pushed past her into the house.
«My, what a large family you have,» she said. «And family is important. So you are right that I should not leave you outside.»
So she opened her food stores to them and let them stay.
Some villagers admired her open heart and welcomed the wolves in the lanes, though not over their own thresholds. Others grew uneasy at having so many wolves close by, and the children drew back when the wolves passed through the lanes. But the spinster said:
«Do not be scared. They are our guests. And as I have already given some of them leave to stay, I cannot deny it to the others.»
Now the wolves lived in the spinster’s house, and they lived well. But as it was in their nature to hunt, hunt they did.
First the villagers noticed that some of their livestock had gone missing. Then they found wolf tracks in the mud. But the spinster said:
«Do not think them responsible merely because they are wolves. These could be dog tracks. You know, dogs eat livestock too.»
The magistrate listened. And because he liked to eat at the spinster’s table, and because he wished to be thought gentle and understanding, he laid the blame on the villagers’ dogs.
After that, the wolves became a common sight in the village, while the children no longer ran in the lanes. At dusk they were called in early, and even by day they went two by two. More than one girl said that the wolves followed her whenever she stepped outside.
But the spinster was glad to see the wolves in the lanes, the children out of sight, and herself at the center of the change.
A few days later, more livestock went missing, and a hunter clearly identified the tracks. He told the villagers how wolves differed from dogs — by the longer stride, the deep claw marks, the throat torn out rather than the flank worried, and by the way wolves killed more than they ate.
Some listened and wanted the wolves removed. But the spinster said:
«Perhaps the hunter is wrong. He never liked wolves, for they take what he would bring home. But even if they were wolf tracks, they could not have been made by these wolves, for they are our guests. We are not so poor that a few sheep will undo us. Shall we cast guests into the cold for the sake of wool and mutton?»
Then some began to mistrust the hunter and called him a hard man.
«He too lives by blood,» they said, «and has spilled more than the bloodiest wolf in the wood.»
The magistrate had already blamed dogs, and he would not turn from it. He spoke much of soft hearts and reminded the villagers that many among them had already welcomed the wolves. It would be a grave thing, he said, to turn cold after being kind. Then he counseled against hasty judgment and promised to inquire into the matter of dogs — how they might be kept from troubling the livestock. He spoke of men to count dogs, inspect kennels, and question shepherds.
But it was noted that he had moved his own family to a stone house on the hill, with walls much higher than mere dogs required, and men with spears at the gate.
Still, some of the villagers embraced the wolves even more. They brought meat to the wolves as a sign of peace, and because dogs had been blamed, they took the meat from the dogs’ bowls. The magistrate praised this and ordered each house to do the same.
The wolves ate what was brought to them, but hunted all the same. So some villagers put guards around their fields and told their children to stay inside. After a while, the villagers grew used to finding an empty stall here, a torn fleece there, and calling it no great matter. Yet when a peddler, a beggar, or a lost man came by the road, the doors opened more slowly than before.
Then one of the girls who had said the wolves followed her went missing.
The villagers found bloodied clothes and wolf tracks that led to the spinster’s house. Outraged, they went to her door, but she did not answer, and the wolves were nowhere to be seen.
When they broke inside, the house looked less like a human dwelling than a wolf’s den. They found rooms torn apart, bones under the tables, filth on the floors, and in one chamber lay the spinster, with her throat ripped out.
When they told the magistrate, he refused to leave his high-walled house.
«Perhaps,» he said, «the spinster offended the wolves. Besides, a dog may yet be found at the root of it. We must not judge so grave a matter in haste.»
Then the villagers understood the magistrate for what he was. From that hour on, his authority reached no farther than his gate.
Instead, the villagers watched the spinster’s house.
When the wolves finally returned to their den to rest, the villagers saw them go inside. Once they were within, the villagers barred the doors and burned the house to the ground.