The Two Fish Who Trusted Different Things
Panchatantra Stories · 1 min read
Two young fish grew up together in the same shrinking pond during a long drought. One fish trusted only what his own eyes could directly confirm, dismissing any warning he could not personally verify. The other trusted the accumulated wisdom passed down by his elders, even when he could not immediately see the danger they warned of.
When an old fish warned that the pond would soon dry up completely and urged everyone to seek the connecting stream while it still had enough water to swim through, the skeptical fish scoffed — the pond still looked plenty full to his own eyes, and he saw no reason to trust a warning about something not yet visible.
The trusting fish left immediately for the stream, arriving with plenty of water still flowing. The skeptical fish waited for visible proof of danger, and by the time the pond had shrunk enough for him to believe it, the connecting stream had already dried to mud, trapping him along with everyone else who had waited for certainty instead of trusting the wisdom of those who had seen droughts before.
Moral of the story
Waiting for a danger to become fully visible before trusting a warning can mean waiting too long to escape it.