Reviving the Dead Lion
Panchatantra Stories · 1 min read
Four childhood friends, three of them brilliant scholars and one merely a man of common sense, set out together to make their fortune. Deep in a forest, the three scholars came across a scattered pile of old bones and recognized at once, from their studies, that they belonged to a lion.
"Let us show off what we've learned," said the first, and began chanting a spell to assemble the bones into a skeleton. The second added flesh and skin to it with another spell. The third prepared to breathe life back into the creature entirely.
The fourth friend, the practical one, grabbed his arm in alarm. "Think for a moment — if you bring a lion back to life, it will surely eat us all the instant it wakes! Please, let me at least climb a tree first." The three scholars, too proud of their skill to hold back, laughed at his caution and finished the spell anyway.
The lion sprang to life at once, fully restored — and ate all three scholars before it even noticed the sensible friend, who watched from safety high in a tree, having lived to tell the tale precisely because he alone had known when cleverness needed a companion called common sense.
Moral of the story
Knowledge without common sense can be more dangerous than no knowledge at all.